Some Fairfax Connector Routes Eliminated And New Ones Added In Reston-Herndon Bus Plan

FAIRFAX, VA – Fairfax County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a proposal at its Tuesday meeting that will alter and eliminate some commuter bus routes in the northwest corner of the county.

Development of Fairfax Connector's Reston-Herndon Bus Plan occurred over the last several years, with county staff conducting community outreach both in-person and virtually.

Michael Felschow, chief of the planning section of the county's transit services division, told supervisors on Tuesday that the Fairfax County Department of Transportation received more than 1,700 comments about the bus plan.

"We also used 3,700 onboard surveys that we received countywide and we also conducted a marketing survey that was done by FCDOT," he said. "They received over 2,600 comments. All those were used to create the Reston-Herndon Plan."

Under the new plan, 19 existing bus routes have been modified or realigned; four new routes were added; and 12 routes were being proposed for elimination.

Modified Routes

• 507 Sunset Hills – Sunrise Valley
• 552 Innovation Center Metrorail Station – Wiehle-Reston East Metrorail Station
• 553 Kingstream – Herndon – Fox Mill
• 557 Reston South – Soapstone
• 558 Center Harbor – Wiehle-Reston East Metrorail Station – Reston Tow Center Metrorail Station
• 574 Reston Town Center – Tysons
• 599 Reston North – Pentagon
• 605 Express Reston – Fair Oaks Mall
• 924 Northern Virginia Community College Loudoun – Herndon – Franklin Farm
• 937 Coppermine – Elden – Herndon Metrorail Station
• 950 Reston Town Center Metrorail Station – Herndon Metrorail Station
• 951 Wiehle-Reston East Metrorail Station – Innovation Center Metrorail Station
• 952 Sunset Hills – Dulles Airport
• 983 Dulles Airport – Udvar-Hazy
• RIBS 1 Lake Anne – Hunters Woods
• RIBS 2 Reston – South Lakes Drive
• RIBS 3 Hunters Woods – Lake Anne
• RIBS 4 Reston Town Center Metrorail Station – North Point
• RIBS 5 Herndon - Reston

New Routes

• 615 Fair Oaks Hospital – Greenbriar – Fair Oaks Mall
• 901 Herndon Metrorail Station – Centreville
• 921 Herndon Circulator
• 954 Sterling Plaza – Herndon Metrorail Station

Route Elimination

• 505 Reston Town Center
• 551 South Lakes
• 554 Reston North: Wiehle Avenue
• 556 Bennington Woods
• 559 Reston South: Glade – Soapstone
• 585 Reston South: Franklin Farms
• 926 Worldgate – Dranesville
• 927 Dulles – McNair Farms
• 929 Centreville Road
• 980 Herndon – Monroe
• 981 Dulles Airport – Wiehle
• 985 Dulles Corner – Wall Road

Hunter Mill District Supervisor Walter Alcorn, who is also the chairman of the board's transportation committee, made the motion to adopt the plan at Tuesday's meeting.

"Through this process and through some data that FCDOT had collected, it became clear that the riders of our system of these Connector routes aren't just going to Metro," Alcorn said. "In fact, more of these riders were going from place to place within the Reston-Herndon area."

The plan, which will affect Fairfax Connector routes in the Dranesville, Hunter Mill and Sully Districts, will serve riders who rely on bus transportation to get to work, go to the grocery store or any other places in the community.

"Frankly, this is one of the huge benefits of buses over rail," Board Chair Jeff McKay said, once the motion had been proposed. You can respond this way by realigning routes and still make sure that you're maximizing the number of riders and running the most efficient routes as possible, which will be really important as we move forward."

Implementation of the plan was set to coincide with the start of second phase of Metrorail's Silver Line expansion, which has been pushed back several times in the last year. The start date is currently expected to happen sometime in the late spring of this year.