W&OD Trail Bridge Opens At Arlington-Falls Church Border

ARLINGTON, VA — A new Washington & Old Dominion Trail bridge over Route 29 and Fairfax Drive at the Arlington and Falls Church border opened Friday, according to the Virginia Department of Transportation.

The bridge aims to provide a safer crossing over Route 29 and Fairfax Drive, which is near an eastbound I-66 exit. Trail users are now separated from vehicular traffic at the intersection. The bridge is 623 feet long.

"The W&OD is the center spine of the trail network in Northern Virginia and has reached a new level of use during the pandemic," said Paul Gilbert, Executive Director of NOVA Parks, in a statement. "We are thrilled to offer trail users this new bridge over one of the busiest intersections along the trail. This is part of the larger effort to improve the capacity of the trail in more urban areas.

The approximately $6 million trail bridge was designed and constructed by VDOT and contractor, Lane Construction Corporation, in collaboration with NOVA Parks, Arlington County, and the City of Falls Church. A separate project spearheaded by NOVA Parks will add dual pedestrian and bicyclist trails on a 1.5-mile segment of the W&OD Trail in Falls Church.

Minor additional work on and around the bridge will continue through summer. That will include replacing traffic signals at the Route 29 intersections with Fairfax Drive and Washington Boulevard, as well as constructing new curb ramps at the intersections.

The bridge construction is part of VDOT's Interstate 66 eastbound widening project. As part of the project, a new travel lane opened in December 2020 along four miles of eastbound I-66 from the Dulles Connector Road to Exit 71. The area was a previous bottleneck as eastbound traffic on the Dulles Connector Road merged with eastbound I-66.

The project also modified ramps at Exits 69 and 71, rehabilitated and repaired bridges crossing I-66, and built over 12,000 linear feet of new and replacement noise barriers along westbound I-66.