A group of Hunter Mill-area residents is organizing against the proposed septic waste disposal site for Lake Fairfax Maintenance Area 6.
The Hunter Mill Defense League (HDML) this week sent Hunter Mill Supervisor Cathy Hudgins a petition with more than 500 signatures in opposition to relocating the septic dump from Colvin Run in Great Falls to the Lake Fairfax spot, located on Hunter Mill Road on the Reston/Vienna line.
About 21,000 homes in Fairfax County are not tied into the public sewer and must have their septic tanks cleaned out every five years and dumped in one of two county receiving facilities. The septage sites also receive waste from portable toilets and grease from restaurants.
Haulers make about 6,000 trips to the Colvin Run site annually — far too many for a narrow road like Hunter Mill to accommodate so many trucks, residents say.
“Since 1985, the Hunter Mill Road community has been unanimous in its desire to maintain development in the corridor in accordance with the established comprehensive plan,” wrote HMDL President David Bell in the letter to Hudgins.
“We have repeatedly voiced this opinion in battling proposals for high-density development at the Toll Road interchange, in the development of the Wiehle metro station, in developing traffic-calming measures and in negotiating in good faith the Special Exception permitting the Oakcrest School project,” the letter continues. “In each of these instances, the message from the community, your constituents, has remained the same — develop in accordance with the comprehensive plan.”
“Given that, many in the community are incredulous that this proposal, for what can best be described as an industrial use, has even been brought before the community by our elected and appointed leaders for consideration.
This week, county officials said all progress will be halted for six months while the county and consultants from Hazen and Sawyer consider other options.
A feasibility study by Hazen and Sawyer said it would cost $3.4 million to build a new, odor-controlled, secure facility at Lake Fairfax.
Meanwhile, the Colvin Run Septage Receiving Site will be temporarily closed in June for safety reasons due to the ongoing construction of the Difficult Run Pump Station. The site will be closed for about two years, Hudgins’ office said.
Want to sign the petition or get involved? The HDML will hold a petition drive/rally at 3 p.m. Saturday at the intersection of Park Lake Drive and Lake Fairfax Drive. You can also sign online.
HMDL Letter to Catherine Hudgins Supervisor HunterMill District
Photo: One-lane bridge on Hunter Mill Road near proposed septage receiving site.
The project to move a septage receiving site from Great Falls to Hunter Mill Road is on hold for at least six months, Fairfax County officials said on Wednesday.
The county told residents in mid-February that the ideal location for a facility to pump septic tank waste from northern Fairfax County homes and restaurant grease from area restaurants would be Lake Fairfax Maintenance Area 6, a parcel on the Reston/Vienna line owned by the Fairfax County Park Authority.
The current septage receiving site is located on Colvin Run Road near Great Falls. That site has been operating since 1970 and has many issues, county officials said, including flooding, odor and poor accessibility for large trucks.
The proposed move did not sit well with area residents, who spoke up at a contentious community meeting. They told county Department of Public Works and Environmental Services (DPWES) and consultants from Hazen and Sawyer that the Maintenance Area 6 spot, located on Hunter Mill Road near a one-lane bridge, was a poor choice because of proximity to homes, increased traffic on a country road and environmental hazards.
The county said it had looked at six sites before deciding Lake Fairfax was the best one. The citizens told the county to go back and find a space better accessible to a main road like Route 7. Read More
Fairfax County is continuing to contemplate moving the Colvin Run septage disposal site a few miles away to Hunter Mill Road, but their concerns are not necessarily the same as the haulers who make about 6,000 annual trips to the dumping tank.
County officials said in February they are considering closing the Colvin Run site, in operation for more than 40 years, and building a new one at Lake Fairfax Maintenance Area 6, a county-owned parcel on Hunter Mill Road on the Reston/Vienna border. The Colvin Run site is one of two in the county.
The county has 21,000 homes that are on septic tank and not public sewers. Those septic tanks must be cleaned out every five years, with waste hauled to Colvin Run or the Norman Cole site in the south end of the county. The septage sites are also used for restaurant grease disposal and portable toilet cleanout.
