Lorton to get new police station and animal shelter
A new co-located police station and animal shelter are coming to Lorton, designed to serve the residents and businesses of southern Fairfax County.
County officials provided an update on the facility at a community meeting last Wednesday evening at the Workhouse Arts Center. Planned for construction on a 14-acre triangular parcel of land on Lorton Road between Workhouse and Hooes Roads, the facility will house the new South County Police Station — including the Animal Protection Police — an animal shelter of similar size to the one on West Ox Road in Fairfax, and a community room for public usage.
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According to the Fairfax County Police Department (FCPD), the new 39,000 square-foot police station will improve response times for Lorton residents who currently live on the outer fringes of the Franconia and West Springfield District Stations’ coverage areas.
“It’s going to make your community safer,” said Lt. Col. Ted Arnn, deputy chief of police for patrol at FCPD. “It also will be a benefit county-wide as other [police] districts will shrink; there will be better response times,” he added.
Arnn’s colleague, Capt. Paul Norton — commander of the Animal Services Division — assured meeting attendees that there won’t be any noise disturbance from the facility and that it will have designated secure areas for interviewing suspects and transporting apprehended animals. He said the police department is hiring 15 new officers per year for the next five to six years and will transfer some of them to the new South County station once it opens in 2022.
“From my perspective, this [personnel increase] is overdue,” said Mount Vernon District Supervisor Dan Storck, who helped establish the steering committee that is making design recommendations and acting as a community liaison.
The co-located 23,000 square-foot animal shelter — which includes an additional 20,000 square feet of outdoor space — will provide a variety of services, including full adoption, a veterinary suite, spay and neuter services, rabies clinics and education programs, according to Karen Diviney, director of the Fairfax County Animal Shelter. She said the facility — which will remain open six days a week — will feature lots of windows and natural lighting, big spaces and quiet places for the animals since “making animals comfortable is important to presenting them well.”
The county’s design team looked to other architectural styles in the area, including South County High School and the Lorton Workhouse, for influence and presented two conceptual design options to meeting attendees. Both concepts are designed to maximize green space and provide sufficient buffer between the building and the surrounding residential community. Supervisor Storck said the steering committee would like more input on the facility and its design.
“It needs to be a community activity,” said Storck. “We want everyone to speak up on how it can be better.”
The new police station and animal shelter will remain in the design, zoning and permitting phase until late 2019; construction is projected to begin in early 2020. The estimated $30 million design and construction cost was approved in the 2015 Public Safety Bond Referendum.
Fairfax County residents with questions about the project can contact project manager Lisa Gossard of the Fairfax County Department of Public Works and Environmental Services at lisa.gossard@fairfaxcounty.gov.
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