Restonian: News blog from Reston, Virginia, the mauve-colored New Town (tm)

Casinopocalypse Never: Developer Denies Interest in Reston, Herndon Casino, Nosiree Bob! (Simon)

2026-05-08T17:09:00.003-04:00

No one:
Absolutely no one:
Comstock: We never wanted to build a casino in your stupid town anyway.

The fancypants casino bill has been dead (for now) for almost a month, and developer Comstock just issued a public statement saying nosiree, we never thought about building a giant ~~casino~~ entertainment project in Reston or Herndon, why would anyone think that, silly rabbits?

To be fair, Comstock probably felt compelled to issue the statement because an Action McNews teevee story conflated two unrelated events in our neighbor to the west, Herndon. At the same time as town officials were considering tweaking zoning requirements to make it difficult to build a casino there, ultimately deciding to try to simply prohibit them outright, they were dealing with another Comstock-related issue: Herndon is suing the company to get back the land for a fancy downtown development project the company backed out of in 2024. And the teevee people combined the two into one story, as they often do given the limited time between mattress commercials, and hence the public statement.

Give us some good public statement blockquote:

Contrary to what has been reported or speculated, Comstock has never pursued the approvals necessary for a casino development anywhere on the Silver Line outside of Tysons. The reason is straightforward: our concept for what this type of destination development should look like, what it should include, and how it should function is simply not compatible with a residential neighborhood.

Alrighty then! We'll give them the benefit of the doubt, but let's be perfectly clear, as ~~the kids~~ politicians said as recently as a decade ago: While Comstock didn't author it, the language in the original casino bill proposed back in ought-twenty-three by Sen. David Marsden (D-Burke) and Del. Wren Williams (R-Stuart) that Comstock supported included some very specific legalese about the location of any proposed casino that was still somehow nonspecific enough to make both Tysons and Reston possibilities, though that later got narrowed to Tysons (and then expanded back to include just about anywhere) during this year's legislative deliberations. So another company, if not them, could have built it here if that language had held and the bill passed.

But we're glad that Comstock put their commitment to keep casinos away from residential neighborhoods in writing for all to see. If only some other equine-adjacent developers could do the same thing instead of poking around some moldy sixty-year-old property plats, we'd all be a lot happier, the end.

With Trump Truth Post, Reston Has Finally Arrived

2026-05-04T17:55:00.003-04:00

Maybe you thought it was that time Money Magazine ranked Reston the 7th best place to live in the country. Or that time they named a disease and an opera after our plastic fantastic planned community. Or that time we got our fancypants Wegmans before Manhattan (yes, that Manhattan). Or that time the Metro finally arrived and ~~all of our homes~~ one particular penthouse quintupled in value.

But no. It was only yesterday, May 3, 2026, that Reston finally arrived. That's because that was the day we joined the ranks of Bruce Springsteen, various"low IQ" politicians, Greenland, the Superbowl halftime show, and covfefe. That's right, Reston was at long last the subject of a Trump ~~tweet~~ truth. Check it, as the kids haven't said since well before his first term:

Good to see Fannie Mae getting with the program! Let's check out that inspirational photo greeting employees as they head past the fake harvested timber to the elevator banks. COMPUTER, ENHANCE:

Resisting the urge to make obvious comparisons that would get us put on a list, so haha, good thing it's posted against a russet brown background or the DRB would be awfully sore, haha, the end.

Swanky $10M Reston Penthouse Sets Record

2026-05-01T21:36:00.000-04:00

ZOMG, someone roust Bob Guccione from his penicillin-lined tomb, as a swanky Reston penthouse has set a new record.

The 27th floor penthouse at the JW Marriott Residences at Reston Station, presumably bathed in the perpetual sunlight of the motel's blinding signage, sold for an eye-popping $10.25 million last month. That's nearly double the cost of the second most-expensive Virginia condo sale ever, which was in (shudder) Rosslyn, which goes to show you what some people will do to be able to walk to a ~~Matchbox Davio's~~ Founding Farmers.

But what else do you get, besides a 5,700-square-foot aerie overlooking a vast swath of midscale chain retail? Give us some good real estate blockquote, BFFs at the Washington Business Journal:

The condos, which have their own private entrance, feature dedicated spaces and amenities, all on the 25th floor, including an owner's lounge, board room, rooftop grilling areas, rooftop dog park, and private fitness center.

Cool cool. Life without a rooftop dog park and "grilling areas" is a hollow existence, indeed. But what else could a mere $10.25 million buy you in our plastic fantastic planned community?

COMPUTER, CALCULATE:

11,516 years of Reston Association dues. That's a lot of pool/pickleball time!
An entire cluster—or two. We'd do it, just to rename Forest Edge Cluster to Forest Gump Cluster, a small price to pay for the laughs
Approximately 640,625 cocktails at one of Reston Town Center's finer drinkeries
40,196 votes for Hunter Mill Supervisor
301,648 cans of Behr Russet Brown paint -- more than enough to paint the entire Pentagon a DRB-friendly color.
931,818 in tolls for round trips to the Tysons Corner Galleria, where you'd obviously shop if you lived in a motel penthouse
43 percent of Reston National Golf Course, which is more than what will remain open space if developers have their way, the end.

