Rosslyn Esplanade
“Make no little plans” was Daniel Burnham’s mantra, and Arlington’s political leaders at the turn of the millennium endorsed it.
''Make no little plans; they have no magic to stir men’s blood and probably themselves will not be realized. Make big plans; aim high in hope and work, remembering that a noble, logical diagram once recorded will never die, but long after we are gone will be a living thing, asserting itself with ever- growing insistency. Remember that our sons and grandsons are going to do things that would stagger us. Let your watchword be order and your beacon beauty.''
Daniel Burnham
It is possible that being a relatively small, but affluent community, Arlington has accomplished what larger communities in the region haven’t–say, for instance, Fairfax County–when it comes to urban design. Does being small allow for more nimble thinking? Size and wealth alone wouldn’t matter if Arlington hadn’t found the leadership and will.
The following is one story I was able to witness firsthand–and participate in. Not on the scale of Daniel Burnham’s master plan for Washington, Rosslyn’s final chapter remains to be written. Perhaps one more article will help?
The McMillan Plan of 1901—image furnished by National Capital Planning Commission
It’s worth noting the McMillan Plan (named for the Senator, not the architect) didn’t make it all the way across the river. OK, it left out a bit of the District as well, but was Daniel really dreaming so big?
No one anticipated Northern Virginia. It certainly wasn’t planned. The national government gave Arlington back to Virginia in 1847, having no use for it as part of the District. Other than Arlington Cemetery and the Pentagon, the Feds couldn’t see it as important.
District of Columbia in 1835, prior to the retrocession of Arlington County
image by Thomas Gamaliel Bradford - Library of Congress
“Arlington County is a jurisdiction of 25.8 square miles located across the Potomac River from Washington D.C. The County was originally part of the ten-mile square surveyed in 1791 for the Nation’s Capital. From 1801 to 1847, what are now Arlington and a portion of the City of Alexandria were known as Alexandria County, District of Columbia. In 1847, at the request of the local residents, Congress retroceded Alexandria County to the Commonwealth of Virginia.
“In 1870, Alexandria County and the City of Alexandria were formally separated and regular elections were held by a post-Civil War government. Subsequently, in 1920, Alexandria County was renamed Arlington County to eliminate the confusion between these two adjacent jurisdictions. The name “Arlington” was chosen because General Robert E. Lee’s home of that name is located in the County, on the grounds of Arlington National Cemetery.
“The Arlington County government exercises both city and county functions, one of the few urban unitary forms of government in the United States. Arlington’s form of government, the County Manager plan, was implemented in 1932. Arlington was the first county in the United States to choose this form of government. Arlington had an estimated population of 211,700 as of January 1, 2012. The County is almost fully developed; there are no farms and little remaining vacant land.”
from History of Arlington
One wonders if Arlington were to be named today–best not to speculate after what the San Francisco Board of Ed did with renaming their schools... I’m not a fan of Robert E. Lee, however the poetic justice of Arlington Cemetery–originally where Union troops were buried as an act of revenge ‘on Lee’s front lawn’ and now the nation’s most important cemetery—should serve as a notice about how history creates its own plot with no mind to a present day’s clamor–even one as large as the Civil War.
Rosslyn has an interesting history going back to those days. Then went on to develope as a sloppy cluster of gas stations, tattoo parlors, and pawn shops before World War II. Oh, and the friendly 24 hour brothels…
Rosslyn in 1903 photo furnished and annotated as part of Rosslyn’s History
Present day Rosslyn was largely developed in the heady car-centric days of the 60s and 70s. Rosslyn’s most distinguishing features became the pedestrian bridges spanning major roads, the traffic planner’s dream of roads meant solely for vehicles and “pity the fool” who tried navigating streets on foot. Was this anticipating Buck Rogers’ personal flying suits with no one touching ground again?
