Relocation of Cherrydale Fire Station
Following is a letter sent to the County Board written by Read Bush of the Cherrydale Fire Station.
November 15, 2002
Via Email
Dear County Board Members:
I am writing to provide you with information to which you may not be privy. Unfortunately, I was unable to attend Saturday’s Board meeting, but I did hear it on Channel 31. Ms. Favola indicated that the citizens of Cherrydale should be patient with the fire station relocation community meeting process, and that we should be open about the necessity to move the station to Quincy Street so that it can be closer to the Rosslyn-Ballston corridor. Unfortunately, the citizens have grown very impatient for four major reasons:
1. Trust was further eroded at last Wednesday’s meeting between the County and the community because the County and the Fire Department could not provide logical answers (or in some cases any answers) to citizen questions, as you will see below. The Assistant Fire Chief who spoke did not have sufficient information to answer many questions, and despite that fact that the Fire Chief was in the audience, he never once stood up to introduce himself or answer questions.
2. County representatives told the community that the purpose of these new meetings is to seek citizen input on where a station should be located. However, very quickly it became clear that the Fire Department’s preferred sites (on Quincy Street) were incongruent with the community’s desire for the station to stay on Lee Highway. This left many citizens dubious about “openness” of this entire process.
3. Over past several years, the County has not been forthright with the community over its plans to relocate the new station elsewhere. In fact, it never told the community it had this intent, and the community only learned about it through the grapevine.
4. The Bromptons plan was approved by the County Board despite concerns raised by citizens and the Planning Commission’s decision to “table” any vote on the Bromptons until the County could answer citizen questions about what would happen to the new fire station. The information that has been provided to you by the Fire Department is very one-sided and lacks any citizen consideration. I believe it is time you hear a more comprehensive view of this situation. Below, I discuss
major concerns based on my 13 years as a volunteer firefighter at Cherrydale and six years of consulting on fire department operations and fire station relocations at TriData Corporation.
• The Fire Department and Manager have stated the new Cherrydale fire station needs to be located on Quincy Street closer to the Ballston/Rosslyn corridor. They argue that 30% of the station’s calls are toward Ballston, and this percentage will rise in the future. The citizens, however, cannot understand why the County wants to move the station away from 70% (or in the future maybe 60%) of its calls. This is illogical.
• In addition, moving closer toward Ballston means moving farther from Military Road. The end of Military Road and the Chain Bridge area, both served by the Cherrydale Station, have the longest response times in the County. This was a key concern of the 1990 meetings. Fire department representatives have provided no answers as to how this problem will be resolved.
• Moving the station to Quincy Street lengthens the response time to Rosslyn. When the Cherrydale engine responds to Rosslyn, it turns right out of the current station and heads east on Lee Highway. By moving it to Quincy Street, it will have to respond back to Lee Highway and pass the existing station.
• Calls for service in the Ballston and Clarendon areas are already answered very promptly by the Clarendon and Ballston fire stations. In fact, when multiple stations respond to calls in these areas (i.e. for a fire call which requires the response of multiple stations), the Cherrydale engine currently arrives within a minute behind the other stations. However, when the Cherrydale engine responds out Military Road, the second and third arriving engines are much farther behind.
• Fire Department representatives told the community that moving the station to Quincy Street will improve safety by limiting the number of times the engine has to go through the five-points intersection at Lee Highway / Quincy Street / Old Dominion / and Military Road. In reality, moving to Quincy Street will increase the number of times the engine must go through the entirety of this intersection.
• The Fire Department states locating a station on Lee Highway unnecessarily forces traffic to be stopped on Lee Highway when the engine leaves, inconveniencing motorists. However, in a new station, traffic would only be stopped approximately six times per 24 hour period (including some instances in the middle of the night). The citizens are not concerned with this inconvenience.
• The Fire Department contends that the reason it must move the station to Quincy Street is based on “new response data” which shows an increased volume of calls in the Rosslyn-Ballston corridor. This data is not “new.” In fact, in 1990, the community and fire department considered the fact that call volumes in the corridor would rise significantly; however, it was decided then that the station would still be better located on Lee Highway.
• A County-hired facilitator started the meeting by telling citizens the purpose of the meeting was to get the citizen’s input. In response, the Pastor of Saint Andrews Episcopal Church asked, “How can the community trust in a new series of meetings when all of the citizen input and concerns raised in the 1990 meetings have been disregarded?” By the end of the two hour meeting, no one from the County could provide an answer to the Pastor’s question, and this left 100+ citizens in attendance
feeling very suspect and betrayed. The County held a series of similar meetings with the citizens in 1990-1. In the end, the County indicated its desire was to build the new station on the land now to be occupied by the Bromptons. Many citizens supported the 1994 Fire Station #3 bond because they were content with the outcome of these meetings. Given the
current debacle, I applaud the efforts to meet again with citizens. But the County cannot expect the citizens to trust a process that has failed them before.
• Citizens asked the County for an explanation as to why the Brompton’s land was never purchased 8 years. County representatives could provide no specific reason other than there was an environmental concern at one point. However, citizens know that after an environmental assessment was performed in the mid-1990s, the State decided there was no compelling reason why the land could not be purchased by the County.
• Questions were raised about why the County and Fire Department never informed the community that it had decided to scrap its plans to build the station on the Bromptons land. It appears this decision was made in 1999 after the fire station location study by Mr. Gordon Routley. The Fire Department and County officials provided no answer to this question.
The sentiment in the community is that the County has arbitrarily decided to put the station elsewhere. In fact, a letter from Mr. Carlee to the County Board dated July 16, 2002 states: “Staff have concluded that the proposed [Bromptons] rezoning to "C-0-1-1.0" and the proposed site plan meet the redevelopment and urban design goals called for in the Lee Highway/Cherrydale Revitalization Plan...Since the location along Lee Highway is no longer under consideration for the new fire station, staff believe the provision of a mixed-use building with ground floor retail and residential above achieves the village concept for Lee Highway that was envisioned in the Revitalization Plan.”
• The Fire Department indicated that the Bromptons site could be reconsidered for the new station. The community pressed the County to put a “hold” on the Bromptons development, but no one from the County government indicated they would be willing to do this.
Until questions are answered and answered logically, the citizens will remain distrustful of any new community process to determine a new location for the fire station. In closing, I want to say that I and many other citizens believe that Assistant Chief Shawn Kelley, who ran the meeting, was very polite and as forthright as he could be. However, it became clear that many of the questions he was asked were questions that a person at his level is unable to answer. The Fire Chief chose not to stand up to assist Chief Kelley, so questions went unanswered. It is very clear that in future meetings with the community, senior level management who have greater background on this topic and the ability to make decisions must be present and willing to speak up. Thank you for listening to my concerns and the concerns of the community.
Sincerely,
Reade Bush
Cherrydale Volunteer Fire Department
Return to Bellevue Forest Citizens' Association Home Page
Copyright © 2000, BellevueForest.org, All Rights Reserved.