Casinopocalypse Later: Spanberger Vetoes Bill, Used Car Lot Casino Off the Table For Now

2026-04-09T16:58:00.002-04:00

V. v. sad news for the people who find their living rooms too devoid of cigarette smoke and sadness to gamble on their phones and the developers who spent more than $3.5 million on their own bet that a fun casino could be built in the complete absence of local support in ~~Reston~~ ~~Tysons~~ ~~Reston~~ ~~Tysons~~ a specific used car lot in Tysons: Gov. Abigail Spanberger has vetoed a bill that advanced relentlessly through the Virginia House, bringing this multi-year saga to an end... at least for this legislative session.

Give us some good blockquote, Action McNews BFFs:

“Local governing boards should lead on proposed casino development, as has happened in every locality that now has a casino,” Spanberger said in a statement. “But in Fairfax County, the Board of Supervisors has explicitly opposed this legislation, and an overwhelming majority of the General Assembly members who represent Fairfax voted against it.”

The casino proposal changed in about a dozen ways in recent months but returned to where it started: with a proposed location in Tysons. The proposal called for funds to be split 70% to the state and 30% to Fairfax County. Fairfax County Board Chairman Jeff McKay told News4 that wasn’t enough.

Reston kept being put on and off the table (as in a meal to be devoured) as the bill twisted and turned, which means it could be back on the table in future legislative sessions. But for now, we can breathe a sigh of relief, what, with no other unwanted development proposals trying to sneak into our plastic fantastic planned community in whatever way they can, even if it means digging up some badly xeroxed zoning documents which were filed and forgotten before Nixon was president. Right?

Right?

Update: Hunter Mill Supervisor Walter Alcorn issued a succinct statement thanking Spanberger for vetoing what he called a "bad bill," stating that "we never wanted it and never asked for it."

Call Me Loudounian

2026-04-01T17:11:00.031-04:00

The rumors are true. After nearly two decades covering Reston like invasive English ivy, we’ve decided to move on to brighter, beiger pastures. That’s right—we’re swapping the earth tones of our plastic-fantastic planned community for the bright lights and particleboard charms of our neighbor to the west, Loudoun County. Back in the day, we used to derisively call this “graduating,” but we’re older and ... older now.

“But why?” one—maybe two—of you unrelated to us by blood or marriage might be asking. “What does Loudoun have that Reston doesn’t?” Thought you’d never ask, silly rabbits.

Midscale chains. A wise man once said that when one is tired of visiting the same shops and restaurants found in exurban strip malls blanketing 98 percent of the country, one is tired of life. We do have that here, but fortunately, there’s an even greater movable feast of midscale chain eateries, shopperies, cofferies, saladaries, cupcakeries—maybe even a picklery, if we’re lucky—to our west.

Unimproved roads. Ever since they added a fancy third turning lane to the intersection of Route 7 and Baron Cameron, we’ve been overwhelmed—what is this, Talladega? A windy two-lane road originally surveyed by a Civil War general, carrying traffic from dozens of massive subdivisions, would let us “bliss out,” as the kids no longer say, while sitting in never-ending traffic.

Latency. When you’re in the highly lucrative online blogging business, every millisecond counts. The only way we can be sure we won’t be scooped on a critical bit of wastewater board meeting news is to have a massive data center behind our home to plug our 300-baud modem directly into. Advantage: Loudoun.

Upscale vowels. The word “Reston” does roll off the tongue nicely, but having a couple of luxury “u”s in one’s address speaks to a certain exclusivity we’d like to grow accustomed to.

Metro. The only thing better than a nonexpress, 50-minute train to downtown D.C.? A 75-minute one.

One Loudoun, which is mathematically one better than Reston Town Center (no numerical value).

Spring vibes. Thinking that the Loudoun lifestyle would be an improvement is like living April 1 every day, the end.

This post originally appeared in the Reston Letter.

You've Got Fail: AOL Lays Off People in Reston; Unclear If They Were Aware AOL Still Existed

2026-03-02T16:59:00.034-05:00

Shocking news from the Internets today, where we learned that AOL plans to lay off 108 employees at its Reston office. Even more shockingly, AOL apparently still exists.

It's easy to forget how huge a deal AOL once was, and its massive role in cementing NoVa's role as an Internet hub. From humble beginnings in Vienna, it moved to a massive campus in Sterling which is now, appropriately, a data center. But who knew it opened offices in Reston at some point? We've won some massive global headquarters over the years, but for some reason, this one warranted less attention than, say, a tuna cannery.

So pour one out for the early days of the Internet -- but be sure to put that drink on a coaster. If you don't have one handy, AOL manufactured more than a billion of them back in the day, the end.

Always Bet on Mauve: Casinopocalypse Bill Heads to Full Virginia House, Reston 'In Play' (Updated)

2026-02-27T17:27:00.005-05:00

Happy Friday News Dump, to all those who celebrate! Our BFFs at the Reston Association opted to send an update on the state of legislative maneuvering around Fairfax County's largely unsolicited, definitely irresponsible plastic fantastic casino proposal at 4:51pm this Friday afternoon, and it's a doozy! To be fair, that probably has more to do with the General Assembly's sneaky maneuvering on this bill, which stripped it of a bunch of qualifications that would have made it ~~harder to be foisted on an unwilling part of the county~~ more difficult to build and moved it out of committee to the full House of Delegates this afternoon, which plans to vote on it "quickly," according to our RA BFFs. Give us some good legalese blockquote:

The Appropriations committee removed several key provisions that would have made a casino more difficult to build or less profitable for developers:

Magisterial District Majority: The requirement for the casino to be approved by a majority of voters in the specific district where it would be located was removed. Only a countywide referendum is now required.
Mandatory Labor Protections: Requirements for prevailing wages and union hiring contracts were removed.
Enhanced Financials: The $150 million licensing fee and the 40% tax rate (which would have significantly benefited the county) were scaled back to align with current state law.