Rosslyn was the butt of many jokes and frequently used as Exhibit No. 1 in how NOT to develop an urban place. Exhibit No.2 being Crystal City at the south end of the County–which I hope Amazon will improve. Arlington’s leaders had a serious challenge on their hands cleaning up what had come before. The brothels were gone from Rosslyn, but so were the pedestrians.
The buildings in Rosslyn that arrived in the 60s–with few exceptions–were as ugly as Corporate America’s Modernism could make them. When you reach the point that a church is perched atop a full service gas station, it’s a clue that you’ve gone too far.
Arlington Temple United Methodist Church and no brothels in sight—Google Streets view
But the heart of the criticism laid against Rosslyn was how such a dense area could so totally dismiss any sense of a streetscape for people. Remember how people walking across Key Bridge reached a no-man’s land, fair warning they were entering Rosslyn? It also suffered from a dearth of streetfront commercial and housing (other than the tiny post-war houses at the edge of its downtown and a curious cross-shaped series of rental and condo buildings known as River Place, landlocked between Wilson Boulevard and Route 50. After the five o’clock rush, no one alive lived in Rosslyn.
One problem still impossible to solve is the river of traffic flowing through the heart of Rosslyn to and from Georgetown and the District. At rush hour, Rosslyn’s Lynn Street looks like an evacuation scene from Independence Day. Lynn Street won’t become an urban boulevard until some time in the far future when private cars might be gone. Or perhaps when we’re all in flying suits, though I digress.
Back in 2000, Arlington’s politicians and planners knew the problem well. When given an opportunity to speak for a more rational urban environment, they went for it. They were willing to offer developers greater density (taller buildings) for greater urbanity, street level commercial with housing, offices and hotels above. Mixed use in planners’ argot.
The name, Rosslyn Esplanade, originated with an earlier study prepared by Arlington planners, and an idea to look at Rosslyn’s rather backdoor attitude toward the river. In 1999-2000 the Lukmire Partnership was invitedby the Arlington Office of Economic Opportunity to join the public in envisioning a new edge to Rosslyn.
Rosslyn’s redevelopment was on the minds of many in Arlington–despite objections from the National Capital Planning and Fine Arts Commissions for how increased building heights might change the District’s “viewshed” [1] and possibly the District’s developers’ frustrated at not being able to rise as high. Arlington planners understood that if Rosslyn were to be improved, greater density was the only real tool they had to induce its redevelopment.
When the first mixed-use project to take advantage of the increased density arrived, Arlington came to us seeking input on what kinds of public amenities might accompany it. Architects don’t often get to play urban designer, the usual purview of city planners–particularly architects in boutique-size firms such as ours. It was an amazing opportunity, coming back to what I had been doing at Harry Weese & Associates, namely urban design.
[1] Viewshed is more planning language, shorthand for what one sees from a specific place, in this case from Washington, DC looking across at high rise Rosslyn.
Waterview
We entered the picture sometime after Waterview. Waterview was a substantial, mixed use project already under design by Pei Cobb Freed–the architects who brought the East Wing Art Gallery and the Holocaust Museum to Washington and the Louvre entrance pavilion to Paris. I studied under Harry Cobb back in the early 70s.
It was a kick to sit in on their planning presentations.
Occupying the corner of Lynn and 19th Streets, the Waterview site is prime, riverfront property looking over Key Bridge across to Georgetown. Although just in front of it, lie the combined tangle of exit ramps from the GW Parkway and I-66, then the Interstate itself and the GW Parkway, both paralleling the river below Rosslyn’s bluffs. Overlooking (disregarding) the immediate foreground, one can see rowers and yachts in the Potomac, with Georgetown and Washington on the far banks. Waterview condos are sought after–and not low income.
