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Falls Church began as a farming village around 1699 and was incorporated in 1875. Today, it’s an independent city, paying no homage or taxes to its broad-shouldered neighboring counties of Fairfax and Arlington. Since 1948, when Falls Church severed ties with Fairfax County, the seven-member city council has governed its own school system, police department and tax policies and has its own city manager. The city’s residents include highly educated professionals, a thriving senior population and flocks of new families who’ve recently moved into this unique place. “Living in Falls Church is great because you know so many people,” says Midge Wang, former president of the city’s Victorian Society and a resident for 36 years. “We’ve always seen ourselves as being a private, family-oriented community, and people care a great deal about the city. We are very big on volunteering, working and helping.”

Now, though, change is coming to the town that has seemed to successfully avoid it for decades. Falls Church officials say the city needs more money. Rising demands on city schools and other services have put pressure on the budget of a city that, according to Mayor Robin Gardner, has a small commercial business base. She says there was almost no development in the city over the last 25 years, and now development is needed to boost tax revenues. To accomplish that goal, says the mayor, “We started moving along a strategic plan for mixed-use development.”

Today, the talk in Falls Church revolves around the redevelopment of its City Center, which is a four-by-two-block area around Route 7 (also known as East Broad Street) and Maple Street, in addition to three other districts within the city: the West End, Broad-Penn and South Washington Street. Over the next three years, the city will build more than 500 new residential housing units (condominiums) in the City Center and add nearly 120,000 square feet of new office and retail space. “There is not a lot of commercial land in the city, so what we have really needs to be developed into higher-density [space],” says Elizabeth Friel, general manager of development services and planning director for the city. “The city has old traditions, but a fairly high turnover rate in terms of new residents coming in. We have a lot of young families, and there is a desire in the community for more services, so people don’t have to go to Tysons [Corner] but can shop right here. There are many people, loyal to the city, trying to do all their errands and shopping here. We are just increasing the variety of services. ...”