What REMAINS in the Bill:

Flexible Location: There is no longer a requirement for the casino to be in Tysons. It could realistically be placed anywhere in Fairfax County that meets the square footage requirement.
Development Size: Any gaming establishment must be part of a larger mixed-use development of at least 1.5 million square feet.
Public Safety Proffer: A mandatory requirement for the developer to fund or dedicate land for a public safety facility (e.g., police or fire station) remains.
Expiration Date: The authority to hold a referendum expires on July 1, 2029.

As this bill closely resembles the language passed in the Virginia Senate earlier this month, it means that Reston is once again in play as a possible location.

Hard to guess where there might be 1.5 million square feet of largely unclaimed euclidian office footage just sitting around in Reston, but we might consider giving our friendly state legislator a call or electronic message. You can find the RA's sample letter here, and a list of lawmakers here. And because the world hates irony, you apparently can't yet gamble online on whether a bill bringing gambling to the county will pass, with this fancy prediction market "web site" suggesting we spend our hard-earned Who's Your Baby Momma ad revenue on some far more trivial wagers:

That $30 minimum wage could buy a couple of watered down drinks at the ~~black~~mauvejack table, the end.

Update: The casino bill passed the Virginia House on March 4 and is expected to go to Gov. Abigail Spanberger, who will ultimately decide its fate. Give us some good procedural blockquote, BFFs at the Reston Association:

This afternoon, SB 756, known as the Fairfax County Casino Bill, passed the Virginia House of Delegates by a 64-32 vote. The bill was then voted on in the Senate and was sent to Conference. This means that 3 members of the House and 3 members of the Senate will discuss the bill as a committee before it is expected to go to the Governor's office for signature or veto.

Today, Reston Association Board President Travis Johnson shared the following statement:
“Reston Association remains opposed to a casino in our community. Unlike any other Virginia jurisdiction targeted for a casino – our community has not asked for this, and the passage of SB 756 disregards local governance and land‑use planning as well as the wishes of the vast majority of our members. We will do everything we can to mobilize the people of Reston to oppose this legislation.”
If you share our views that you do not want a casino in our community, we encourage you to share those thoughts with the Governor’s office by contacting: Abigail.Spanberger@governor.virginia.gov.
We need your advocacy now to help defeat this measure and protect our community.

Sadly, you still can't bet on the bill's passage on any of the major prediction markets -- which are kind of like casinos, only they exist online, not on used car lots or collections of oddly shaped polygons, the end.

Will the American Dream (Way) Remain Reston's First Gated Community? We Don't Know, But It Gave Us The Chance to Use A Decade-Old Meme

2026-02-24T12:05:00.003-05:00

Hey, remember that time when a developer was going to build a mixed-use townhouse community on the site of the former Fannie Mae campus on American Dream (heh) Way, and in the true spirt of that phrase they decided to make it a gated community, which was so antithetical to Reston's immaculate vibes that county planners recommended denying the entire project, but it was ultimately approved by the board of supervisors, in part because the developer said the gated access was needed to ensure the nine-story office building on the property would attract a tenant?

Yeah, that was awesome. Anyhoo, we've all watched the office building being slowly torn down over the past few months, and now the developer is requesting a rezoning application to build another 100 or so townhomes on the site. Give us some good procedural zoning blockquote, BFFs at Fairfax Now:

The county board’s decision to allow residential development on the site came despite objections from some residents and county staff, who took issue with Wheelock’s insistence on retaining a secured gate limiting access to a portion of American Dream Way. At the time, the property owner said the gate was necessary to draw tenants to the office building, which it still hoped to lease out... According to the application, Wheelock spent over $10 million since 2020 to maintain the approximately 400,000-square-foot office building, even it had “no prospect for re-tenanting.”

Sure, demand for office space has shifted in recent years, and there are a ton of shiny new ~~BASE-jumping launch points~~ trophy-class office towers around town. But that means county officials will demand that Wheelock remove the gates from the community as a condition of approving this request, right?

Right?

COMPUTER, EXECUTE TIRED_OLD_MEME.BAT:

Mauve Alert: The Sassy Chatbot Pretty Much Nailed It

2026-02-18T12:25:00.002-05:00

For reasons known only to The Pantopticon, this question and answer were served up unbidden by the AI powering the Facebooks following a recent post on this filthy "web log":

"Complex feelings," indeed. Let's ask the all-knowing sassy chatbot What Do It All Mean?

