Town Centers Could Stamp Out Small Businesses

Editor’s note: This is the first part of an ongoing series about redeveloping the Potomac Communities.

Woodbridge, Va. –– As redevelopment in Woodbridge continues its shift from strip malls to urban town centers, some smaller businesses may not survive.

Town center developments like Belmont Bay in North Woodbridge on the Occoquan River, with easy connections to Virginia Railway Express and Interstate 95, to the planned Harbor Station near Dumfries, embody the vision of a new Woodbridge where residents can live, work and play.

At the center of these developments, arguably an early success in the area’s redevelopment is Potomac Town Center at Stonebridge, home to Wegman’s supermarket.

The center’s most vocal supporter, Woodbridge Supervisor Frank Principi, says developers here are doing all the right things. “It’s taken us decades to get to the position we are. National best practices, architects, urban planners are all doing things differently in communities and, dammit, we need to do that here,” he said.

Despite a depressed economy, Potomac Town Center, which already boasts several chain restaurants and a gated residential neighborhood, has moved forward with construction on a second phase to include office space.

In contrast, Woodbridge’s main street, U.S. 1, is lined with overwhelmingly vacant strip malls, fast food restaurants and car dealerships, and t hey may not have a place in the new Woodbridge.

“In the life cycle in many of the freestanding, low volume retail functions, they disappear, as they have over the years,” said Director of George Mason University’s Center for Regional Analysis Dr. Steven Fuller. “Stores come and go. Some will survive if they change their merchandising if they change to meet the changing marketplace.”

As younger families move into the area, many businesses will have to offer more products and services in one place.

“I think you can look around Woodbridge and point to some places like restaurants that are destinations that will survive, and there are others such as the [car] dealerships…and they’ll find some other place to locate, possibly, or they go out of business,” added Fuller.

There are plans to widen U.S. 1 from four to six lanes in an effort to add capacity to the already congested road, as well as more mass transit buses.

The new Woodbridge, says Principi, will be a place where both old and new will be able to coexist.

“For this to occur and to be successful, we have got to infuse the existing businesses and relocate new businesses here. So, it’s not about moving them, it’s about making sure in our planning process in the horizon over time that we are doing everything possible to expand their business, because, quite frankly, as we expand Route 1 and have more traffic, they are going to be a larger customer base,” said Principi.