Northern Virginia (colloquially referred to as
"NOVA") consists
of several
counties and independent cities in the U.S. state of Virginia
in a
widespread region generally radiating southerly and westward from
Washington,
D.C.
It is the most populous region of both
Virginia and the
Washington
metropolitan area.
Communities in the region form the Virginia portion of the
Washington-Arlington-Alexandria
DC-VA-MD-WV MSA
and the larger
Washington-Baltimore-Northern
Virginia DC-MD-VA-WV CSA. Northern Virginia is the most
diverse (in terms of both the number of ethnic groups and
nationalities represented) and highest-income region of Virginia,
having six of the twenty
highest-income
counties in the nation, including the two highest .
Northern
Virginia's transportation infrastructure includes major airports
Washington National
and Dulles
International
, several lines of the Washington Metro
subway system, the Virginia Railway Express suburban
commuter rail system, transit bus
services, and an extensive network of Interstate highways and
expressways.
Notable
features of the region include the Pentagon
and the Central Intelligence Agency, and
the many companies which serve them and the federal
government. The area's attractions include various
monuments and Colonial and
Civil War-era sites such as
Mount
Vernon
and Arlington National Cemetery
. It is the most affluent region in the
nation.
History
Source of the name
The name "Northern Virginia" does not seem to have been used in the
early history of the area. According to Johnston, some early
documents and land grants refer to the "Northern Neck of Virginia",
and they describe an area which began on the east at the western
shore of the
Chesapeake Bay and
includes a territory that extended west, including all the land
between the Potomac and Rappahannock Rivers, with a western
boundary called the Fairfax line.
The Fairfax line, surveyed in 1746, ran
from the first spring of the Potomac (still marked today by the
Fairfax
Stone
) to the first spring of the Rappahannock, at the
head of the Conway River. The Northern Neck was composed of
5,282,000 acres, and was larger in area than five of the modern
U.S. states.
Early
development of the northern portion of Virginia was in the
easternmost area of that early land grant, which encompasses the
modern counties of Lancaster
, Northumberland
, Richmond
, and Westmoreland
. At some point, these eastern counties came
to be called separately simply "the Northern Neck", and, for the
remaining area west of them, the term was no longer used.
(By some
definitions, King George County
is also included in the Northern Neck, which is now considered a
separate region from Northern Virginia).
One of the most prominent early mentions of "Northern Virginia"
(sans the word
Neck) as a title was the naming of the
Confederate Army of Northern Virginia during
the
American Civil War
(1861–1865).
Colonial period
Historically, in the British
Colony
of Virginia first permanently settled at
Jamestown in 1607, the area now
generally regarded as "Northern Virginia" was within a larger area
defined by a land grant from King
Charles II of England on September 18,
1649, while the monarch was in exile in France during the
English Civil War. Eight of his loyal
supporters were named, among them Thomas Culpeper.
On February 25, 1673, a new charter was given to
Thomas Lord Culpeper
and
Henry Earl of
Arlington. Lord Culpeper was named the Royal Governor of
Virginia from 1677–1683.
(Culpeper County
was later named for him when it was formed in 1749;
however, history does not seem to record him as one of the better
of Virginia's colonial governors). Although he became
governor of Virginia in July 1677, he did not come to Virginia
until 1679, and even then seemed more interested in maintaining his
land in the "Northern Neck of Virginia" than governing. He soon
returned to England. In 1682, rioting in the colony forced him to
return, but by the time he arrived, the riots were already quelled.
After apparently misappropriating £9,500 from the treasury of the
colony, he returned to England and the King was forced to dismiss
him. During this tumultuous time, Culpeper's erratic behavior meant
that he had to rely increasingly on his cousin and Virginia agent,
Col.
Nicholas Spencer. Spencer
succeeded Culpepper as acting Governor upon Lord Culpeper's
departure from the colony. For many years, Lord Culpeper's
descendants allowed men in Virginia (primarily
Robert "King" Carter) to manage the
properties.
Final legal claim to the land was finally established by Lord
Culpeper's grandson,
Thomas Fairfax, 6th
Lord Fairfax of Cameron, who became well-known in the colony as
"Lord Fairfax", in a survey authorized by Governor
William Gooch in 1736.
The lands of Lord
Fairfax (and Northern Virginia) were defined as that between the
Rappahannock
and Potomac Rivers,
and were officially called the "Northern Neck".In 1746, a
back line was surveyed and established between the headwaters of
the Potomac and Rappahannock Rivers, defining the west end of the
grants. According to documents held by the Handley Regional Library
of the Winchester-Frederick County Historical Society, the grants
contained 5,282,000 acres. They included the 22 modern counties of
Northumberland, Lancaster, Westmoreland, Stafford, King George,
Prince William, Fairfax, Loudoun, Fauquier, Rappahannock, Culpeper,
Madison, Clarke, Warren, Page, Shenandoah, and Frederick Counties
in Virginia, and Hardy, Hampshire, Morgan, Berkeley, and Jefferson
Counties in West Virginia.