The tone and purpose of the site can be broken down as follows:
1. Tone: Satirical, Cynical, and Irreverent
The blog is written with a heavy dose of irony and "gallows humor" regarding suburban life. Key characteristics include:
Self-Deprecating Localism: It affectionately mocks Reston’s unique quirks, such as its obsession with "earth tones" (specifically mauve and brown), its rigid architectural standards, and its "plastic fantastic" planned-community nature.
Wry Skepticism: The writing often targets local governance (the Reston Association), developers, and "boxy buildings." It uses recurring jokes like "New Town™" and "conforming architectural non-conformity" to highlight the contradictions of the community.
Snarky Commentary: Even when reporting on serious local issues—like the closure of the RELAC cooling system or potential casino developments—the prose remains biting and sarcastic.
2. Purpose: Community Watchdog and "Counter-Narrative"
While it is funny, the site serves a functional role for the community:
The "Warts and All" View: The site explicitly states its purpose is to look at Reston "warts and all." It provides a counterpoint to the polished, "live-work-play" PR imagery put out by official entities.
Hyper-Local News Filter: It tracks zoning changes, retail openings/closings, and board elections, making dry civic news more engaging (and often more critical) for residents.
Community Identity: By leanings into "inside jokes" about Reston’s history and aesthetic, it creates a shared sense of identity for residents who love the town but enjoy venting about its bureaucratic or aesthetic eccentricities.

The anonymity is part of the blog’s brand; it allows the author to critique local powerful figures, developers, and neighbors without the social or professional friction that would come with being a known "curmudgeon" in a tightly-knit planned community.

Summary
If the official Reston.org is the community’s "brochure," Restonian.org is its "complaint department" run by a very witty, slightly exhausted resident. It serves as a satirical watchdog that keeps residents informed while poking fun at the absurdity of suburban planning.

Now that a small lake has been evaporated to answer this question, it's time to bring out the heavy guns: What Do It All Look Like?

Wow, it's like we're looking into a mirror, except that the computer looks way too new. But what's on the screen?

COMPUTER, ENHANCE:

We've been at a Level 5 Mauve Alert since 2007, but the sassy chatbot would have to drain Lake Newport dry to figure out what "lemee bovated" means, the end.

Casinopocalypse Soon, Maybe: New Bill Could Move Casino Out of Tysons to Another Place With a Bunch of Boxy Buildings (Hint: Here)

2026-02-12T20:04:00.002-05:00

Hey, remember that time there was a big push in the Virginia legislature to build a fancypants ~~national security honeytrap~~ casino in Fairfax County, with a lot of sketchy provisions that would really only allow it to be built in either Reston or Tysons, and then after a lot of hubbub, the bill was killed, and then after even more hubbub, it came back but the language was refined so said casino could literally only be built on the site of one used car lot in Tysons, which, you know, Tysons LOL, and then the bill was ~~killed~~ coldpilled, which sounds like a mid-tempo early oughts band and not a legitimate parliamentary maneuver, but we digress, and then it came back again and was killed by the state house?

Yeah, that was awesome. Well, this week, the bill re-emerged from the dead, and all that language about the Tysons used car lot was stripped out, meaning that the casino could be built anywhere in the county, including another Metro-adjacent area with fewer used car lots and more tall buildings, not all of which have sides that intersect at 90-degree angles, including ones owned by casino-curious companies which in the past have donated significant amounts of money to pro-casino state lawmakers and tried to outright buy local elections. Sound familiar?

The Reston Association board voted to oppose the changes in Senate Bill 756, saying:

Reston Association is disappointed at the news that SB 756, which would allow for a casino in Fairfax County, was amended to remove location-specific language in the bill and passed through the Senate Finance and Appropriations Resource Subcommittee yesterday morning. Reston Association maintains that a casino is detrimental to our community and goes against the careful planning that has been a part of Reston for more than six decades.
Reston Association has consistently and unequivocally opposed the idea of a casino in Reston. Our members have never expressed a desire or need for such a facility. Reston is a proven economic engine with a robust commercial tax base, world-class corporations, and innovative technology firms. Introducing a casino would jeopardize this success, as companies considering relocation have indicated such a development would make the corridor a “no-go zone” for future investment.

We don't know, though. One Action McNews story described the proposed casino as "classy," like "Wynn in Las Vegas," but that would be a total violation of contemporary Reston design cues. Just look at this thing:

While we appreciate the DRB-friendly choice of goldenrod as a colorway, that curvy building with those rounded edges simply don't fit in with this:

Get a carpenter's square and some woonerf and we'll talk, the end.

VY ask VY? Apartments that Sparked Reston's Consonant-Happy Trend Gets Old-Sounding New Name

2026-01-15T16:18:00.003-05:00

VY ask VY? Apparently that's what the new owners of our favorite vowel-free apartment complex in South Reston with a parking garage camouflaged so deftly that it's practically invisible to the naked eye asked themselves, and they decided the answer was vowels. Lots of vowels, in convenient word-you-can-find-in-a-dictionary format!

Behold The Point at Rise, and yeah, we guess there's a hill there or something, since the original name of the entire development was Reston Heights, at least until some latte-holding, goatee-wearing bespectacled "brand manager" (it was the oughts, after all) suggested the name VY, which apparently is an abbreviation for "very."

But now, RIP VY. At least the name was original, and an inspiration for everything from burger joints and vowel-curious Metro-adjacent apartments to cold plungeries. Frankly, the name "The Point at Rise" is so boring that we're falling asleep as we type this on the membrane keyboard of the Atari 400 that powers this filthy "web log" and skimming the model apartment photos. Wait, what's this?

Computer, ENHANCE:

Luckily, the blinding 650-watt equivalent output of that hipster not-a-vintage-fan-but-a-light in the model apartment could keep even a mole rat awake enough to read the handy at-arm's-reach model apartment travel book (called "Travel Book"), the end.