The officials say the Colvin Run site, which gets 6,000 visits annually (or about 22 trips per day), is outdated, its smells, and has a pipe too small to accommodate waste. It is also in a flood area and there is no way for trucks to turn around.
The county looked into the move after a handful of Colvin Run-area residents complained.
But the potential for the Reston-area site has many residents on this side of Route 7 very upset. Some of their concerns came to light at a community meeting six weeks ago. Among them: increase in traffic on Hunter Mill Road, which already can’t handle trucks going over a one-land bridge; proximity to home and a stream; concern that the septage dump stay closer to the 21,000 homes it serves, mostly in Great Falls and Oakton; and irritation that the move was presented as almost a done deal rather than a community input session.
The county says it researched six area sites, including renovating Colvin Run, for a new facility. The criteria: Proximity to a 30-inch sewer pipe; off a major road; outside of a floodplain; away from public use (but on county land); and an available footprint to build a secure, odor-controlled facility where trucks could drive in a loop rather than have to back up to leave.
At the meeting, they said Colvin Run could not be renovated. However, a report by environmental consultants Hazen and Sawyer, hired by the county for this project, said it may be feasible.
It would be about $700,000 cheaper to renovate an existing Fairfax County septic disposal site rather than build a new one on Hunter Mill Road, says a Septage Site Receiving Study made available by Fairfax County.
Hunter Mill-area residents attended a somewhat contentious community meeting on Feb. 18, where they were skeptical of many things — including the need to relocate the site after 46 years from Colvin Run to Fairfax County Park Authority’s Maintenance Area 6 on Hunter Mill Road, where Reston meets Vienna.
The existing site (one of two in Fairfax County) serves about 21,000 homes with septic tanks — mostly in Great Falls and Oakton — as well as all restaurants in this part of the county, which must dispose of grease into the septage receiving site.
County officials said at the February meeting that the Colvin Run site floods, smells and is serviced by a pipe that is too small. The county looked at six sites, determining that Hunter Mill Road was the only one that could accommodate a facility, even though hauling trucks would have to contend with the one-lane bridge to access the location.
Residents who live on or near Hunter Mill Road were opposed to that plan, citing traffic, noise and the potential for sewage to get into nearby streams as concerns. They urged officials to go back to the drawing board to find a new location.
A couple of items of note in the report, prepared by consultants at Hazen and Sawyer:
The search for the new site came about after a petition was sent to Dranesville Supervisor John Foust. However, the petition only contained 20 signatures from 11 families.
The report was completed in June of 2015, but Hunter Mill-area residents said they did not know anything about the potential project until just before the February meeting.
About 6,000 trips are made to the Colvin Run site annually, the report says. But the consultants also recommend that Fairfax accept sewage from the City of Alexandria and Loudoun County, which would make the new site much busier.
A survey of haulers says that at least 20 percent of waste currently being hauled to Colvin Run may not originate in Fairfax County.
A new site at Hunter Mill will cost $3.4 million to construct. Renovating Colvin Run — which authorities said at the February meeting was not a possibility — would cost $2.6 million.
Read the full feasibility study on Fairfax County’s website.
Photo: Lake Fairfax Maintenance Area 6Â
Keep the poop out of the parkland and off of Hunter Mill Road.
That was the sentiment — if not the exact phrasing — of dozens of citizens who attended a community meeting with Hunter Mill Supervisor Cathy Hudgins in Reston on Thursday.
At issue is the county’s proposal to relocate a Septage Receiving Site from Colvin Run in Great Falls a few miles away to the Fairfax County Park Authority’s Maintenance Area 6, located off of Hunter Mill Road on the Reston-Vienna line.
The Colvin Run site, one of two septage receiving sites in Fairfax County, collects waste from septic tanks at homes not hooked into public sewer lines. In this part of the county, most of those homes are in Great Falls and Oakton. Overall, 21,000 Fairfax County homes do not have public sewer service, says a feasibility report on the potential move. Read More
