Fifth Bi-Monthly Community Meeting: Planning & Zoning Update (January 9, 2026)
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Fifth Bi-Monthly Community Meeting: Planning & Zoning Update (January 9, 2026)
The City of Alexandria Department of Planning & Zoning held its fifth bi-monthly community meeting on January 9, 2026, to update residents on long-range planning initiatives, development applications, and zoning code updates. The meeting included presentations on the Duke Street Land Use Plan, the Housing 2040 Master Plan, stormwater management review processes, and upcoming development cases. Staff also summarized outcomes from the January 8 Planning Commission meeting and addressed questions from attendees.
Duke Street Land Use Plan Update
- Presenter: Carrie Beach (Division Chief, Neighborhood Planning) and Jeff Farner (Deputy Director, Planning Department)
- The plan covers a ~3.5 mile corridor (~1,000 acres), from Old Town to the Landmark Mall redevelopment. Key existing conditions include: 70% impervious cover in commercial/industrial areas, a 55-acre city campus, 35% foreign-born population, and a high concentration of market-rate affordable rental units.
- Community engagement to date: Over 1,700 participants in an online poll; pop-up events and a community meeting in June 2025. Draft guiding principles were developed in five categories: Land Use & Design, Mobility & Safety, Parks & Open Space, Housing, and Health & Sustainability.
- Staff presented an initial framework identifying opportunity areas (commercial/semi-industrial sites for potential redevelopment), housing preservation zones (e.g., Fox Chase), small business retention areas, and the city campus. No specific density or height recommendations have been set; further community workshops are planned (winter/spring 2026) with a draft plan expected in fall 2026 and adoption in December 2026.
- Jeff Farner confirmed the city is hiring an independent transportation consultant to study traffic impacts.
Housing 2040 Master Plan Update
- Presenter: Tamara Yovovich (Office of Housing)
- The plan updates the city's 2013 housing master plan with a 15-year horizon. Phase I topics include: preservation tools, tenant rights, financial tools for affordable housing, condominium support, senior housing options, first-time homebuyer programs, and healthy housing initiatives.
- Upcoming milestones: City Council work session on January 27, 2026; release of draft principles, goals, and recommendations around February 20; community open house on February 28 at the Lee Center (10 a.m.–3 p.m.); public hearing targeted for June 2026.
Stormwater Management Site Plan Review
- Presenter: Gavin Pelletari (Stormwater Principal Planner, T&ES)
- Any project disturbing ≥2,500 sq ft must submit stormwater management and erosion control plans meeting city/state water quality and quantity standards. The city has 14 staff dedicated to reviewing plans, including BMPs, detention systems, erosion control, and long-term maintenance access.
- Benefits to residents include improved flood protection, better water quality in local waterways and the Chesapeake Bay, and green infrastructure providing climate resiliency and pollinator habitat.
Development Applications Update
- Presenters: Rob Kearns (Development Division Chief) and Tony Lacola (Division Chief, Land Use & Preservation)
- January cases (after Jan 8 PC review):
- 220 & 224 South Peyton Street: Mixed-use infill (8 one-bedroom units, ground-floor commercial, no parking). PC recommended approval 7-0.
- Colvin Street Garage: Extension of 2022 approval for a 9,500 sq ft building. PC recommended approval 7-0.
- February cases:
- Duke & Quaker townhomes: 11 units (includes 1 affordable for-sale unit), land dedication at intersection.
- Upland Park extension: 92 townhomes, conforming to updated Alex West small area plan.
- 806 North Columbus Street: 3 townhomes on parking lot.
- 300 North Lee / 333 North Fairfax: 32 townhomes (2 affordable), cluster development.
- Eisenhower East Block 3: 767-unit residential tower (32 stories), 40,000 sq ft retail, target spring hearing.
- Power Plant site (Blocks B & C): Two buildings, ~800 units, 80,000 sq ft commercial, spring target.
- Zoning Text Amendment (Office-to-Residential): To simplify conversions from office to residential by eliminating need for multiple approvals. Includes voluntary affordable housing contribution. PC recommended unanimous approval on Jan 8.
- Other February cases: SUPs for a restaurant at 211 Yoakum Parkway and rooftop recreation at 601/619 South Patrick Street; subdivision at 102 East Monroe. Spring cases include 833 Elbert Avenue subdivision.
Q&A Highlights
- Scope of Duke Street Plan: Staff clarified the plan focuses on opportunity areas (commercial/semi-industrial) and preservation strategies; traffic analysis will be part of the process with an independent consultant.
- Planning Commission Outcomes (Jan 8): Unanimous approvals on subdivisions, Colvin Garage, South Peyton, the office-to-residential conversion (732 N. Washington St. SUP), and the zoning text amendment. The Green Building Plan also received unanimous PC support after amendments and will go to City Council on January 24.
- Emergency Services: Each development application is reviewed for fire/EMS access, water pressure, and infrastructure; small area plans and annual budgets consider community facility needs.