The Biennial What’s Out/What’s In List for Reston

2026-01-05T17:45:00.002-05:00

Happy 2026! Back by (semi-)popular demand for the first time since 2024, here’s our (semi-)annual list of what’s out and what’s in for our plastic fantastic planned community:

OUT	IN
Jet-age lake cooled AC	Brownouts from jet-age wiring
Office parks becoming homes	Team huddles in the breakfast nook
DRB citations for Mocha Mousse trim (PANTONE 17-1230)	DRB citations for Cloud Dancer trim (PANTONE 11-4201)
"Civic plazas" (Reston Station)	"Central greens" (RTC North)
Dark sky lighting	Blinding motel LEDs
Planner-proposed roundabouts	Planner-proposed runarounds
Vowel-free apartment buildings (RIP VY)	Vowel-free cold plungeries
Boozin' at RTC	Booz Allen in RTC
Paid parking	Gated communities
Bears in Herndon	Karens in Loudoun
Pedestrian bridges over Wiehle	Pedestrian bridges between office buildings
Wondering when Taco Bell will reopen	Wondering when pools will close
Invasive plants	Invasive developers
Tired "web log" listicles	Wired newspaper listicles

This post was originally published in the Reston Letter.

2025: The Reston Year in Review

2025-12-31T13:35:00.008-05:00

If you're looking for a metaphor for what 2025 was like in our favorite plastic fantastic planned community, you could do worse than this cellular telephone photo of a garbage truck in front of the office building on American Dream (heh) Way being prematurely demolished to make room for, whazzitcalled, a gated community to keep us Lesser Restonians out, as God and Bob Simon clearly intended, while a golf course sits behind it, invisible to the camera eye but even unseen causing the mouths of developers to involuntarily water, the end.

Computer, ENHANCE:

Yep. Checks out.

On Soapstone, Crime Pays (in Paint)

2025-11-24T12:25:00.001-05:00

While perusing the Face Books, somewhere between a post from someone we sat next to one time in a grade school assembly and a 1,000-word rant about a restaurant visit gone bad, we noticed that an intrepid member of the Reston Herndon Community Group posted this lovely cellular telephone photo of the Soapstone 7-11, which apparently appears to have some... inventory control issues. But is it just toothless corporate boilerplate? Let's find out:

Unless that's a display case for some product in throwback 1980s packaging, apparently not, so be warned if you're looking for a five-finger discount on a cord of wood or a case of bottled water, the end.

You've Got Ring Around the Cluster: The Heartbreak of Drought and Dried Out Concrete

2025-10-18T11:25:00.003-04:00

Growing up in the fab 1970s, we learned that the absolute most embarrassing thing that could ever happen to someone was to be caught in public with ring around the collar. Now, with the ongoing lack of rain, we're noting that some of our favorite water-adjacent clusters have their own unsightly stains. Oh, the humanity!

Please to be noting this SHOCKING cellular telephone photo, with the comical light fixture and its incandescent lighting hovering in the foreground as silent judge, jury, and executioner:

A little club soda will get that out!

While we keep our fingers crossed for rain, perhaps the RA could learn something from this helpful instructional video for ~~housewives~~ HOAs:

We don't know who the child actor relentlessly mocking their father in this ad is, but we're guessing she ended up all right, the end.

RELAC Didn't Do It: With Yet Another Closure, Frankie Goes To Hollywood, Maybe for Good This Time (Updated)

2025-10-12T17:11:00.003-04:00

Sad news for fans of humid air, peeling wallpaper, and jet-age technology: RELAC announced Friday that it is discontinuing operations, saying that “rising operating costs, aging infrastructure, and a decline in participation have made it impossible to sustain the utility in a reliable, safe and financially responsible way.”

The Reston Association quickly issued a statement saying it's not involved and has no oversight over RELAC, not our problem nosiree!, but just the same reminded property owners not to forget Section VI.3(d)(15) of the Reston Deed. For those of you who haven't committed the Deed to memory as required in that thick binder of disclosure documents you signed when you bought your home, that's the part about requiring homes with RELAC connections to use it and not that new-fangled "air conditioning" people keep prattling on about. (Presumably Section VI.3(d)(16) has something about bell bottoms being part of the mandatory Reston dress code, but the dog ate our dog-eared copy.)

But we digress. Similar closure news happened a couple of years back, but there was talk then about turning it into some socialist co-op, and then RELAC was handed over to a contractor, and the tepid air kept a'comin', except when it didn't. Residents reported multiple outages this summer, with temperatures inside some homes reaching 85 degrees or higher.

Other homeowners reported that the system stopped working on Friday. Your intrepid Restonian On Your Side I-Team Action McNews correspondent had noticed earlier in the week that unsettling grinding and clanking noises were coming from the RELAC machinery near Lake Anne, but attributed them to the incredibly low water levels of rain-starved Lake Anne, which provides the juice for the system, if by "juice," you mean "tepid water for the tubes."

What will RA leadership do? Give us some good blockquote:

RA leadership will be meeting to discuss next steps in the coming days and will keep affected members updated on the process. For the latest information, please continue to visit the RELAC page on RA’s website.

We will! Referenda to remove the RELAC requirement failed in 2024, 2015 and 2008. We're guessing it won't fail again if put up to a vote.