Lord Fairfax was a life-long bachelor, and became one of the more
well-known persons of the late colonial era.
In 1742, the new
county formed from Prince William County
was named Fairfax County in his honor, one of
numerous place names in Northern Virginia and West Virginia's
Eastern Panhandle which were named after him.Lord Fairfax
established his residence first at his brother's home at "Belvoir"
(now on the grounds of Fort Belvoir
in Fairfax County).
Not long
thereafter, he built a hunting lodge near the Blue Ridge Mountains
he named "Greenway Court", which was located near White
Post
in Clarke County
, and moved there. Around 1748, Lord Fairfax
met a youth of 16 named
George
Washington, and, impressed with his energy and talents,
employed him to survey his lands lying west of the Blue
Ridge.
Lord Fairfax stayed neutral during the
American Revolutionary War.
Just a
few weeks after the surrender of British troops under General
Cornwallis at Yorktown
, he died at his home at Greenway Court on December
9, 1781 at the age of 90. He was entombed on the east side of
Christ Church in Winchester
.While his plans for a large house at
Greenway Court never materialized, and his stone lodge is now gone,
a small limestone structure he had built still exists on the
site.
Statehood, Civil War
Following
the American Revolutionary
War, when the Thirteen
Colonies formed the United States of America
, war hero and Virginian George Washington was the choice to become
its first president. Washington had been a surveyor and
developer of
canals for transportation earlier
in the 18th century.
He was also a great proponent of the
bustling port city of Alexandria
, which was located on the Potomac River below the
fall line, not far from his plantation at
Mount
Vernon
in Fairfax County.
With his
guidance, a new federal city (now known as the District of
Columbia
) was laid out straddling the Potomac River upon a
square of territory which was ceded to the federal government by
the new states of Maryland
and Virginia. Alexandria was located at the
eastern edge south of the river.
On the outskirts on the northern side of
the river, another port city, Georgetown
, was located.
However, as the federal city grew, land in the portion contributed
by Maryland proved best suited and adequate for early development
and the impracticality of being on both sides of the Potomac River
became clearer. Not really part of the functioning federal city,
many citizens of Alexandria were frustrated by the laws of the
District government and lack of voting input.
Slavery also arose as an issue. To mitigate these
issues, and as part of a "deal" regarding abolishment of slave
trading in the District, in 1846, the U.S.
Congress passed a
bill retro-ceding to
Virginia the area south of the Potomac River, which was known
as Alexandria
County
. That area now forms all of Arlington
County
(which was renamed from Alexandria County in 1922)
and a portion of the independent
city of Alexandria.
Slavery,
states rights, and economic
issues increasingly divided the northern and southern states during
the first half of the 19th century, eventually leading to the
American Civil War from
1861–1865.
Although Maryland was a slave state, it remained with the Union, while
Virginia seceded and joined the newly formed Confederate States of America,
with its new capital established at Richmond, Virginia
.
The
Supreme Court of the United
States
has never issued a firm opinion on whether the
retrocession of the Virginia portion of the District of Columbia
was constitutional. In the 1875 case of
Phillips v.
Payne, the Supreme Court held that Virginia had
de facto jurisdiction over the
area returned by Congress in 1847, and dismissed the tax case
brought by the plaintiff. The court, however, did not rule on the
core constitutional matter of the retrocession. Writing the
majority opinion,
Justice Noah
Swayne stated only that:
The plaintiff in error is estopped from raising the
point which he seeks to have decided.
He cannot, under the circumstances, vicariously raise a
question, nor force upon the parties to the compact an issue which
neither of them desires to make.
With barely 100 miles separating the two capital cities, Northern
Virginia found itself in the center of much of the conflict. The
area was the site of many battles and saw great destruction and
bloodshed. The
Army of
Northern Virginia was the primary army for the
Confederate States of America
in the east. Owing to the region's proximity to Washington, D.C.
and the Potomac River, the armies of both sides frequently occupied
and traversed Northern Virginia. As a result,
several
battles were fought in the area.
In addition, Northern Virginia was the operating area of the famed
Confederate partisan,
John Singleton
Mosby, and several small skirmishes were fought throughout the
region between his Rangers and Federal forces occupying Northern
Virginia.
Well after the war, the
Lost Cause
remained popular among the regions residents and many area schools,
roads, and parks were named for Confederate generals and statesmen,
including:
In addition, several schools are named for Civil War battles,
including Bull Run Middle School and Antietam Elementary School in
Prince William County.
