Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just be careful with "walkability" in this area. Get a google map and zoom in. Most places that are billed as walkable do not have any sidewalks so you are in the street. Coming from abroad you may not be aware of this. Real walkability was crucial to me and I ended up in Bethesda/CC.

Which areas are called “walkable” but don’t have sidewalks?

Both FCC and the areas near Westover, both with proximity to EFC metro, are similar in having spotty sidewalks. The shopping areas have sidewalks, but not all of the neighborhoods.

The areas in Arlington near St Agnes have sidewalks

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: I can walk in less than 10 min to multiple parks, restaurants, bars, FedEx, CVS, 2 Starbucks, Harris Teeter, 2 breweries, 2 barber shops, dry cleaning, kids indoor play spaces and I'm probably forgetting ones! It's an awesome place to live.

Thank you. This is the kind of info I am looking for. Would you say middle school kids can wander about meeting friends after school or weekends (within reason)?

My middle schooler and their friends are cheerfully feral once school is out. They bounce around the community center gym and teen space, parks and sport courts, food options, and whatever games (rec, pickup, high school) are being played. All in all, it’s a very safe place to develop some basic street smarts and public behavior norms. I frequently get reports from other parents that they saw DC out and about, which helps me reinforce lessons like “The grocery store is not a playground.”

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just be careful with "walkability" in this area. Get a google map and zoom in. Most places that are billed as walkable do not have any sidewalks so you are in the street. Coming from abroad you may not be aware of this. Real walkability was crucial to me and I ended up in Bethesda/CC.

Which areas are called “walkable” but don’t have sidewalks?

Many/most? SFH in Falls Church

+1

I’m the pp above that lives near the wfc metro and I deal with plenty of streets with no sidewalks, or a sidewalk on only one side of the street, while walking my dogs. I hate it.

We have lived in FCC for about 10 years. I wouldn’t describe it as “walkable.” I walk my dogs every day and have to navigate streets with no sidewalks. We don’t walk to local restaurants etc, we drive. We do walk the 15 mins to the WFC metro to commute downtown for work (although I drive to the metro if weather is bad).The “main drag” — Broad St, aka Route 7 — is a very busy street.

St James is a very large church with an active community. I’ve attended a few services and it is a beautiful church. Their school is very convenient for anyone wanting Catholic school in Falls Church, but bear in mind that you need to think about passing up such good public schools. People pay the premium to live in FCC because of the good public schools. Also bear in mind that a lot of what you might think is FCC is actually Fairfax County, but those schools are good too. I don’t think it makes sense to pay to live here if you are going to send your kids to private school.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just be careful with "walkability" in this area. Get a google map and zoom in. Most places that are billed as walkable do not have any sidewalks so you are in the street. Coming from abroad you may not be aware of this. Real walkability was crucial to me and I ended up in Bethesda/CC.

Which areas are called “walkable” but don’t have sidewalks?

Many/most? SFH in Falls Church

The W&OD trail runs through FCC on its way from Leesburg to Arlington, so there are good bike path options which go from FCC to at least Arlington or downtown DC. There is a bike path from W&OD through Rosslyn across the GW Parkway to the Roosevelt Bridge (I-66) into downtown DC near Foggy Bottom.

St James has a good reputation. They usually are full, but you should contact them quickly now if that is your preference. It is possible they would make room for international students, if the fire code permits.

FCC schools today are reasonably diverse. Class sizes are smaller than FCPS or APS. Education quality is good within FCCPS.

One thing to be careful about. The US Post Office designation of “Falls Church, VA” covers a good sized portion of (unincorporated) Fairfax County outside of Falls Church City. Realtors sometimes will make mistakes about whether a house is in the county or in the city So if you want to be in FCC, then you need to verify that the house one is looking to rent or buy actually is within Falls Church City’s official city limits.

Anonymous wrote:Just be careful with "walkability" in this area. Get a google map and zoom in. Most places that are billed as walkable do not have any sidewalks so you are in the street. Coming from abroad you may not be aware of this. Real walkability was crucial to me and I ended up in Bethesda/CC.

Which areas are called “walkable” but don’t have sidewalks?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: I can walk in less than 10 min to multiple parks, restaurants, bars, FedEx, CVS, 2 Starbucks, Harris Teeter, 2 breweries, 2 barber shops, dry cleaning, kids indoor play spaces and I'm probably forgetting ones! It's an awesome place to live.

