What is Ashburn like?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Boring, devoid of culture, and rich in traffic. Wegman's will be the center of your universe.

Since there is a Tysons commute in your household, consider the area around Hunter Mill Rd. Close to Tysons, solidly suburban, but much more accessible to DC, Tysons, Reston, etc.

In Ashburn you're only close to Leesburg, Dulles Town Center, and that unfinished Loudoun Town Center (the place with the Uncle Julios and a few other restaurants surrounded by parking lots and new construction residences on tiny lots) apparent failure.

To each is own, the suburbs aren't for everyone, but we love it out here. Although I do love Wegmans, there's plenty of other things to do, especially of you have a family.

As far as "Loudoun Town Center" goes...you mean One Loudoun which has something like 20 restaurants, an Alamo theater which is great (and just expanded) a kids concert series and splash pads for the in the summer? Sure, the restaurants are fairly common place but to call it an apparent failure? Weird.

[Anonymous]

I work in Tyson's with a lot of people who commute from Ashburn- they seem to love it, lots of young families, nice neighborhoods with pools, etc, and the schools are good. They have nice homes that weren't crazy expensive. They may not be unique, custom woodwork, etc. homes, but they are comfortable for their lifestyle.
I live closer in and am happy where I am, but for OP's situation, it sounds like it could be a good fit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Boring, devoid of culture, and rich in traffic. Wegman's will be the center of your universe.

Since there is a Tysons commute in your household, consider the area around Hunter Mill Rd. Close to Tysons, solidly suburban, but much more accessible to DC, Tysons, Reston, etc.

In Ashburn you're only close to Leesburg, Dulles Town Center, and that unfinished Loudoun Town Center (the place with the Uncle Julios and a few other restaurants surrounded by parking lots and new construction residences on tiny lots) apparent failure.

To each is own, the suburbs aren't for everyone, but we love it out here. Although I do love Wegmans, there's plenty of other things to do, especially of you have a family.

As far as "Loudoun Town Center" goes...you mean One Loudoun which has something like 20 restaurants, an Alamo theater which is great (and just expanded) a kids concert series and splash pads for the in the summer? Sure, the restaurants are fairly common place but to call it an apparent failure? Weird.

+1 to this. One Loudoun is really quite nice.

Ashburn is really quite large, with many different communities. We moved into a SFH in Ashburn Village just this year. We got more bang for our buck, home-wise, than we would closer in. Schools seem to be very good (our DD isn't school-age yet), and it works well with our commutes. We looked around quite a bit, and we chose the area north of the toll road (20147) specifically because most of the neighborhoods were more mature. The 20148 area seemed to be piled full of construction and cookie-cutter homes, and both of us wanted a more "settled" area with trees, wider streets. larger lots, etc. Similar to previous posters, I can walk to the W&OD, the bank, local grocery store, community centers/pools/playgrounds/tennis courts, etc.
I'm not bothered by the plane noise from Dulles. On occasion, one will go over the neighborhood on approach into Dulles, but it isn't this constant noise of jet engines, 24/7, like some people seem to think.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I live in Loudoun Valley Estates (on 606 right behind the airport........there are multiple LVE neighborhoods, ours is separate in Dulles/Sterling). I the comment re: airport / airplane noise interesting as we live very close to the airport and do not have that problem. Since we are so close (and more parallel to the runways), we don't have any noise, but I think some of the Ashburn neighborhoods suffer due to the planes turning after take-off, especially the international flights in the early evening. I have heard a lot of people enjoy Willowsford, but I do think the commute options from there can be challenging. Although we now work from home offices, my husband and I commuted for years to Bethesda and Tysons Corner from our neighborhood and since we are just down the road from the Greenway exit on 606, we could easily cut 20-30 minutes off of our commute time. I did go into the office early (7am-3:30pm) to accommodate my kids' schedules and it took 20 minutes to get to Tysons, 40 minutes to downtown Bethesda. If you go during prime rush hour, add 20 minutes. I highly doubt that is doable from Willowsford and/or the other Ashburn communities. We do have to drive to some of the amenities people mention above, but we also have a lot of flexibility because we are in the middle of Ashburn, Brambleton, South Riding, Dulles, Sterling, Herndon, etc. This has been great for kid activities (and other reasons such as Dr. selection, etc) as we could select based on convenience / schedule as opposed to being restricted based on geography lines.

Sorry for the long reply - I think there is a little bit of everything out in this area if you can prioritize what is most important to you. For us, we love our 7500+ sq ft home with large yard on a cul de sac where the kids play outside with the neighbors regularly and the excellent schools. Our commutes are relatively short (my commute to Bethesda was often shorter than my colleagues who lived in Bethesda) and we are fine with driving 5-10 minutes to hit a variety of stores / restaurants or to one of the many pools. If you are looking for a full amenity neighborhood that is "walkable" to things, Brambleton fits the bill for newer and Ashburn Village / Farm for older properties. It's a big decision - Good Luck!

How was your commute shorter from Ashburn to Bethesda than your co-workers who live in Bethesda? Serous question. I have co-workers in Herndon who at a minimum do it an hour to Bethesda.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I live in Loudoun Valley Estates (on 606 right behind the airport........there are multiple LVE neighborhoods, ours is separate in Dulles/Sterling). I the comment re: airport / airplane noise interesting as we live very close to the airport and do not have that problem. Since we are so close (and more parallel to the runways), we don't have any noise, but I think some of the Ashburn neighborhoods suffer due to the planes turning after take-off, especially the international flights in the early evening. I have heard a lot of people enjoy Willowsford, but I do think the commute options from there can be challenging. Although we now work from home offices, my husband and I commuted for years to Bethesda and Tysons Corner from our neighborhood and since we are just down the road from the Greenway exit on 606, we could easily cut 20-30 minutes off of our commute time. I did go into the office early (7am-3:30pm) to accommodate my kids' schedules and it took 20 minutes to get to Tysons, 40 minutes to downtown Bethesda. If you go during prime rush hour, add 20 minutes. I highly doubt that is doable from Willowsford and/or the other Ashburn communities. We do have to drive to some of the amenities people mention above, but we also have a lot of flexibility because we are in the middle of Ashburn, Brambleton, South Riding, Dulles, Sterling, Herndon, etc. This has been great for kid activities (and other reasons such as Dr. selection, etc) as we could select based on convenience / schedule as opposed to being restricted based on geography lines.

Sorry for the long reply - I think there is a little bit of everything out in this area if you can prioritize what is most important to you. For us, we love our 7500+ sq ft home with large yard on a cul de sac where the kids play outside with the neighbors regularly and the excellent schools. Our commutes are relatively short (my commute to Bethesda was often shorter than my colleagues who lived in Bethesda) and we are fine with driving 5-10 minutes to hit a variety of stores / restaurants or to one of the many pools. If you are looking for a full amenity neighborhood that is "walkable" to things, Brambleton fits the bill for newer and Ashburn Village / Farm for older properties. It's a big decision - Good Luck!

How was your commute shorter from Ashburn to Bethesda than your co-workers who live in Bethesda? Serous question. I have co-workers in Herndon who at a minimum do it an hour to Bethesda.

I know it sounds crazy, but it took me 40-45 minutes door-to-door from my home in LVE to my office at 7272 Wisconsin. My boss lived just up the street near the NIH (literally a few minutes from the office) and could take 45-60 minutes to get home. It is all about traffic patterns and timing.