Virginia literally split apart during the American Civil War. The
population of fifty counties in the western, mountainous portion of
the state, did not agree with the others (and were also extremely
isolated from eastern authorities). Rather than support the
Confederacy, they split from the rest of Virginia and eventually
joined the Union as a new state, West Virginia, in 1863. During
this process, a provisional government of Virginia was
headquartered in Alexandria, which was under Union control during
the war.
As a result of the formation of West Virginia, part of Lord
Fairfax's colonial land grant which defined Northern Virginia, was
ceded in the establishment of that state in 1863.
Now known as the
Eastern Panhandle of
West Virginia, the area includes Berkeley
County, West Virginia
and Jefferson County, West
Virginia
.
20th century and beyond
The
Department of Defense
's increasing reliance on information technology companies
during the Cold War started the modern
Northern Virginia economy and spurred urban development throughout
the region. After the Cold War, prosperity continued to
come as the region positioned itself as the 'Silicon
Valley
' of the Eastern United States
. Symbolic history was made in early 2001
when local
Internet company
America Online bought
Time Warner, the world's largest traditional
media company, near the end of the
dot-com bubble days. After the bubble burst,
Northern Virginia office vacancy rates went from 2% in 2000 to 20%
in 2002.
After 2002, vacancy rates fell below 10% due to increased defense
spending as the
War on Terrorism
began and the government's continued and increasing reliance on
private defense contractors.
Defining "Northern Virginia"
"Northern Virginia" is more of a functional name than a rigidly
defined area.
Much like Virginia's second largest region,
Hampton
Roads
, there is no single entity which clearly defines
the boundaries of the region for all purposes in a manner such as
the legal boundaries of states, counties, cities and towns.
For statistical purposes, the federal government defines certain
portions of the area in its definition of a
Metropolitan Statistical Area
(MSA).
Presently included jurisdiction are Arlington, Fairfax
, Loudoun
, Stafford
and Prince William counties, and the independent cities of Alexandria, Falls Church
, Fairfax
, Manassas
, and Manassas Park
.
Businesses, governments and non-profit agencies may define the area
considered "Northern Virginia" differently for various purposes.
Beyond the areas closest to Washington, D.C., many communities also
have close economic ties, as well as important functional ones
regarding transportation issues such as roads, railroads, and
airports.
Under
broad and varying criteria, additional jurisdictions which may be
considered part of Northern Virginia (which are outside the
MSA-defined area) include Clarke, Culpeper, Fauquier
, Frederick
, Madison
, Page
, Rappahannock
, Shenandoah
, Spotsylvania
, and Warren
counties, as well as the independent cities of
Fredericksburg
and Winchester.
Regional organizations
Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments
Northern Virginia constitutes a considerable portion of the
population and number of jurisdictions that comprise the
Metropolitan
Washington Council of Governments (MWCOG).
Founded in 1957,
MWCOG is a regional organization of 21 Washington-area local
governments, as well as area members of the Maryland and Virginia
state legislatures, the U.S. Senate,
and the
U.S. House of Representatives.
MWCOG provides a forum for discussion and the development of
regional responses to issues regarding the environment,
transportation, public safety, homeland security, affordable
housing, community planning, and economic development.
The
National
Capital Region Transportation Planning Board, a component of
MWCOG, is the federally-designated
metropolitan planning
organization for the metropolitan Washington area, including
Northern Virginia.
Demographics
, the United States Census estimates that there are 2,432,823 people in Northern Virginia, around 32% of the state's population. This figure includes the exurban Clarke, Fauquier, Spotsylvania, Stafford, and Warren counties, as well as the independent city of Fredericksburg. Together, these jurisdictions account for 377,809 residents. The combined population of Arlington, Fairfax, Loudoun, and Prince William counties and the independent cities of Alexandria, Falls Church, Fairfax, Manassas, and Manassas Park is 2,055,014, which is 26.89% of Virginia's estimated population in 2006.
Virginia's 8th
congressional district, representing 643,503 people in Northern
Virginia, has the highest
life
expectancy rate in the nation.
