Sleepy Hollow Road projects underway
Sleepy Hollow Road has become a construction zone as five big public works projects are underway.
Work has started on the $6 million Sleepy Hollow Walkways Project, which entails constructing 4,500 linear feet of concrete sidewalks, 690 square yards of curb ramps, and 206 linear feet of retaining wall.
The new sidewalks will fill in the gaps between Bay Tree Lane and Castle Place. The project is scheduled to be completed in 2024. The work is being done by the Fort Myer Construction Corp.
Related story: Sleepy Hollow sidewalk project revised
Sidewalks will be built along the east side of Sleepy Hollow Road between Eppard Street and Aspen Lane and north of Valley Brook Drive and on the west side of Sleepy Hollow between Marlo Drive and Eppard Street.
Pedestrian cross points on Sleepy Hollow Road will be upgraded at Bay Tree Lane, Dearborn Drive, Kennedy Lane, Kerns Road, and Eppard Street.
When the project was first proposed in 2017, there was extensive opposition from some homeowners, mostly due to the potential loss of trees. The Fairfax County Department of Transportation revised the design in October 2018, reducing the width of the sidewalk in some sections.
In September 2021, the Board of Supervisors approved the use of eminent domain to acquire land rights from property owners who failed to come to an agreement.
A new Seven Corners Fire Station is under construction at 2949 Sleepy Hollow Road, the same location as the old fire station.
The contractor for the $13 million project is Branch Builds Inc. The fire station is expected to be completed in spring 2024.
The new two-story building will have 13,500 square feet, compared to 8,500 for the old one. It will also have an additional apparatus bay, for a total of three, and a storage building in the rear.
The Seven Corners Fire Station is currently working out of a temporary building at 6637 South Street in Falls Church.
Fairfax Water has started work on the Sleepy Hollow Road Pump Station on the site of a single-family house at 2959 Sleepy Hollow Road next to the fire station. The new building will look like a residence.
It will house three pumps, electrical equipment, and instrumentation. There will be an emergency backup generator behind the building. The parking lot will be removed, and a new wall will be constructed between the pump station and the single-family house next door. There won’t be any staff on site.
Fairfax Water is also installing a new transmission main connecting Route 7 and Route 50 in Seven Corners. The new main will be under Nicholson Street, Juniper Lane, and Aspen Lane.
The new water main and pump station are aimed at improving pressure, flow, and resiliency in the Seven Corners area, and over the long term, help meet future demand.
Phase 1 of the water main project covers Arlington Boulevard to Sleepy Hollow Road. This phase of the work involves a 2,300-foot, 24-inch wide suction main and a 300-foot section of the 24-inch discharge main under Aspen Lane and Sleepy Hollow Road.
Under Phase 2, a 530-foot section of the 24-inch discharge main will be installed at the Route 7 and Patrick Henry Drive intersection. Approximately 900 feet of cast-iron distribution mains under Route 7 will be abandoned.
Phase 3 calls for the construction of a 2,600-foot water main along Nicholson Street and Juniper Lane between Sleepy Hollow Road and Route 7.
Work has also begun on the rehabilitation of the Holmes Run Pump Station on the corner of Sleepy Hollow Drive and Dearborn Drive.
The existing pump station will remain, with most of the upgrades occurring inside the building. Outdoor improvements include the addition of a standby generator and an odor control system in a walled enclosure. The project also includes upgraded vehicular access for maintenance staff, permeable pavers, and landscaping.
During construction, a temporary bypass pipe will be installed along Sleepy Hollow Road from Dearborn Drive to a manhole in front of 3420 Sleepy Hollow Road.
The Sleepy Hollow Wastewater Pump Station serves a population of approximately 35,000 within a 6.8-square-mile area. It was built in 1957, making it one of the oldest pump stations in Fairfax County.
The station diverts a portion of the wastewater flow from the 33-inch Holmes Run gravity trunk sewer, which is just south of the pump station. Wastewater collected in the station is subsequently pumped via a 20-inch force main pressure sewer to gravity sewer manhole #113, located approximately 2,000 feet north of the pump station on Sleepy Hollow Road.
Related story: Planning Commission approves rehabilitation of Holmes Run Wastewater Pump Station
From there, the wastewater enters the Tripps Run gravity sanitary sewer and is combined with the Holmes Run gravity trunk sewer below Lake Barcroft. The sewage is eventually treated at Fairfax County’s wastewater treatment plant in Lorton.
Finally, the Gulick Group, which is developing Hudson Quarter, with 18 single-family homes at 6562 Brooks Place, is constructing a sidewalk next to the property along Sleepy Hollow Road.
10 responses to “Sleepy Hollow Road projects underway”
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All a waste of money, except Hudson Quarter. Traffic will be even more snarled now because people won’t be able to pass leftward turning vehicles by going around them on the right. People already speed 55 mph on sleepy hollow, which is 35 except next to the two schools, which are 25 mph. I have not seen a traffic enforcement action in years, and I live here. We are paying money to make things harder on ourselves.
The narrowing of the road by replacing some of the parking lanes with sidewalks will have a nice benefit of slowing speeding.
I really look forward to the sidewalks being completed, as do my children. My son has a friend who lives right by sleepy hollow and currently to get together we need to drive them because of the lack of sidewalks. Looking forward to them being able to get together by walking/biking themselves.
Wow lots of progress, thanks for the great synopsis!
Good to see so much investment in new infrastructure around here. The fire station was obsolete. The water distribution improvements are sorely needed. And while some claim sidewalks will invite crime (ridiculous on so many levels), it’ll be nice so see people safely walking up and down SHR.
I am not sure if timing this work concurrently was done purposefully, but I applaud the result. Five significant projects on one stretch of road is a tough design environment, and doing them all at once really makes the impact on the community so much better. I recognize that not everyone supported the idea or reality of the sidewalk/trail, but connecting the community to the many services at either end of Sleepy Hollow Road really is a necessity and something that, over time, will be seen as a significant benefit.
The timing was indeed aligned deliberately.
All those nice sidewalks abruptly stop at the deadly Columbia Pike / SH interchange? Getting to Mason Park from SH as a cyclist is super dangerous. Why is that ? And perhaps this is the contractor to hire for lake Accotink dredge vs the over-priced knuckle heads that Ffx parks hired. Funny how SH, Lake Barcroft residents get this done by Ffx county — but a lake dredge is just impossible to figure out.
Lake Barcroft is a special tax district with in the county – a Watershed Improvement District. Residents pay an additional 1% (+/-) in property taxes to fund the county employees and was used to purchase the backhoe, barges, and other dredge equipment. While technically county employees, residents pay for the service vs. general tax funds.
I’ll bet folks would pay an extra .0045 percent on property tax to fund a Lake Accotink renovation. That would actually be adequate to support a very strong bond issue. The current “let it become a mosquito nest swamp” plan was the most pathetic demonstration of public service failure we’ve seen in decades. The lake Accotink cost analysis presented by the county at public meetings was so lame in fact that some random 8 year old kid was able to poke holes in it without much effort at all. It was hard not to laugh at the arrogant engineer being taken apart verbally by one of the park’s top jungle gym fans.
To the commenter who said “people won’t be able to pass leftward turning vehicles by going around them on the right.” You’re correct, and that is a good thing! Sometimes a pedestrian or cyclist may be hidden from your view, crossing from the left in front of the left turning vehicle, which could be a truck or schoolbus. To save a precious few seconds, you endanger that pedestrian or cyclist as you pass on the right. A bit of patience is recommended.