Vienna is a

Washington Metro The Washington Metro (or simply Metro), formally the Metrorail,Google Books search/preview

Fairfax County, Virginia Fairfax County, officially the County of Fairfax, is a county in the Commonwealth of Virginia. It is part of Northern Virginia and borders both the city of Alexandria and Arlington County and forms part of the suburban ring of Washington, D.C. ...

, on the Orange Line. The station is in Oakton, in the

median In statistics and probability theory, the median is the value separating the higher half from the lower half of a data sample, a population, or a probability distribution. For a data set, it may be thought of as "the middle" value. The basic fe ...

Interstate 66 Interstate 66 (I-66) is an east–west Interstate Highway in the eastern United States. It runs from an interchange with I-81 near Middletown, Virginia, on its western end to an interchange with U.S. Route 29 (US 29) in Washingt ...

at Nutley Street ( Virginia State Route 243), with a postal address in

Fairfax City The City of Fairfax ( ), colloquially known as Fairfax City, Downtown Fairfax, Old Town Fairfax, Fairfax Courthouse, FFX, or simply Fairfax, is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States. At the 2010 census the p ...

. The station can be accessed from I-66 without merging onto Nutley Street by a series of ramps that transport

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to the station's north and south side parking complexes. From the parking areas, riders use elevated walkways that bridge the east and westbound lanes of I-66 to reach the platform and mezzanine. The station provides easy access to the nearby Town of Vienna, the City of Fairfax, and the main campus of

George Mason University George Mason University (George Mason, Mason, or GMU) is a public research university in Fairfax County, Virginia with an independent City of Fairfax, Virginia postal address in the Washington, D.C. Metropolitan Area. The university was origin ...

. Service began on June 7, 1986.

Station layout

History

Although originally identified as the western terminus of the Orange Line in the 1968 plan, by 1978 Fairfax County was debating whether the initial terminus should be at the Vienna location or at another location in

Tysons Corner Tysons, also known as Tysons Corner, is a census-designated place (CDP) in Fairfax County, Virginia, United States, developed from the corner of Chain Bridge Road ( SR 123) and the Leesburg Pike ( SR 7). Located in Northern Virginia between the c ...

. After much public debate and public comment, the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors endorsed the Vienna routing. The endorsement was made after determining it would cost an additional $59 million and take another five years to complete the line to Tysons. (Metro service to Tysons Corner would be established, with the 2014 opening of the Silver Line). The groundbreaking for the station took place on September 8, 1982. At the time, the final facility was to have cost $17.6 million with parking for 2,000 vehicles. After nearly four years of construction, the station opened on June 7, 1986, as the western terminus of the Orange Line. Its opening coincided with the completion of of rail from the Ballston station and the opening of the East Falls Church, West Falls Church, and Dunn Loring stations. By 1993, officials in Fairfax City were looking to add "Fairfax" to the station name. In March 1999, the station name was changed to Vienna/Fairfax–GMU, which was misleading because a drive or ride on an infrequent

CUE Bus CUE Bus (City-University-Energysaver) is a bus service operated by the City of Fairfax, Virginia, and is completely separate from the Fairfax Connector bus service run by Fairfax County. In , the system had a ridership of , or about per weekday ...

or Metrobus is required to reach Fairfax City and GMU. In 2011, the Metro Board adopted guidelines limiting station names to nineteen characters. Stations with longer names were split in two: Vienna's "primary name" went back to ''Vienna'' and ''Fairfax–GMU'' became a "secondary name" on Metro maps. In May 2018, Metro announced an extensive renovation of platforms at twenty stations across the system. The platforms at the Vienna station would be rebuilt starting in mid-2020. From May 23 until September 7, 2020, this station was closed due to the platform reconstruction project which closed stations west of Ballston–MU station.

Transit-oriented development

In line with high-density development, the Fairlee Metro-West project aims to increase the housing density around the Vienna station from 60 single family homes to 2,250

condominium A condominium (or condo for short) is an ownership structure whereby a building is divided into several units that are each separately owned, surrounded by common areas that are jointly owned. The term can be applied to the building or complex ...

s and

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s. This development has been controversial, as many Orange Line commuters believe the system will be pushed beyond capacity at rush hours as a result. As of May 2009, the project is under construction.

References

External links

{{Washington Metro stations navbox Stations on the Orange Line (Washington Metro) Washington Metro stations in Virginia Railway stations in the United States opened in 1986 Transportation in Fairfax County, Virginia 1986 establishments in Virginia Bus stations in Virginia Washington Metro stations located above ground Railway stations in highway medians