Background
| Demographics in Northern Virginia's five
largest jurisdictions |
| Household
income |
NOVA |
U.S. |
| ($200k+) |
13.6% |
3.7% |
| $100k+ |
46.1% |
19.0% |
| $75k-100k |
15.1% |
12.1% |
| $50k-75k |
16.3% |
18.8% |
| $25k-50k |
14.2% |
25.6% |
| $25k or less |
8.4% |
24.5% |
| Race |
NOVA |
U.S. |
| White |
67.2% |
74.1% |
| Black or African American |
11.6% |
12.4% |
| Asian |
12.5% |
4.3% |
| (Hispanic or Latino) |
13.9% |
N/A |
| Some other race |
N/A |
6.2% |
| Two or more races |
2.4% |
2.1% |
| Educational
attainment |
NOVA |
U.S. |
| (Graduate/professional) |
25.2% |
9.9% |
| Bachelor's or higher |
55.5% |
27.0% |
| Associate's |
5.7% |
7.4% |
| Some college |
14.8% |
19.5% |
| High school/equivalent |
15.8% |
30.2% |
| Less than high school |
8.1% |
15.9% |
Northern Virginia is home to people from diverse backgrounds, with
significant numbers of
Arab Americans,
Afghan Americans,
Korean Americans,
Indian Americans,
Iranian Americans,
American Jews,
Pakistani Americans, and
Vietnamese Americans, along with other
Americans of Asian descent especially a growing
Chinese American and
Filipino American population. Annandale,
Chantilly, and Fairfax County have large Korean American
communities. Falls Church has a large Vietnamese American
community. Northern Virginia is also home to a small
Tibetan American community as well.
There is a sizable
Hispanic
American population, primarily consisting of
Salvadoran Americans,
Peruvian Americans,
Dominican Americans,
Bolivian Americans,
Mexican Americans, and
Colombian Americans.
Arlington is the
center of the largest Bolivian American community in North America
(mostly immigrants from Cochabamba
). Many of these immigrants work in
transportation-related fields, small businesses,
hospitality/restaurants, vending, gardening, construction, and
cleaning.
Of those born in the U.S. and living in Northern Virginia's four
largest counties, their place of birth by
Census region is 60.5%
from the
South, 21.0% from
the
Northeast, 11.5% from
the
Midwest, and 7.0% from
the
West.
33.7% were born in
Virginia, which is categorized as part of the Southern United
States along with neighboring Maryland and Washington, D.C. by the Census Bureau.
Educational attainment
The core Northern Virginia jurisdictions of Alexandria, Arlington,
Fairfax, Loudoun, and Prince William comprising a total population
of 1,973,513 is highly educated, with 55.5% of its population 25
years or older holding a bachelor's degree or higher.
This is comparable to
Seattle
, the most educated large city in the U.S., with
53.4% of residents having at least a bachelor's degree. The
number of graduate/professional degree holders in Arlington is
relatively high at 34.3%, nearly quadruple the rate of the U.S.
population as a whole.
Affluence
The region is known in Virginia and the
Washington, D.C. area for its
relative affluence. Of the large cities or counties in the nation
that have a
median household
income in excess of $100,000, the top two are in Northern
Virginia, and these counties have over half of the region's
population.
In 1988,
the Tysons
Galleria
mall
opened across Virginia Route 123
from Tysons
Corner Center
with high-end department stores Neiman Marcus and Saks 5th Avenue, hoping to become the
Washington area's upscale shopping destination. The mall had trouble
with sales and attracting high-end boutiques well into the 1990s,
and faced competition from Fairfax
Square, which opened nearby in 1990 with the largest Tiffany & Co. boutique outside of
New York
City
. The Galleria was able to attract high-end
stores after a 1997 renovation, and in 2002 National
Geographic
described it as "the Rodeo Drive
of the East Coast".
In 2008,
luxury home service Sotheby's
International Realty – which had three offices in Virginia serving
the rest of the state, and two in Washington, D.C. serving the Washington metropolitan area – opened a
new office in McLean
to sell more high end real estate in Northern
Virginia.
Crime
A 2009 report by the Northern Virginia Regional Gang Task Force
suggests that anti-gang measures and crackdowns on illegal
immigrants by local jurisdictions are driving gang members out of
Northern Virginia and into more immigrant-friendly locales in
Maryland, Washington, D.C., and the rest of Virginia. The violent
crime rate in Northern Virginia fell 17% from 2003 to 2008. Fairfax
County has the lowest crime rate in the Washington metropolitan
area, and the lowest crime rate amongst the 50 largest
jurisdictions of the United States.
Economy
The
federal government is a major employer in Northern Virginia, which
is home to numerous government agencies; these include the Central Intelligence Agency
headquarters and the
Pentagon
(headquarters of the Department of Defense), as well as Fort Myer
, Fort
Belvoir, Marine Corps Base Quantico
, the United States Patent
and Trademark Office, and the United States Geological
Survey.
Government contracting is an important part of the region's
economy.
Arlington alone is home to over 600 federal contractors, and
has the highest weekly wages of any major jurisdiction in the
Washington metropolitan
area.
, the Northern Virginia office submarkets contain 172 million square feet of office space, 33% more than those in Washington and 55% more than those in its Maryland suburbs. 8 million square feet of office space is under construction in Northern Virginia. 60% of the construction is occurring in the Dulles Corridor submarket.