“Waterview is a hallmark, 1.3-million-square-foot mixed-use project on the banks of the Potomac River in Arlington, Virginia. The property consists of two towers, each rising more than 300 feet, connected by a fourth-floor terrace with built-in restaurant space.”
from the Clark Construction website
Aerial view of Key Bridge photo by Mariordo (Mario Roberto Duran Ortiz), 2013
Key Bridge
Key Bridge was built in 1923, connecting Georgetown to Rosslyn. It predates Memorial Bridge as the first road bridge across the Potomac River. In 1987, I was still with Harry Weese & Associates designing Metro stations along with their sites. The Washington office was at the time also involved in a major renovation of Key Bridge, including the widening of the sidewalks from 5 to 9 feet and introduction of safety barriers separating the foot and car traffic. The proposed bridge sidewalk widening is the kind of urban design gesture that makes for better cities. Less than a mile downriver, the Roosevelt bridge has walkways of the five foot variety.
I learned a great deal from Harry about prioritizing pedestrians over other modes of transportation. Today’s foot traffic on Key Bridge, with bikes weaving between, proves the effort paid off. If anything, the sidewalks could be twice as wide to handle the traffic.
However, crossing the river and arriving from Georgetown was (and remains) hazardous for pedestrians navigating the multiple exit and entrance ramps from the GW Parkway and I-66 in Rosslyn. Ditto for the brave cyclists.
Google Streets image—3-plus traffic lanes on N. Lynn Street heading for Georgetown
Google Streets image—Leaving Rosslyn
Google Streets image—Intersection at Lee Highway approaching Key Bridge
Not that going into the 90s Georgetown was an exemplar of urbanity, with too-narrow sidewalks, no Metro station and a riverfront used to park cars for the Georgetown bars and restaurants. The story goes that Georgetown’s poohbahs refused a Metro station, not wanting the expected riff raff–i.e. less privileged–to flood the place. Georgetown has the riff raff anyway–minus a Metro station, though the line runs underneath on its way to Rosslyn.
Why Do We Hate Rivers?
The issues for a Rosslyn esplanade along the river seemed rather obvious. Much like other American cities, Rosslyn had turned its back to the river. A few miles downstream in Alexandria the river was an industrial wasteland–and across from Alexandria in DC, the Blue Plains treatment plant was dumping poorly treated ‘wastewater’ (euphemism for water and shit) along with the excess shit from the combination storm/sanitary sewers. Nobody went fishing south of Blue Plains in the 60s.
For recorded time, humans have planted themselves beside rivers for obvious reasons–needing a reliable source of drinking water being the foremost. And proceeded from there to turn them into literal cesspools. What they couldn’t pollute they dammed. The Potomac River was so polluted in the 60s swimming was banned. Yet the river was a primary source of drinking water. We are a confused if not confusing species.
Across the way in DC, Tiber Creek used to flow from near the Capital to the river near the Lincoln Memorial. First it was dredged into a canal for boats to ferry people to the Capital, then it was buried under Constitution Avenue in a large stormwater pipe. A large reason Georgetown has always been the wealthier end of Washington–as opposed to Anacostia–was being upstream it received the water first, before it was thoroughly polluted. Another time-honored example of wealth over poverty.
“You can’t get there from here” was the next issue. How does one get across six lanes plus exits of moving Interstate traffic only to reach the George Washington Parkway’s four lanes plus parking for Roosevelt Island? I wouldn’t want to be the geese looking for love by the river come spring. At the south end, Wilson Boulevard (technically another overused highway here) launches into Rosslyn.
In a final quirk, there is a singular pedestrian ‘high line’ known as Freedom Park predating the more famous one in New York City. Originally constructed as a flyover carrying car traffic, it seems the survey crews mis-measured the relative heights of the sections to be joined–by several feet where they met–leaving it as a curio park roughly two blocks long spanning over Lynn Street and Wilson Boulevard and terminating somewhere near the southern end of what could become the Rosslyn Esplanade.