- City Hall Appeal: The city manager’s appeal of the BAR decision on City Hall renovations will be heard as a public hearing at the January 13 City Council meeting; public comment will be accepted.
Key Outcomes
- Planning Commission (Jan 8, 2026): Recommended approval (7-0) for multiple items: subdivisions (consent), Colvin Street Garage, 220 S. Peyton, 732 N. Washington office-to-residential SUP, zoning text amendment, and the Green Building Plan.
- Upcoming Public Hearings:
- City Council: January 13 (City Hall BAR appeal), January 24 (Green Building Plan), and various DSUP/SUP hearings in late January/February.
- Housing 2040: Council work session Jan 27, draft release Feb 20, open house Feb 28, public hearing June 2026.
- Duke Street Plan: Community workshops ongoing; draft plan fall 2026; adoption December 2026.
- Next Community Meeting: Likely March 2026 (bi-monthly schedule).
Meeting Transcript
All right, well, let's go ahead and get started. Welcome everybody. My name is Paul Stoddard. I'm the director with the Department of Planning Zoning here in the City of Alexandria. And I want to start by saying thank you to investing in evening with us to learn more about what's going on across the City of Alexandria and also inform us through the questions that you ask as we talk about all these different projects and initiatives. And if we go to the next slide. So this is the fifth installment of our bi-monthly community meeting series. And this meeting has a couple different objectives that we're hoping to that we hope it's achieving. One of the biggest ones is we just want to make sure that people are being made aware of what's going on, not just within their neighborhood, but across the city, and really have the opportunity to learn about a range of projects, whether they are development projects or master plan updates or proposed updates to the to the city zoning regulations. We want to be making sure we're we're getting the word out broadly about those proposals as they're under consideration. And then also we want to have the opportunity, of course, for people to learn more. So you'll see throughout the presentation that we've provided uh web links where people can find more information. Uh and of course, we'll have a QA session at the end so that people can just ask their questions tonight. And then before we hop off on this slide, I'll just uh mention one more thing. Uh if we can go back one in the lower left corner, uh you'll see a web address for Alexandria BA.gov slash planning. That is the home page for the planning and zoning department. Uh, and of course, you can find a lot of information uh if you go there. Uh and one of the things you can find is the web page for this meeting series. Uh, we do make available on that page the presentation slides that we use of each of these meetings. We we post the video uh that we record as part of the meeting. Uh, and then we also type out the QA and post that on that web page as well. So you'll be able to find that for tonight's meeting as well as the other four meetings we've run prior to this. Uh, and just in terms of uh timing, we are trying to run these uh approximately every other month. Uh sometimes holiday timing throws that off a little bit, but we are trying to run these every other month so that people can be uh sort of made aware of what's coming up with uh each series uh planning commission and city council members. Um the agenda for tonight's presentation. Uh we got some of the preliminaries uh uh in the first couple slides there. Long range planning. We have three different topics that uh we want to touch on tonight. First is providing an update on the Duke Street uh land use plan, the small area planning process for the Duke Street corridor. Uh, we also have some colleagues with us uh uh tonight from the Office of Housing. Uh, we're gonna get an update on the uh uh what's going on with the Housing 2040 plan, which is our master plan for the city. We're updating that. Uh and then also from the Department of Transportation and Environmental Services that we know that stormwater is something that people are often worried about when they see construction activity. And so our colleagues from TAS uh Transportation Environmental Services are going to talk through and provide a summary of what are the things that we look at on every development application and how are we making sure that stormwater is controlled and managed properly. Uh, from there, we're gonna jump over and talk about development applications that are being considered now. Uh that includes some of the larger development applications in the city as well as some of the smaller infill projects. Uh, and we'll also talk about proposed updates to our zoning coordinates. And as I mentioned on the last slide, we'll close the meeting with QA. Uh, so as we go, you should be able to see a QA icon, a question mark icon in the bottom center of your screen. As we go, please do uh type in your questions, uh, and then we'll answer answer all those questions at the end of the meeting. And anything that we can't get to tonight or need to provide additional information on, we'll do that in that typed QA that we provide on the web page. Slide. So this is one uh that I often find helpful to keep in mind because as we go through tonight's presentation, you're gonna hear from a number of different speakers on a number of different projects. Uh, and this graphic can serve as a reminder of how all the different things that we're talking about tonight are linked and really pointed toward the same goal of delivering uh on the Alexandria vision for the future. So the vision uh is where this whole graphic starts on the far left of the screen. Uh vision, objectives, recommendations, and SAP is an acronym uh for small area plan. This is where uh community members, city council, city staff, uh, advisory boards and commissions work together to come up with a common vision of what they want the future of their neighborhood, what they want the future of uh the city of Alexandria to be. And that formally gets adopted by Planning Commission as well as city council through a public hearing process. Once that vision is set, that provides direction to staff to develop to write down the development regulations, which also have to get approved by the city council through a hearing process. And then those regulations set the rules under which development applications are reviewed.
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