Mythical Western HS

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just because a new ES might be in Dranesville doesn’t mean it will get assigned to Herndon rather than Westfield. A small part of Westfield is in Dranesville now, and with Centreville being built out to 3000 one could easily see more of Bull Run and/or London Towne getting moved to Centreville so Westfield can handle Silver Line growth near Coates.

Curious on why you are so sure that 1) Bull Run and London Town will be moved to Centreville and 2) Westfield alone can take care of the Silverline growth. I mean it’s a possibility but did the CIP or any board member mention that scenario? I don’t even know when Centreville expansion will happen.

On the othern hand, Herndon High just finished the expansion and have extra capacity now. HMS also has some extra capacity. Some of Herndon town kids go to Coates as of now. From another thread, once all the current and planned housing projects are done, Herndon High will see 2 (two!) additional students while Westfield is projected to have additional 597 students.

Which TOH kids go to Coates?

Oh. That’s not TOH.

DP, but a small area east of Elden Street and north of the Toll Road. Basically the Worldgate Condo area.

[Anonymous]

Yes, it is. It's not the "historic district," but it's within the town of Herndon boundaries.

https://www.herndon-va.gov/home/showpublisheddocument/2763/635856861521230000

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm thinking that Silverline ES is going to be grouped with Mythical HS, as in, never gonna happen. If you look at the toll road, there are elementary schools all along it. Where would a new one even go? It seems those school would also start seeing expansions like the high schools.

The difference is that FCPS has a site for Sliverline ES but no site for Mythical HS. According to a map in the CIP, Silverline ES will be built west of 28 and south of toll road near Coates.

From a somewhat dated article:
The plan depicts a five-story, 135,000-square-foot elementary school — details that are contingent on the future approvals of the final development plan for the school and pending discussions between the school system and land use staff.

https://www.restonnow.com/2019/10/28/planning-funds-sought-for-new-elementary-school-near-silver-line/

Also buiding a new HS would threaten Langley parents. Building an ES that’d feed to HMS and HHS would reduce the threat.

In the adopted FY 2023-27 CIP, Herndon's renovation was shown as expanding the school to 2500 seats. The draft FY 2024-28 CIP now shows Herndon with a program capacity of 2744 and to be at only 85% capacity over the next five years.

Typical for FCPS, they don't indicate whether they expanded Herndon more than planned or just recalculated the school's capacity. If it's really 15% under capacity that could re-open the discussion about moving Forestville back to the Herndon pyramid. Those folks will have every incentive to try and get part of Westfield assigned to Herndon in connection with a new ES.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm thinking that Silverline ES is going to be grouped with Mythical HS, as in, never gonna happen. If you look at the toll road, there are elementary schools all along it. Where would a new one even go? It seems those school would also start seeing expansions like the high schools.

The difference is that FCPS has a site for Sliverline ES but no site for Mythical HS. According to a map in the CIP, Silverline ES will be built west of 28 and south of toll road near Coates.

From a somewhat dated article:
The plan depicts a five-story, 135,000-square-foot elementary school — details that are contingent on the future approvals of the final development plan for the school and pending discussions between the school system and land use staff.

https://www.restonnow.com/2019/10/28/planning-funds-sought-for-new-elementary-school-near-silver-line/

Also buiding a new HS would threaten Langley parents. Building an ES that’d feed to HMS and HHS would reduce the threat.

In the adopted FY 2023-27 CIP, Herndon's renovation was shown as expanding the school to 2500 seats. The draft FY 2024-28 CIP now shows Herndon with a program capacity of 2744 and to be at only 85% capacity over the next five years.

Typical for FCPS, they don't indicate whether they expanded Herndon more than planned or just recalculated the school's capacity. If it's really 15% under capacity that could re-open the discussion about moving Forestville back to the Herndon pyramid. Those folks will have every incentive to try and get part of Westfield assigned to Herndon in connection with a new ES.

What about the middle school capacity? You can’t just look at the high school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm thinking that Silverline ES is going to be grouped with Mythical HS, as in, never gonna happen. If you look at the toll road, there are elementary schools all along it. Where would a new one even go? It seems those school would also start seeing expansions like the high schools.

The difference is that FCPS has a site for Sliverline ES but no site for Mythical HS. According to a map in the CIP, Silverline ES will be built west of 28 and south of toll road near Coates.

From a somewhat dated article:
The plan depicts a five-story, 135,000-square-foot elementary school — details that are contingent on the future approvals of the final development plan for the school and pending discussions between the school system and land use staff.

https://www.restonnow.com/2019/10/28/planning-funds-sought-for-new-elementary-school-near-silver-line/

PP. Oh wow, thanks for the link. That would also have to mean widening Frying Pan Road. Could you imagine the traffic with a school there? There are no connecting roads or shortcuts besides Sunrise Valley and Frying Pan which are both two lane roads over there. I can see how a lot of infrastructure improvements would need to happen even if they could break ground tomorrow.

[Anonymous]

Has anyone on here who desperately wants this high school built ever tried to figure out where they could actually build it? That is the real problem. You can blame the current school board all you want, you can blame politics, Langley parents, whatever you want. But it all comes down to them not being able to find a decent site that that could actually afford.

