Developers present plan for two warehouses at 3790 Pickett Road; BAR asks for stronger massing and landscape details

Developers and their consultants presented a work session to the Fairfax City Board of Architectural Review on May 7 for a proposal to redevelop a former tank farm at 3790 Pickett Road into two Class A logistics warehouses totaling about 311,000 square feet.

City planning staff described the site as zoned IH (Industrial Heavy) in the Architectural Control Overlay District and summarized the proposal: demolition of existing fuel tanks and structures; two warehouses oriented around an internal truck court; Building 1 roughly 700 feet long and 250 feet wide with 32 dock doors and two drive-in doors; Building 2 approximately 570 by 220 feet and largely screened from Pickett Road by Building 1; both buildings proposed at about 42 feet in height and constructed with textured concrete panels, metal, and glass in a paint palette provided to the board. Staff noted a city-owned wooded buffer to the north that the applicant proposes to enhance with additional plantings and said the project does not request special exceptions.

Bob Brandt of Walsh Colucci introduced the design team and said the applicant sought BAR feedback. Will Pasek of Brookfield described Brookfield’s national logistics portfolio and said the buildings are designed to be LEED-capable: "Our minimum goal is LEED certified; our maximum goal is LEED Platinum," he said, while noting the final certification level will depend on credits earned. Pasek also said the roofs will be built to be "solar capable"—including extra steel to support future panels—and that conduits for electric truck charging would be installed to support possible future charging infrastructure, though no solar will be installed on day one.

Board members focused discussion on the buildings’ visual impact from Pickett Road. Multiple members said a 700-foot-long, relatively flat parapet would present as an undifferentiated wall and urged the applicant to break up the massing through varying heights, bump-outs, different materials or color bands, and enhanced corner treatments. Members also asked about the size of proposed replacement trees and whether the renderings reflected mature sizes; applicants responded that the renderings assumed several years of growth and that some of the larger street trees would be preserved to help blend new plantings over time. Other clarifications included that the primary truck court faces inward to reduce headlight and truck impacts on the public right-of-way and that site security measures (tenant-installed guard shacks or internal fencing) would be considered by future tenants.

The presentation included engineering and lighting details, a landscape schedule showing roughly 250 parking spaces, and material samples. The BAR’s comments were advisory: the item was a work session rather than a formal application, and staff and the applicant said they would return with revised drawings that address façade articulation, corner treatments, tree-sizing/landscape staging, and material choices.

Because this was a work session, the board took no formal action; staff and the applicant will coordinate follow-up submissions.