Route 1 Widening Update: Environmental Assessment Complete

The process to widen Route 1 near Fort Belvoir is moving forward.

The Environmental Assessment is complete, and an RFP will be sent to selected contractors this week, according to an update released by Fairfax County.

The Finding of No Significant Impact was issued on Nov. 20, Fairfax County BRAC Coordinator Laura Miller told Patch. This document is posted on the Federal Highway Administration Eastern Federal Lands Division website, along with the 4(f) determination and the Section 106 Programmatic Agreement.

"Issuance of those documents conclude the environmental planning and compliance phase of the project," Miller told Patch in an email.

According to Miller, the RFP that will be sent this week is going to the contractors who were pre-qualified during part 1 of a two-part process, with the RFP being the second part.

"The bidders will have 60 days to prepare cost proposals," Miller explained.  "Once received, the proposals will be evaluated and a contractor will be selected, and then FHWA will award a contract.  Design will begin in the spring of 2013, and the following several months will be focused on the design effort."

The Fairfax County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved the revised bypass option for the widening of Route 1 in September. The Federal Highway Administration offered the revised bypass option after a well-attended public meeting at Hayfield Secondary School in June and a public comment period that generated more than 300 comments from community members supporting the preservation of Woodlawn Stables and the historic cemetery at Woodlawn Baptist Church.

Supporters of Woodlawn Stables were disheartened after learning that the National Trust for Historic Preservation would not renew the stables' lease after 2016. Grassroots organization Save Woodlawn Stables said in a statement, "We have been working throughout the Federal Highway’s consulting parties process to try and design the Bypass in such a way that it would minimize the takings of the Trust property and still allow for a viable equestrian business to remain on the site."

Construction is expected to begin in late 2013 and the target completion date is mid-2016.