Northern Virginia's
data centers
currently carry more than 50% of the nation's Internet traffic, and
by 2012
Dominion Power
expects that 10% of all electricity it sends to Northern Virginia
will be used by the region's data centers alone.
In September 2008 the unemployment rate in Northern Virginia was
3.2%, the lowest of any metropolitan area if ranked. The national
unemployment rate in September 2008 was 6.2%. While the U.S. as a
whole had negative job growth from September 2007 to September
2008, Northern Virginia gained 12,800 jobs, most of which were in
the professional and business services sector, and represented half
of Virginia's new jobs. After months of increases, the unemployment
rate of Northern Virginia held steady at 5.2% in March 2008.
Notable companies
The following Northern Virginia companies appear in the Fortune
1000 list:
Additionally,
ExxonMobil's
downstream division is based in
the region. Companies formerly headquartered in the region include
Mobil, and
Nextel/
Sprint Nextel,
PSINet,
MCI
Communications, and
UUNET.
Attractions
The
region's large shopping malls, such as
Potomac
Mills
and Tysons Corner Center, attract many visitors, as well as its Civil War battlefields. Old Town Alexandria is known for its
historic churches, townhouses, restaurants, gift shops, artist
studios, and cruise boats. The waterfront and outdoor recreational
amenities such as biking and running trails (the
Washington
and Old Dominion Rail Trail is the longest paved path in the
U.S.; the
Mount Vernon Trail, and
trails along various stream beds are also popular), whitewater and
sea kayaking, and rock climbing areas are focused along the
Potomac River, but are also found at
other
locations in the Baltimore-Washington metropolitan area.
Scenic
Great Falls
Park
and historic Mount Vernon
(which opened a new visitor center in 2006) are
especially noteworthy. Woodbridge
is home to two minor-league sports franchises, the
Northern Virginia Royals
soccer team and the
Potomac Nationals baseball team.
Politics
Background
From the mid-1880s until the mid-1960s, Virginia politics were
dominated by
Conservative
Democrats. After
World War I, under
the leadership of
Harry Flood Byrd,
who became
Governor of Virginia
and later a
U.S. Senator, this group became known as the
Byrd Organization. With a power
base in a network of the constitutional officers of most of
Virginia's counties, they controlled Virginia's state government.
The Byrd Organization largely followed conservative and anti-debt
principles espoused by Byrd, who had grown up in a rural setting
during the fiscally-stressed era following
Reconstruction.
Although a member if the
Democratic Party and an
initial supporter of President
Franklin D. Roosevelt, Senator Byrd became a
bitter opponent of the New Deal and related national policies,
particularly those involving fiscal and social issues. He became
Virginia's senior senator after the death of Senator
Carter Glass of Lynchburg in 1946.
The period following
World War II saw
substantial growth of Virginia's suburban areas, notably in the
regions of Northern Virginia, Richmond, and Hampton Roads. The
population became more diverse. People of the emerging middle class
were increasingly less willing to accept the rural focus of the
General Assembly, nor Byrd's extreme positions on public debt and
social issues. The latter was nowhere more graphically illustrated
than with Byrd's violent opposition to
racial integration of the state's
public school.
His
leadership in the failed policy of Massive Resistance to racial
desegregation of the public schools and efforts to circumvent
related rulings of the United States Supreme Court
ultimately caused closure of some public
schools in the state and alienated many middle class voters.
The Byrd Organization had never been strong in Virginia's
independent cities, and beginning in the 1960s, city and suburban
factions increasingly supported efforts to make broad changes in
Virginia. In this climate, the
Republican Party of Virginia
began making inroads.
Rulings by both state and federal courts that "Massive Resistance"
was unconstitutional and a move to compliance with the court orders
in early 1959 by Governor
James Lindsay Almond, Jr. and the
General Assembly could be described as marking the Byrd
Organization's "last stand," although the remnants of the
Organization continued to wield power for a few years longer.
When Senator Byrd resigned in 1965, he was replaced by his son
Harry F. Byrd, Jr. in the
U.S. Senate. However,
the heyday of the Byrd Organization was clearly in the past, ending
80 years of domination of Virginia politics by the Conservative
Democrats with the election of a Republican governor,
Linwood Holton, in 1969 for the first time in
the 20th century, succeeding a longtime member of the Byrd
Organization, Democrat
Mills E.
Godwin. To the amazement of many
observers, Godwin changed parties and was elected again as governor
in 1974, but as a Republican.
During the last quarter of the 20th century, Virginia's Republicans
gained ground against the Democrats. Republican
John Warner from Northern Virginia gained one of
the seats in the U.S. Senate in 1978. After longtime state senator
L. Douglas
Wilder became Governor in 1989, the first
African American to become a Governor in
the United States, Republicans subsequently gained control of both
houses of the General Assembly and the Governor's mansion beginning
in 1993.