Esplanade Design
In considering how to build a new face to Rosslyn on its riverside, several things seemed obvious, the first being the views along Arlington Ridge Road needed the same attention the Waterview site was already receiving. The second, that view of the Interstate needed to go. As it was in 1999, Arlington Ridge Road by any definition today remains no better than a service alley with no redeeming value as an urban corridor.
Arlington Ridge Road ca 1999—photo by the author
Google Streets image Arlington Ridge Road today
Sadly, Arlington Ridge Road in Rosslyn looks about the same twenty some years later. Behind the chain link fence and down the hill lies I-66. No commercial street frontage, only back of house service doors and dumpster pads, and a four-foot sidewalk hard against a continuous wall of buildings.
However, suppose the street were remade as part of a general rebuilding to include storefronts, widened to include a pedestrian promenade, street furniture and landscaping? And without I-66 to see?
Rather than burying the Interstate, cover it progressively in stages with new open space, transforming Arlington Ridge Road into a boulevard and views toward Washington, thus offering an entirely new face to a rebuilt Rosslyn. The basic idea would be to extend a new plane out over I-66. Cut a deal with those insisting on adding lanes to the Interstate at the price of covering it, returning views of Rosslyn to something approximating pre-Interstate days.
The initial phase would include a redeveloped Arlington Ridge Road with broad sidewalks and landscaping, reorienting the adjacent properties to front on the new boulevard. At the Wilson Boulevard end, introduce a large traffic circle as the new gateway into Rosslyn, and at the elbow of Arlington Ridge Road and 19th Street, extend a pedestrian overlook reaching the park beside the river. Where now 19th Street peters out at a service drive, in its stead would be an anchoring public space visible from Lynn Street two short blocks away.
Subsequent phases would include the gradual decking over of I-66, beginning at Lynn Street done in several sections so the tunnels could be self ventilated.[2] While we were working on the project, Arlington County was in a battle with Virginia DOT and the Feds to keep I-66 from being widened and further scarring the County. The thought was to horse trade the highway’s widening for the expense of the deck.
In all of this, the George Washington Parkway would be left untouched. As one of the nation’s early scenic parkways, despite its modern use as a commuter highway, it follows the older tradition of integrating the road and landscape into a long-running scenic way.
[2] At 300 feet, the tunnel sections wouldn’t require mechanical ventilation, the engineers advised.
Early Studies
We did our work in open, public forums, or rather we did the presentations in public. This was 1999, and we hadn’t yet embraced 3D because the software wasn’t easy to use nor was it stable. There were just two of us on the project, and the best we had was 2D AutoCAD. I led the design with freehand sketches which Robin Puttock translated into AutoCAD; then an intern architect, she wasn’t married, had no kids yet, and devoted herself as any driven architect might, making it obvious women were in the profession to stay. She became a partner in years to come. I didn’t hold it against her that she’d gone to Virginia Tech–well, maybe a little.
There were no dry runs with County staff prior to the public meetings–they saw what the citizens saw at the same time–and heard what we heard as feedback. I think Chris Zimmerman may have attended one forum. A County Board member, Zimmerman was an outspoken leader for urban design in Arlington.
We began by studying the early planning department’s scheme, a simple decking over of Arlington Ridge Road with a pedestrian walkway, which became Scheme 1. The primary disadvantage being the street itself doesn’t participate, and the elevated walkway would need to be some twenty feet higher where it met 19th Street. We suggested major water fountain at Wilson Boulevard would anchor the south end of the esplanade. What it lacked was any real connection to Key Bridge—and the Potomac River.
In the public meetings, this option was politely listened to and dismissed.
Scheme 1 prepared by the Lukmire Partnership, © 1999
The curving two-pronged object to the right is Freedom Plaza, an aborted car overpass.
“Under this scenario, the Esplanade would become an opportunity never fully realized. Elevating the Esplanade over top of North Arlington Ridge Road condemns the road to no better than service status. The struggle for visibility for the buildings on K Street under the Whitehurst Freeway in Georgetown bears this out.”
from the Rosslyn Esplanade Report prepared by the Lukmire Partnership.