For all our jokes made comfortably within the air-conditioned nerve center of Restonian World Headquarters, RELAC's latest shutdown is still a shame. In the heat of the summer, it's nice to walk through neighborhoods without the sound of individual AC units droning away, but it's probably nicer to have a home or business that doesn't feel like a sauna. The RA did provide a medical opt-out for the system, which multiple operators have said siphoned off enough customers over the years to make the math not math. So not a great situation for anyone involved, and a little bit of what made Reston a little bit different when it was founded is likely going away.

So pour one out for RELAC, but leave that drink of choice out of the fridge for at least 45 minutes before doing so, the end.

Update: According to this, roughly one-quarter of RELAC households had been given the cough cough sneeze sneeze "allergy" exemption this year, much like our decidedly non-allergic college roommate when we lived in an un-airconditioned dorm. Hard to see how anyone could keep the system sustainable that way.

Hunter Mill Supervisor Walter Alcorn has weighed in as well:

Now is the time for the homes and businesses that relied on RELAC to plan for how they'll meet their cooling needs next summer. This is why I've reached out to the Waterview, Hickory, Washington Plaza, Wainwright, Coleson and Governor's Square Clusters and the Vantage Hill and Lake Anne condo associations. I've inquired about their plans, as well as asked what, if anything, the county may be able to do to help like expediting permitting for new cooling systems. RELAC has always been a private utility, however. So, homeowners will need to find alternatives soon before the summer heat returns.

And now the Reston Association has weighed in. Noting that the utility has not formally issued an intent to dissolve, the RA states:

Reston Association is not affiliated with nor does it have oversight over RELAC and so must await formal notification as to either the formal closure of the company or of a new owner/operator who intends to continue service.

In the meantime, RA is still expeditiously processing medical exemption forms from RA members affected by RELAC who have a need to install individual cooling units in their homes. Cluster members with a medical need must receive a medical exemption from the Covenants Committee prior to submitting a DRB application for an HVAC system. Eligible members can complete the medical exemption form and DRB application for HVAC at any time.

At this time, properties subject to the covenant, without an approved medical exemption, will not be permitted to install exterior HVAC systems.

In the meantime, a Confidential Restonian Operative sent us this cellular telephone photo of a RELAC customer waiting for their home to cool down during the most recent heat wave:

We'll Leave the (Burnt Orange) Light on For You

2025-10-09T17:13:00.008-04:00

The last year has seen one big change in Reston--not one, but two fancy new hotels have opened their doors with amenities that would have been unthinkable when our plastic fantastic planned community was founded. Rooftop bars with views of bland glass boxes rivaling those in, say, downtown Dallas! Multiple dining "concepts," for those who find "food" too commonplace! Rare bourbons, not the stuff in plastic bottles once made right here in Reston for folks at a certain state school!

Now, we're simple folk who usually stay at lesser hotel brands, ones where you can park right outside your front door and walk down a "breezeway" to get ice from a machine that sounds like a broken rock tumbler. But we do think these hotels would benefit from a little more...Reston.

Instead of rooftop bars, why not a sunken conversation pit? Nothing sparks lively conversation and good times like stepping down into a living space muted by thick wall-to-wall carpeting.

Instead of pricey wooden and textile finishes to signal contemporary good taste, why not poured concrete? If it was good enough for generations of Reston kids to play on, it's good enough for a C-level executive flying into town for an in-person "standup," whatever that is.

Gyms with ellipticals and weight racks are great, but to get your guests' heart rate really pumping, why not provide bikes and point them to the W&OD? They'll be in tip-top shape, assuming they don't get run off the trail.

Instead of valet parking, why not offer baffling color-coded garages, inscrutable rules about when you can park for free, and an app to provide the true Reston experience?

Everyone loves room service, but we love chain dining even more!

And, of course, what busy business person doesn't love golfing when they're not busy doing business? Might want to hurry up and get those guest passes while they're still available, the end.

This post was originally published in the Reston Letter.

A Room With An (Expensive) View: Fancypants New Hotel Has 24-Hour Room Service, Creepy Robert E. Simon Mask

2025-09-29T22:11:00.003-04:00

While we were focusing on the An Art and palpable lack of woonerf right outside, the fancypants JW Marriott at Reston Station opened its doors to guests last week. We Restonians -- us lumpen proletariats, toiling away at our rapidly endangered government contracting jobs strapping bombs to dolphins -- are now the hosts of Virginia's ONLY JW Marriott, among the fanciest of the fancy Marriott hotel "brands."

"Every moment made exquisite," the hotel's website gushes, and we agree! For a high-end chain, the folks at Marriott really leaned into the Reston mystique. Its signature restaurant is called "The Simon," and it offers "a multi-sensory journey" (we assume one of the senses is taste, but then again, we're simple folk who usually stay at lesser hotel brands, ones where you can park right outside your front door and walk down a "breezeway" to get ice from a machine that sounds like a broken rock tumbler). Another amenity is the "Schar Bar," named after the folks who funded Inova's cancer center and offering the bourbons which were once made right down Sunset Hills from this august hotel. Plus, as an added bonus, you can be ~~creeped out~~ inspired by this ~~terrifying death mask~~ breathtaking rendering of Robert E. Simon:

Yikes. Hopefully that glass frame will keep it from escaping and invading our nightmares. If not, those of us of a certain age can remember the first time we saw something similar:

But enough of the public spaces. What are the rooms like? Well, they have beds and whatnot, plus windows that offer this breathtaking view of our cutting-edge, Metro-adjacent developments:

Stunning. Let's see how affordable that million-dollar view might be.