For a number of years, the recurring Republican theme was to reduce
waste in state government and taxes. However, this seemed to reach
a peak during the administration of
Jim
Gilmore, with a move to repeal an unpopular car tax accompanied
by a failure to provide promised replacement funds to the counties,
cities and towns. Subsequently, two Democrats were elected
consecutively as Governor, and control in the General Assembly
shifted back to a more bipartisan balance of power. As governor,
both
Mark Warner and
Tim Kaine were confronted with stabilizing state
economics and dealing with a deteriorating transportation funding
situation partially caused by the state's failure to index state
fuel taxes to inflation, with a "cents per gallon" tax rate
unchanged since the administration of Democratic Governor
Gerald Baliles in 1986.
21st century politics
In the 21st century, Northern Virginia is becoming increasingly
known for favoring candidates of the
Democratic Party at both
the state and national level.
Fairfax
County supported
John Kerry in the
2004
presidential election, the first time the county supported the
Democratic candidate since
Lyndon
B. Johnson in 1964. The area
also voted for Democrats
Jim Webb in 2006
for U.S. Senate,
Tim Kaine in 2005 for
governor, and
Mark Warner in 2001 for
governor. In these three races for statewide office, the margins
tallied in Northern Virginia provided the Democratic candidate with
a winning margin of victory.
Senior Senator from Virginia Jim
Webb.
Democrat Jim Webb defeated incumbent Senator
George Allen by the slim
margin of 49.6% to 49.2% in 2006. However, that margin increased to
58.1% to 40.7% in favor of the Democratic challenger in the
counties and cities of Northern Virginia, whereas Webb ran behind
Allen somewhat, 46.1% to 52.7%, in the remainder of the
Commonwealth.
Webb carried Fairfax
County, Prince William County, and Loudoun County, as well as the more urban areas of Arlington
, Alexandria, and Falls Church. Allen's sole wins in Northern Virginia were
the cities of Manassas and Manassas Park, winning the latter two only by the narrow margins
of 3.54% and 2.38%, respectively.
In the
2004
presidential election, 53% of Northern Virginia voters voted
for
John Kerry, the Democratic candidate,
and 46% voted for
George W. Bush, the
Republican candidate. This
contrasted with the rest of Virginia, which gave 43% to Kerry and
56% to Bush.
Kerry also carried Fairfax
County, the most populous county in Virginia, and Fairfax
City
, the first time those jurisdictions had voted
Democratic since Johnson's national
landslide in 1964. The strongest support in the area for the
Democrats lies inside the Beltway, in Arlington, Alexandria, and parts of Fairfax County. The more distant
areas (i.e., Loudoun County and Prince William County) are generally more conservative though as they
have increased in population they have also become more
liberal. Both Mark Warner in 2001, and John Kerry in 2004,
lost Loudoun and Prince William. Tim Kaine won both counties in
2005. And in 2006, despite not polling as strongly as Mark Warner
statewide, Democratic senate candidate Jim Webb won both Loudoun
and Prince William. In 2005, 65% of the voters of Northern Virginia
voted for Democrat
Tim Kaine for governor
over
Jerry Kilgore, who
received only 32% of the vote, easily 14 points lower than George
W. Bush's showing only a year earlier.
The 8th, the 10th, and the 11th
congressional districts lie within
Northern Virginia. The current congressman from the 8th district is
Jim Moran (D), the current congressman
from the 10th district is
Frank Wolf (R),
and the current congressman from the 11th district is
Gerry Connolly (D). All three districts voted
for Jim Webb in the 2006 Senate election.
In the 2005 gubernatorial election, the entire region continued to
move away from the Republicans. Fairfax County, Arlington County,
the cities of Alexandria, Fairfax City, and Falls Church, and for
the first time, Loudoun County and Prince William County, went to
Tim Kaine, the Democratic candidate.
The area
continued to be more Democratic the closer it was to Washington,
D.C., but Richmond resident Kaine was able to accomplish
what Northern Virginian Mark Warner had
been unable to do just four years earlier in 2001: carry Loudoun
County and Prince William County (as well as win over 60% of the
vote in Fairfax County).
In 2006, Democrat
Mark Herring swept
every precinct in the 33rd state Senate District on January 31, en
route to beating Republican Loudoun County Supervisor Mick Staton
by a margin of 62 to 38 percent, providing evidence for the claim
that Loudoun is transforming into a liberal county. The district
sits primarily in Loudoun County but also includes nine precincts
in western Fairfax County: Floris, Fox Mill, Frying Pan, McNair,
Franklin, Kinross, Navy, Lees Corner East, and Lees Corner
West.