A second scheme focused on extending the streetscape toward Key Bridge, and an overlook spanning I-66 and the GW Parkway reaching the bike trail parallel to the parkway. The water feature at Wilson Boulevard was carried forward from the first option.
Scheme 2 prepared by the Lukmire Partnership, © 1999
“Scheme 2 has similar weaknesses to Scheme 1; again the principal one is that as a back-of-property walkway set above North Arlington Ridge Road, there is the distinct possibility the walkway may not be greatly used. However, as an enhancement over Scheme 1, the pedestrian river bridge offers potential connections with long term impact on the urban area for relief from the dense city environment. For the people in Rosslyn it also offers access to Roosevelt Island, which presently is only accessible from a northbound GW Parkway parking lot.”
from the Rosslyn Esplanade Report prepared by the Lukmire Partnership.
The third scheme moves closer to the one that was finally endorsed by citizens and planners and the Rosslyn civic groups. In this scheme, Arlington Ridge Road would become a boulevard beginning with a traffic circle (with fountain) at Wilson Boulevard and the pedestrian river bridge brought forward from Scheme 2. It also decks over a beginning section of I-66 visually extending the existing Gateway Park, still presently bounded on all sides by multi-lane arterial streets.
Scheme 3 prepared by the Lukmire Partnership, © 1999
“The full width of the boulevard including walks and landscaping is 120 feet (Four main travel lanes (two each direction) = 48’; Esplanade = 40’, landscape island (including turn lanes) = 16’;sidewalk at building side = 16’), or two parking bays in width to account for subsurface parking to occur at the lower levels below.”
from the Rosslyn Esplanade Report prepared by the Lukmire Partnership.
Scheme 4 was the whole enchilada–the complete decking of I-66. Just build over the sucker!
Scheme 4 prepared by the Lukmire Partnership, © 1999
“Rosslyn suffers in its relationship to the river by the sheer number of highway lanes that lies between. The George Washington Parkway is of such an aesthetic design and well thought detail that it is an appropriate feature at the edge of the river; the same cannot be said for I-66. This is not meant as criticism of the highway’s utilitarian design, so much as an acknowledgement that its presence, in combination with the George Washington Parkway creates a no-man’s land of highways between Rosslyn and the river. It also occupies valuable real estate that would be wonderful if it were converted to open space.
“Arlington is a community of limited open space, with little means of gaining more. As such, covering I-66 needs to be considered for inclusion in the long range goals for the County; the vision for Rosslyn as a vibrant, upscale pedestrian friendly downtown will remain incomplete at its edges without it.”
from the Rosslyn Esplanade Report prepared by the Lukmire Partnership.
Bringing the public along, building from one scheme to the next, made a straightforward case. Still, it surprised me to see how engaged the citizens and staff became, and how little disagreement to what we were proposing.
Asking ‘what would happen if’ is the realm architects dwell in, much as any creative persons, perhaps with the harder constraints of physics, budgets and politics. Harry Weese used to insist in his cranky way “make it look like an architect’s been here!” something I have no argument with doing. I only wish we had had the software back then to create the 3D images–video even, beginning with a long drone shot of the existing Interstate then evolving into what it might be to play soccer in the middle of a greensward Frederick Olmsted could be proud of.
Final Design Phase 1 prepared by the Lukmire Partnership, © 1999
Final Design Phase 3 prepared by the Lukmire Partnership, © 1999
Final Design Phase 4 prepared by the Lukmire Partnership, © 1999
Final Design Phase 7 prepared by the Lukmire Partnership, © 1999
We were lauded, I wrote the report and moved on from dreaming big dreams. The sidewalk heading toward Key Bridge has been improved. None of the properties along Arlington Ridge Road have been redeveloped, and the only new development since Waterview is Central Place in the heart of downtown Rosslyn. The Esplanade remains a dream.