Road to Ruin is taking a closer look at Prince William County. In a previous article, writer Peter Galuszka profiled the county’s aggressive road-building program. This time, he came back to see how well Prince William is coordinating its $1.5 billion, 15-year transportation plan with its land use policies. (See “Will the Real Prince William County Please Stand Up?”)
It wasn’t easy sorting through the conflicting claims. Sean Connaughton, chairman of the board of supervisors, made a vigorous case that the county has been proactive and forward thinking. But Stewart Schwartz with the Coalition for Smarter Growth, showed Peter some examples of awful slash-and-clear development. My sense as an outsider who occasionally drives through the county is that Prince William is doing a pretty good job connecting land use and transportation in the east, especially in the revitalization of the U.S. 1 corridor. The situation is harder to untangle in the western end of the county around Manassas.
Under Connaughton, the board has been steering the county towards more compact, higher-density, pedestrian-friendly and transit-friendly development than the county had seen before. The problem is that a huge backlog of traditional, sprawl-style development is in the pipeline. The result to date has been a mixture of the good, the bad and the ugly. As the backlog gets worked down, I would expect to see a more transportation-efficient mix of projects. It may not meet the standards of smart growth advocates, but it’s better than what came before.
Does that mean Prince William County has turned the corner to a sustainable pattern of development — or that it’s just sliding downhill at a slower speed? We probably won’t know for years. As Connaughton says, you don’t bring about meaningful change with a snap of the fingers. It’s too bad that Connaughton won’t be around long enough — he’s taking that maritime administration job with the Bush administration — to bask in the praise or catch the blame.