COMPUTER, ENHANCE:

Oof. People are going to have to clicky clicky on a lot of the fun WHO'S YOUR BABY'S DADDY ads on this filthy "web log" for us to be able to afford a night away, if by "away," you mean "right down the street with $45 hamburgers for room service," the end.

Here An Art, There An Art: Everywhere An Art Art: New Arts Confound Restonians, Or Maybe Just Us

2025-09-25T10:23:00.000-04:00

Way back in Reston's Golden Age, when the Silver Line was still a dream we could only clap for, we would pore over the design documents and behold the breathtaking vision for Reston's 21st century future. And it was rad!

BEHOLD, what might have been at the Wiehle Reston Metro Station, instead of a giant LCD screen showing fish and whatnot. You can sense the '80s vibes.

Clean. Edgy, in a tasteful pastel sort of way. Never happened for reasons known only to God and WMATA. But the second phase of the Silver Line did include a different An Art for the RTC Metro Station, which was completed last year. This An Art reflects a... different vision.

Behold "Ethos." No clean lines. No pastels. Something vaguely cyber-y? If only there was an explanation to help us comprehend this An Art! Oh, wait:

Completed in 2024, the design was inspired by the founder of Reston — Robert E. Simon — and the statement that “You can’t have a Utopia of one.” The artwork, inspired by these interactions, is multifaceted and thought of as a dialogue in which everyone can participate. Bates' design for the station can be seen as referencing artistic movements and philosophies such as Brutalism, Modernism, Wabi-Sabi, and Universal Constructivism, or as an echo of the biophilic character of Reston's history of natural and environmental integration, growth, and togetherness. It may also be experienced as a representation of emotional delight, as the "Play" from the "Live, Work, Play" maxim of Reston's founding vision.

IT MAY. To us, it looks like something that would be used on an album cover for some '90s grunge band. There's an old saying that the 1980s was basically a reboot of the 1950s and the 1990s was the same for the 1960s. So if the ought-teens were the '80s and the ought-twenties are the '90s, who knows what will be in vogue in just five years time? An homage to reality TV? Land wars in Asia? Green Day cover bands? The mind boggles.

But we digress. This An Art was nominated for a fancy award, but sadly, it lost to other An Arts with names like "Cloud Puncher" and "Elder Mother". But do those An Arts allow people to peer through them, metaphorically speaking, and see the monolithic earth-toned pillar of a Metro station totem sticking out like the proverbial sore thumb? WE THINK NOT.

Meanwhile, across town (or at least down Sunset Hills), another An Art was unveiled earlier this month. Called "Building Bridges," it is a replica of An Art in Venice, only instead of romantic sun-flecked canals navigated by singing gondoliers in striped shirts we have endless traffic crammed into one lane as cranes work to finish the fancy mauvescraper it sits in front of. BEHOLD:

We could have had woonerf in this very spot, but instead we got this scaled down version of An Art. Again, we are not bright enough to understand the meaning of this An Art without some blockquote. Oh, wait:

“I want this sculpture to spread love and to make us realize that, really, skin-deep we are all the same. It doesn’t matter where we come from or our background—it’s important to work together to bring the world together. There are so many wonderful, good-hearted people who need to work together to make this a better world. When we work together, humanity achieves greatness.”

True true, as the kids today might have said as recently as six months ago, before devolving into polyglot phrases such as "Skibidi." Anyhoo, expose yourself to your nearest An Art, we guess, the end.

Counting What Matters in Reston

2025-08-04T10:28:00.039-04:00

Somehow, we missed the annual Reston Butterfly Count this summer. But thanks to a helpful Reston Association press release, we learned that while volunteers spotted plenty of different species, overall numbers were down. Sightings ranged from the European Cabbage White (which also happens to be a DRB-approved trim color) to the Huron Sachem Skipper (that abandoned floating dock), and the Common Wood Nymph (think closing time at one of RTC’s many fine watering holes).

But we digress. Why should we only count the bugs flitting through our plastic-fantastic planned community? They don’t even pay HOA dues! Here are some other things we, as Right-Thinking Restonians, might consider keeping tabs on:

The number of times the police helicopter circles over Reston. Airborne like the butterflies, but with a distinct soupçon of suburban suspicion.
The number of Facebook and Nextdoor posts about the police helicopter circling over Reston. Grab some extra scratch paper for this one.
The number of vowels in apartment and business names. BLVD, VY, SWTHZ, the late-lamented BGR (RIP)—you could count them on one hand.
The number of fish swimming on the jumbotron at Wiehle Metro. Great for keeping the kids occupied while you try to remember if you parked on level G95 or G96.
The average indoor temperature in homes with Reston’s jet-age lake-cooled AC system. Bonus points for breaking triple digits!
The number of green dots signifying open parking spaces in RTC garages. For extra fun, subtract the actual number of open spaces and order that many breadsticks at your favorite chain restaurant.
The number of 90-degree angles in the new buildings rising near Wiehle Metro. You won’t need a lot of paper for this one.
The number of walls meeting at 90-degree angles inside Reston’s 50-year-old homes. Another low number. Things improve with age—but don’t necessarily get more plumb.
The number of golf balls sliced into the woods around Reston’s golf courses. If some folks have their way, that number may soon drop faster than the butterfly count, the end.

This post was originally published in the Reston Letter.

