To the Editor:
Kathryn Papp’s April 16 letter to the editor “No Longer 2006” perpetuates many incorrect and misleading statements about the city’s Waterfront Small Area Plan.
The plan was not devised in 2006 by a “small, very small, group of mostly non-elected men,” as Papp states, but during a series of over 100 community meetings held between 2010 and 2012. When significant objections to the draft plan were raised by some members of the public, City Council halted adoption of the plan in June 2011 so that it could be reworked by a citizen group that included representatives both in support of and opposed to the draft plan. Through this process elements of the plan addressing parks, development, architecture, and parking were improved prior to its adoption by council in January 2012.
Far from creating a “21st century tourist center,” the plan will replace industrial blight with high-quality, mixed-use development, including a significant amount of new residential. The plan supports numerous community objectives, including additional open space, the creation of a continuous pedestrian pathway along waterfront, and flood mitigation. The plan balances new areas of economic vitality with quiet places for contemplating the water. Implementation of the plan will complement and enhance connections between the Old and Historic District and the Potomac River.
The plan provides a blueprint for encouraging redevelopment of the last vestiges of the city’s industrial waterfront, but leaves many of the specific decisions about uses and architecture for consideration as individual development proposals move forward. That’s how consideration of the Carr Hotel, Old Dominion Boat Club, and the two Robinson Terminal sites have proceeded, with detailed reviews by the Waterfront Commission, Board of Architectural Review, Planning Commission, and City Council. Each of these venues has afforded ample public input into the city’s decision-making process.
One may object to the waterfront planning decisions reached by fellow citizens, but concocting falsehoods about the plan and its origins does not serve the community’s interests.
Nate Macek
Alexandria