Thank you. This is the kind of info I am looking for. Would you say middle school kids can wander about meeting friends after school or weekends (within reason)?

Absolutely. It's kind of a rite of passage that kids look forward to come middle school.

About diversity, I have three kids in the middle and high schools. None are friends only with white kids, and one is the only white kid in her immediate friend group. I don't know if this is the norm or an outlayer but it's our experience.

Other schools have real diversity; FCC has parents making performative statements about diversity. Nice way to have your cake and eat it, too.

And the term is “outlier,” not “outlayer.”

I live further west, our school is "diverse" yet there are literally 0 hispanic or black kids. The diversity is all wealthy white and asian families.

What I find frustrating about Falls Church City is that I don't think the schools are *SO* much better to justify the housing prices.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: I can walk in less than 10 min to multiple parks, restaurants, bars, FedEx, CVS, 2 Starbucks, Harris Teeter, 2 breweries, 2 barber shops, dry cleaning, kids indoor play spaces and I'm probably forgetting ones! It's an awesome place to live.

Thank you. This is the kind of info I am looking for. Would you say middle school kids can wander about meeting friends after school or weekends (within reason)?

Absolutely. It's kind of a rite of passage that kids look forward to come middle school.

About diversity, I have three kids in the middle and high schools. None are friends only with white kids, and one is the only white kid in her immediate friend group. I don't know if this is the norm or an outlayer but it's our experience.

Other schools have real diversity; FCC has parents making performative statements about diversity. Nice way to have your cake and eat it, too.

And the term is “outlier,” not “outlayer.”

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: I can walk in less than 10 min to multiple parks, restaurants, bars, FedEx, CVS, 2 Starbucks, Harris Teeter, 2 breweries, 2 barber shops, dry cleaning, kids indoor play spaces and I'm probably forgetting ones! It's an awesome place to live.

Thank you. This is the kind of info I am looking for. Would you say middle school kids can wander about meeting friends after school or weekends (within reason)?

Absolutely. It's kind of a rite of passage that kids look forward to come middle school.

About diversity, I have three kids in the middle and high schools. None are friends only with white kids, and one is the only white kid in her immediate friend group. I don't know if this is the norm or an outlayer but it's our experience.

Anonymous wrote:New people arrive all the time (we're military and there are lots of state department kids) so it's not unusual. My child's experience has been he had a bullying issue once. The schools addressed it very quickly and no issues for a long time after that. He's always been friendly to new kids and I often hear about them being new friends at school.

Op here. Thank you for the information. Sorry to hear about the bullying but glad the issue is over with. I am very keen on info like this, and is probably my primary concern since my kids are non-Americans who can't speak the language well. Did this happen at the elementary middle or HS?

Anonymous wrote: I can walk in less than 10 min to multiple parks, restaurants, bars, FedEx, CVS, 2 Starbucks, Harris Teeter, 2 breweries, 2 barber shops, dry cleaning, kids indoor play spaces and I'm probably forgetting ones! It's an awesome place to live.

Thank you. This is the kind of info I am looking for. Would you say middle school kids can wander about meeting friends after school or weekends (within reason)?

New people arrive all the time (we're military and there are lots of state department kids) so it's not unusual. My child's experience has been he had a bullying issue once. The schools addressed it very quickly and no issues for a long time after that. He's always been friendly to new kids and I often hear about them being new friends at school.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To add to the above info, Meridian HS, the school for Falls Church City is the smallest high school in Northern Virginia. So if you want to save some money, the public schools from middle through high school are very small.

The only smaller public school is HB Woodlawn in Arlington (grades 6-12 and about 70 students a grade), but entry is by lottery only, and the waitlist is hundreds of students long.

I live in Arlington so no firsthand experience, but I’ve heard FCC schools referred to as basically a “public private.” But you pay tuition in the form of housing and property taxes. Which is why posters are saying to give the public schools a glance if you’re considering living there, but otherwise don’t pay the premium only to go with Catholic school.

I think a lot of the kids at St. James come from surrounding areas where the public schools aren’t as highly rated as opposed to within FCC but that is totally my anecdotal knowledge. Perhaps someone whose kids attend there could say otherwise.

I know Catholics in FCC that send their kids to St. James.