SMALL-TOWN VIBE: FALLS CHURCH CITY
Okay, so technically it’s a city, not a neighborhood. But one could easily argue that the magic of “The Little City” (population 13,600) is the sum of its parts. In a municipality spanning a scant 2.2 square miles, you’re hard-pressed to find any residential area that isn’t walkable to the shops, pubs, parks and civic buildings that form the lifeblood of this tight-knit community. There’s always something happening—from “First Friday” gallery events and the Saturday farmers market to music festivals, egg hunts and parades.
“The identity is really the city,” says real estate agent and Falls Church resident Will Gaskins, a father of five whose wife, Allison, grew up here. As is so often the case in small towns, folks who have been raised in The Little City are inclined to stay. “We want to live in a place where people know each other,” Gaskins says. “Our kids grow up in the same school system, play on the same sports teams and it takes no more than five to seven minutes to get anywhere in town. Everything is close.”
Though the local population has grown nearly 11 percent since 2010, new condos and townhomes are keeping the social fabric cohesive, says Theresa Sullivan Twiford, a development consultant and agent at Smith Schnider who lives in Falls Church City with her family. Dwellings of different sizes and price points mean that “people can remain in the same community as they have kids and move up [to bigger houses] without changing schools,” she says. (The city’s independent schools system is made up of Mount Daniel and Thomas Jefferson Elementary, Mary Ellen Henderson Middle and George Mason High.)
And there’s high engagement in all aspects of life. Falls Church City may fall smack dab in the middle of a major metropolitan region, but it’s also “an intimate place where people are very civically involved,” Sullivan Twiford says. “It’s the best of both worlds.”