In 2008,
economist Nancy Pfotenhauer, a spokesperson and
adviser for the John McCain presidential
campaign, created controversy by referring to the areas of
Virginia not included in Northern Virginia as "real
Virginia", picking up on a Republican talking point that Sarah Palin promoted; namely that red states are
the "real America" and more "pro-America".Joe McCain, brother of John McCain, also called
Arlington and Alexandria
in Northern Virginia "communist
country".
In the
2008
presidential election, the majority of Northern Virginia voters
voted for
Democratic presidential
candidate
Barack Obama. Over 70% of
registered voters in Arlington, Alexandria and Falls Church voted
for Obama. Fairfax County, Loudoun County, Manassas and Prince
William County also went to Obama with Obama receiving 60% of the
vote in Fairfax County compared to
Republican candidate
John McCain’s 39%. Obama’s win in
Fairfax County, the most populous county in the state, marks the
second time a Democrat has carried that county since
the 1964 breakdown of Democratic predominance in the South (the
other being the 2004 presidential elections when the county went to
John Kerry). Obama's victory in Northern Virginia continues the
trend of Northern Virginia favoring Democrats over
Republicans.
Culture
Owing to its status as a suburb of Washington, D.C., Northern
Virginia is considered to be more cosmopolitan in its culture than
the rest of Virginia. This can be attributed to the movement of
people from the rest of the country to the area and its location
near Washington D.C, as well as the fact that more urban areas in
Virginia tend to have more frequent migration and mixing of
cultures.
Northern Virginia's population is ethnically diverse, with
significant numbers of immigrants. There are large numbers of
restaurants, and international food of nearly any type is easy to
find. Immigrants have established many shops and many in ethnic
centers, such as the
Eden Center. Some
are highly-educated doctors, engineers, diplomats, and other
professionals, while others work in construction, landscaping,
airport services, restaurants and convenience stores, vendors, taxi
drivers, custodial services, and parking garages.
Due to the proximity to the capital, many Northern Virginians go to
Washington D.C. for cultural outings and nightlife.
The Kennedy
Center
is a popular place for performances as is Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing
Arts
near Vienna
. Nissan Pavilion
(near Manassas), the Patriot Center
at George Mason University
in Fairfax, and the Verizon Center
in Washington serve as popular concert venues, and
the Verizon Center also serves as the home of sporting
events. Smithsonian
museums also serve as local cultural
institutions with easy proximity to Northern Virginia, and the new
Udvar-Hazy
center of the National Air
and Space Museum
in Chantilly is popular as well.
Tysons
Corner Center ("Tysons I") is one of the largest malls in the
country and is a hub for shopping in area. Tysons
Galleria ("Tysons
II"), its counterpart across Route 123, carries more high-end
stores. Tysons Corner
itself is the 12th largest business district in
the United States. Other malls include Springfield Mall,
Fair Oaks
Mall
, Manassas Mall, and The Fashion
Centre at Pentagon City
. Dulles Town Center
is the region's newest mall, serving the eastern
Loudoun
County area. Reston Town Center
is a high-density mixed-use retail, commercial, and
residential development located just off the 267 Toll Road in
Reston
. Potomac Mills, located in Prince William County, is the largest
outlet mall in the region.
The town
of Leesburg
in Loudoun County contains the Leesburg Corner
Premium Outlets outlet mall.
Since the mid-1990s, Loudoun County has been known as America's
fastest-growing county, having grown by almost 50% from 2000 though
2005. Since the 2000 census, both Loudoun and Fairfax counties are
the
top
large U.S. counties by median household income. Loudoun County
has branches of at least five higher education institutions.
Secession
Due to the political and economic differences between Northern
Virginia and the rest of the commonwealth, some secessionist
sentiments have emerged, with those persons wishing that the area
could become the separate state of "North Virginia". Former
Republican delegate
Jeannemarie Devolites Davis
expressed a common sentiment when she said "The formula for funding
school construction in Northern Virginia requires that we pay 500
percent more than the actual cost of a project. We have to pay 500
percent because we give 400 percent away to the rest of the state."
The state government's funding level for transportation projects in
Northern Virginia is a perennial issue that often causes
consternation from the region's politicians and citizens.
Secession
would require consent from the Virginia General Assembly and the admission of a new state by the
U.S. Congress, neither of which is considered a practical
possibility at present. Many people consider the idea a rhetorical
one used to express frustration with the treatment of Northern
Virginia by the state government as well as the occasional opposing
political sentiments between it and the rest of Virginia. Critics
of this movement often point out that many supporters of secession
fail to realize that all
U.S. states
include regions of varying income, political, and cultural
discrepancies within their borders.