Vowel Movement: Consonant Explosion More Unnerving Than A Cold Plunge

2025-07-03T10:21:00.005-04:00

Following in the footsteps of some of Reston's trendier, or at least blockier, apartment complexes, this vaguely Welsh-sounding business is currently under construction in RTC West, whatever that is. For those of us over the age of 27 and/or not goatee-adorned "brand consultants," this loosely translates to "Sweathouse" in English, and will apparently be a place where you can sit in an infrared sauna followed by a cold plunge to, wedunno, sweat all the vowels out of your system?

We've got a fever, and the only cure is more consonants!

We're old enough to have the name, like Proust's madelines, spontaneously remind us of some of our favorite TV sitcom characters:

Who among us didn't laugh along with the SWTHGZ, the end.

The DOGE Days of Summer

2025-07-01T17:32:00.032-04:00

There's been a lot of talk about efficiency these days, but why does it have to stop with the gubmint? As the founding members of the Department of Cluster Efficiency (DOCE), we and our employee (a 21-year-old named Big DRBs) have taken over the RA headquarters and stayed up 23 hours a day for the last four months finding ways to save us all money on our annual assessments. Here's what we've found so far:

Swimming pools. 15 of them is way too many, especially when we have all those lakes, just sitting there! Sure, there are some algae blooms and whatnot, but a tube of Neosporin is a heck of a lot cheaper than a pool pass.

Sunrise Valley and Sunset Hills. Clear waste—why do we need two roads when one would do? Call it Midday Motorway and be done with it.

Yard waste pickups. We have common areas for a reason, right? As an added bonus, dumping all our leaves into those otherwise underused spaces will deprive Reston's dreaded invasive plants of sunlight. Win-win.

Color palettes. Why do we need all these wasteful colors like Sea Foam and Copper Taupe? Look at our neighbor to the east, Vienna, and just paint everything a nice uniform brown.

McTacoHut. Clear inefficiency. We've already lost the Hut, resulting in 33% savings, but why do we need two drive-throughs when one could dispense both round meat discs and tubular meat sacs?

Library. There's talk about building a new one, but who reads books these days? There are plenty of quality free newspapers and blogs out there.

Electric car charging stations. We do need those, for reasons, and preferably near Terraset Elementary, which bears an uncanny resemblance to our fancy new stainless steel pickup truck.

Tot lots. Why coddle the youngest Restonians? Just give them some rocks and sticks and let them play in the parking lots. Again, Neosporin.

Two golf courses. Don't worry, some out-of-towners are already hard at work on that one, the end.

This post was originally published in the Reston Letter.

Meanwhile, in the Anti-Reston: Herndon is Apparently Big Game Country, Just Barely

2025-06-10T14:07:00.001-04:00

It's been a while since we've chronicled the exploits of our friendly neighbor to the west, in large part because ~~we haven't chronicled much of anything of late~~ the arrival of Metro has made the town a less distinctive part of the much larger, more uniform sprawly "Dulles Corridor," whatever that is.

But we digress! Yesterday, we learned that the town, despite its easy access to the Silver Line and some fun artisanal tunnels, is officially bear country! Grab your tranquilizer gun and read some good nature time blockquote from our BFFs at Channel 4:

A black bear who spent hours in a tree on a busy street in Herndon, Virginia, on Monday was safely captured and taken to Shenandoah National Park, wildlife officials said.
The ordeal prompted a crowd of onlookers to gather nearby — even as police told residents to keep their distance.
Herndon police blocked off the 800 block of Elden Street around 3:30 p.m. in both directions after the male bear was spotted in the tree. Earlier in the day, residents saw him roaming their yards in a neighborhood.

The police dubbed the bear "Elden," because why not, it's fun.

So long, Elden, we hardly knew you!

Update: Turns out it's not just unruly undomesticated mammals who appreciate our neighbor to the west. HOA-hating posters on the Face Books apparently do too:

Lake Anne Rebranding: Get Your Mind Out of the Gutter, or at Least the Fountain

2025-05-31T14:05:00.004-04:00

The perennial rebranding of Lake Anne Village Center got a little more, um, titillating this week when our BFFs at Reston Now pointed out that the current logo is a tad, ah, "suggestive." Give us some good PG-13 blockquote, BFFs at Reston Now:

The current Lake Anne logo has a somewhat retro feel — though the “A” part of the symbol, intended to evoke the fountain in the middle of the lake, did draw some Freudian sniggers on the social media site BlueSky.

You mean the Children's Fountain? Sure, RN, blame it on the sickos on BlueSky, and not your own fevered imaginations.

Because Restonian is always On Your Side, we walked over to the Plaza to see just how suggestive things are, and despite some extremely tame unpleasantness that riled people up nearly 15 years back, we can report there's simply nothing to see here these days, nosiree! Nothing at all, even when you go out back and -- oh, wait:

Computer, ENHANCE:

As noted planned community enthusiast Sigmund Freud once famously wrote, sometimes a flagrant DRB violation is just a flagrant DRB violation, the end.

Hats Off for Cathy Hudgins

2025-05-26T13:06:00.002-04:00

Sad news: Just days after Rep. Gerry Connolly passed away on May 21, former Hunter Mill Supervisor Cathy Hudgins passed away on Saturday. Among many other accomplishments, she was instrumental in bringing the Silver Line to Reston and beyond. Here's current Hunter Mill Supervisor Walter Alcorn's tribute and a video honoring her service on the board from 2019: