Dear Friends,
Here is a summer update on what NOVA Parks has done to Upton Hill.
It was painful to chronicle the loss of the trees on the upper park. Leyland Cypresses summarily ripped out of the ground, piled up and shredded. Several months later, ignoring our appeals, the three nice maples in the lower park were also ripped out of the ground.
In the upper park, there is a huge new parking lot and a denuded hill instead of the pleasant greenery that was there. Though other trees were cut down, thankfully four of the mature trees in the parking lot that generated some shade were preserved.
As predicted, the upper park area now looks more like a new mall parking lot than part of park system that is supposed to preserve the area’s remaining greenspace and trees.
The damage is visible from space, with the before and after Google Earth photos showing the loss of trees and scarring of the land.
During construction, the contractor was remiss in installing the tree protection areas. It took several months and County intervention to get the contractor to put up fences around the mature White Oak in the lower park. Construction equipment and material was parked and piled under trees that were supposed to preserved, putting them at risk. Tree limbs were also unnecessarily damaged. Though the Urban Forestry Commission urged NOVA Parks to pick a contractor familiar with Arlington’s tree preservation regulations, it is not clear NOVA Parks bothered to do so.
A major problem at Upton Hill Park, uncorrected for years, was the stormwater runoff from the existing parking lot in the upper park. The expansion of the parking lot has added to the problem, which NOVA Parks attempted to mitigate by constructing a large underground cistern and by using pervious pavers for some of the new parking spaces.
During heavy rainstorms, however, just as in the past, a considerable volume of water still flows from the parking lot — its pavement increase adding to the volume — and runs down the hill. This stormwater runoff’s force is further eroding drainage channels flowing downhill and sending more sediment-laden water into the ecologically sensitive woodland wetlands (near the corner of Wilson Blvd. and N. Livingston Street). This additional runoff flows into Reeves Run and then into Four Mile Run and ultimately into the Potomac River.
During construction, we witnessed a stream of sediment flowing downhill into the lower park. Now that the parking lot is paved and some mitigation measures were finally installed on the denuded hill, the visible sediment may be decreasing, but the excessive runoff volume remains unchanged.
In the lower park, muddy sediment-laden runoff still flows from the construction area into the vulnerable wooded wetlands and down Reeves Run and into Four Mile Run. The new curb cut on Wilson Boulevard also generates a lot of sediment-laden runoff that flows into the storm drain, which ultimately flows directly into Four Mile Run.
More funds needed for maintenance. Plans to build a climbing structure on what was the nice green hill have been postponed due to the COVID crisis it seems as related in NOVA Parks’ adopted FY2021 budget (pg. A-7). The budget still projects a revenue increase of $50k a year when it is built (pg. D-2). Rather than stealing the money away from Upton Hill, the new revenue should be devoted to better maintenance of the forested areas of the park where trash is still regularly strewn about and invasives remain pervasive. More native plants and flowers should be planted too at the entryways to help create pollinator corridors.
More Dead Trees Walking — W&OD trail widening. Keep an eye on more ecological destruction curtesy of NOVA Parks with its plans to widen the W&OD Trail in Arlington. If brought to fruition, the plans call for the removal of mature trees at Brandymore Castle in Madison Manor Park near the East Falls Church Metro and would add plenty of impervious pavement along Four Mile Run as the trail is unnecessarily widened.
Our neighbors in Falls Church have already documented NOVA Parks’ ecologically destructive construction practices used when widening the W&OD in the Little City.
In July, the Northern Virginia Transportation Authority (NVTA) granted NOVA Parks $650,000, which thankfully is some $5 million less than requested. The money is “to enable a measured approach to design, environmental assessments, and public engagement but not construction,” according to NVTA’s Technical Advisory Committee June 25, 2020 report (pg. 99).
In asking for clarification, NVTA responded by saying that the funding will be available starting FY2024 and would be distributed on a reimbursement basis, which means NOVA Parks must spend the money first and provide adequate documentation for NVTA to reimburse the expenses on a line by line basis. (NOVA Parks, however, seems eager to begin and is exploring using its own funds now in the hope of getting reimbursed later. Several hundred thousand dollars are in the FY2021 budget for the project.)
NVTA expects NOVA Parks to follow all environmental and public engagement processes dictated by federal/state/local regulations, as appropriate. NVTA commented, “there is no commitment from NVTA to fund further phase(s) of the project at this point. NOVA Parks needs to apply for further funding in a future cycle and the application will be evaluated along with the rest of the applications received during the application period.”
Friends of Brandymore Castle Anyone? We need more details about NOVA Parks plans for public engagement, analysis of alternatives and environmental assessments. More tree cutting and stormwater runoff is not needed in Arlington and is especially harmful along this section of the W&OD, where runoff and severe erosion (and flooding) are already a problem.
Two trails already exist over the area -- the W&OD and Custis Trail or the W&OD and Four Mile Run trail -- that are adequate for commuters coming from farther out.
FoUH
www.FriendsofUptonHill.org – with updates!