Conversely, some citizens in the rest of Virginia would like to
separate from Northern Virginia, arguing that it is culturally and
linguistically unconnected to the remainder of the
commonwealth.
Transportation
The area
has two major airports, Ronald
Reagan Washington National Airport and Washington
Dulles International Airport. While flights from the older National
Airport (a
focus city for
US Airways) are restricted for distance,
frequency, and flight paths due to the proximity to federal
facilities, Dulles is the region's busiest airport in both
passenger loadings and aircraft movements, and the
sixteenth-busiest airport in the United States by takeoffs and
landings in 2007.
Dulles is the region's primary international
gateway, serves as a hub for United
Airlines, and has recently improved its low-cost carrier
offerings with the addition of multiple flights by Southwest
and jetBlue.
Commuters
are served by the Washington Metro subway and the
Virginia Railway Express, a
commuter railroad.
Metro is
the second-busiest subway system in the nation; only New York City's subway system
carries more passengers. A
planned expansion project
will extend the system past Dulles Airport into Loudoun County. VRE
service is significantly more limited, but nevertheless saw over a
year of continuous ridership increase from 2007 into 2008. Bus
service is provided by WMATA's Metrobus and several local
jurisdictions.
Northern Virginia, along with the rest of the region, suffers from
severe road congestion, usually ranking within the top five most
congested areas in the nation. To alleviate gridlock, local
governments encourage using Metrorail,
HOV,
carpooling,
slugging, and other forms of
mass transportation. In 2002, voters rejected a
referendum to raise the Virginia
sales tax within the region to pay for
transportation improvements; several
PPTA proposals to increase
Beltway and Interstate 95 capacity via
toll-funded construction are under consideration
by
VDOT.
Major limited- or partially limited-access
highways include Interstates 495 (the Capital Beltway), 95, 395, and
66, the Fairfax County Parkway and adjoining
Franconia-Springfield
Parkway, the George Washington Memorial
Parkway
, and the Dulles
Toll Road. High-occupancy vehicle (HOV) lanes
are used for commuters and buses on I-66, I-95/395, and the Dulles
Toll Road.
Two major
regional bottlenecks, the Springfield Interchange
and Woodrow
Wilson Bridge, were massively reconstructed with completion in
2007 and 2008. Generally, Potomac River crossings remain
major choke points; proposals to add crossings (such as near
Leesburg or Quantico
as part of a long-proposed Outer Beltway) are opposed by
Virginia communities near the suggested bridge sites, and by
Marylanders who fear that new bridges would bring new housing
development to green space in that state. Because of Northern
Virginia's high housing costs, tens of thousands of employees there
choose more affordable housing far away in outer Virginia exurban
counties, or in Prince Georges County
and Southern
Maryland, thus creating tremendous traffic congestion on the
Potomac bridges. This situation is much like metropolitan
areas of California
. Furthermore, localities such as
Great Falls,
Dranesville, and
Clifton
impose low-density, large-acreage residential zoning, which forces
developers to leapfrog into Loudoun and Prince William Counties to
build housing, thus increasing commuters' driving distances.
Education
Fairfax
County's public school system includes the Thomas Jefferson High School for Science
and Technology
, an award-winning magnet school. 19 of the region's
schools appear in the top 200 of
Newsweek's
America's Top Public High Schools, which excludes schools
such as Thomas Jefferson for having selective admissions.
In
comparison, Washington, Maryland, and the rest of Virginia have 10 schools between them in the top
200.
Although Northern Virginia contains a large portion of the
Commonwealth's population, there are only a handful of colleges and
universities in the region.
The largest and most well-known is George Mason
University in Fairfax, the second largest university in
Virginia.
Other
higher education institutions include Northern Virginia Community
College (colloquially known as NOVA) in Annandale
(with several branch campuses throughout
Northern Virginia), and Marymount University
in north Arlington. A relatively new addition to the roster of
colleges and universities in the region is the University of Northern
Virginia in Manassas, established in 1988. In addition, the
University
of Virginia
and Virginia Tech
maintain a Center in Falls Church, and George
Washington University
has a campus in Loudoun County. Virginia
Commonwealth University
Health Systems has a satellite campus in Fairfax at
the INOVA healthcare system.
Recreation
Northern Virginia is home to many activities for families and
individuals, including biking/walking trails, sports leagues,
recreation facilities, museums, historic homes, and parks.
It is home to the
Northern
Virginia Swim League, which comprises 102 community pools and
NVSL-Dive, which is composed of 47 teams in
Fairfax and Arlington counties. The swim and dive competes compete
of the course of 5–6 weeks from the end of June through the first
weekend in August.
See also
References
External links
Stuart High School
Lee High School
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