[Anonymous]

I'm going to throw a wild idea out here. Would there ever be an appetite for sharing of athletic fields and facilities like cities have to do? I feel like a big footprint of high schools is the football field, baseball diamond, soccer field, practice fields for all of those and parking as well. How much space do they need to teach students without all of those?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Has anyone on here who desperately wants this high school built ever tried to figure out where they could actually build it? That is the real problem. You can blame the current school board all you want, you can blame politics, Langley parents, whatever you want. But it all comes down to them not being able to find a decent site that that could actually afford.

Yep, it's totally fair that western Fairfax gets factories and Langley is semi-private. #OneFairfax

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Has anyone on here who desperately wants this high school built ever tried to figure out where they could actually build it? That is the real problem. You can blame the current school board all you want, you can blame politics, Langley parents, whatever you want. But it all comes down to them not being able to find a decent site that that could actually afford.

Yep, it's totally fair that western Fairfax gets factories and Langley is semi-private. #OneFairfax

Can you answer the actual question?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Has anyone on here who desperately wants this high school built ever tried to figure out where they could actually build it? That is the real problem. You can blame the current school board all you want, you can blame politics, Langley parents, whatever you want. But it all comes down to them not being able to find a decent site that that could actually afford.

Op here. I’ve been following this for years.

There was a prime lot adjacent to Carson middle. FCPS should have built the new HS on that site and probabaly that was the very original plan. Instead they gave that away to Saudis without getting much community input.

Then they wanted to build the HS on Hutchison site. Since one of then board members had said the new HS woild take some of Herndon kids and in turn HHS would take Great Falls kids, this whole thing became a political issue. It’s not about giving relief to crowded Western Fairfax anymore. It’s more about equity and whether Langley should take some of low income families or not.

Last year or so, the school board dropped Hutchison idea. They still don’t have a site and nobody wants to take a responsibility.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm thinking that Silverline ES is going to be grouped with Mythical HS, as in, never gonna happen. If you look at the toll road, there are elementary schools all along it. Where would a new one even go? It seems those school would also start seeing expansions like the high schools.

The difference is that FCPS has a site for Sliverline ES but no site for Mythical HS. According to a map in the CIP, Silverline ES will be built west of 28 and south of toll road near Coates.

From a somewhat dated article:
The plan depicts a five-story, 135,000-square-foot elementary school — details that are contingent on the future approvals of the final development plan for the school and pending discussions between the school system and land use staff.

https://www.restonnow.com/2019/10/28/planning-funds-sought-for-new-elementary-school-near-silver-line/

Also buiding a new HS would threaten Langley parents. Building an ES that’d feed to HMS and HHS would reduce the threat.

In the adopted FY 2023-27 CIP, Herndon's renovation was shown as expanding the school to 2500 seats. The draft FY 2024-28 CIP now shows Herndon with a program capacity of 2744 and to be at only 85% capacity over the next five years.

Typical for FCPS, they don't indicate whether they expanded Herndon more than planned or just recalculated the school's capacity. If it's really 15% under capacity that could re-open the discussion about moving Forestville back to the Herndon pyramid. Those folks will have every incentive to try and get part of Westfield assigned to Herndon in connection with a new ES.

What about the middle school capacity? You can’t just look at the high school.

HMS is at 81% as of now. It would be 77% in 2027-28.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Has anyone on here who desperately wants this high school built ever tried to figure out where they could actually build it? That is the real problem. You can blame the current school board all you want, you can blame politics, Langley parents, whatever you want. But it all comes down to them not being able to find a decent site that that could actually afford.

Op here. I’ve been following this for years.

There was a prime lot adjacent to Carson middle. FCPS should have built the new HS on that site and probabaly that was the very original plan. Instead they gave that away to Saudis without getting much community input.

Then they wanted to build the HS on Hutchison site. Since one of then board members had said the new HS woild take some of Herndon kids and in turn HHS would take Great Falls kids, this whole thing became a political issue. It’s not about giving relief to crowded Western Fairfax anymore. It’s more about equity and whether Langley should take some of low income families or not.

Last year or so, the school board dropped Hutchison idea. They still don’t have a site and nobody wants to take a responsibility.

+1 I've been following it for years, too. This is correct.

[Anonymous]

If there were the will, I'm sure the county could acquire enough land off Sully or Fairfax County Parkway for a comprehensive new high school. It doesn't have to have as much acreage as Westfield or Robinson.

But we all know who doesn't want that to happen, and why.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Has anyone on here who desperately wants this high school built ever tried to figure out where they could actually build it? That is the real problem. You can blame the current school board all you want, you can blame politics, Langley parents, whatever you want. But it all comes down to them not being able to find a decent site that that could actually afford.

As I mentionned upthread, Carson is on 32 acrea and Hutchison 38. Carson could be expanded to a high school and a middle school could be built at Hutchison. Each site is oversized for a middle and elementary school. Frankly it's silly to ignore the residential addresses bussed to Langley that have Herndon addresses but are just N, NW of the town boundaries.

It is just poor resource allocation of our tax dollars to never consider boundary changes. But then this is FCPS which no longer does administrative or really any substantive/productive boundary changes. Code of VA has language on school divisions and attendance areas re improve operational efficiency of the division.

[Anonymous]

I don't think there's ever been a time when there was less confidence in the ability of FCPS to manage its facilities and boundaries effectively. Central administration is incompetent and the School Board members are corrupt and only act in the interests of their own neighbors. It's a shame FCPS can't be put in receivership or split into smaller, more responsive divisions. As it is, FCPS is just going to continue its sad spiral downward.