Will Big Companies Really Be Able to Resist Sprawl’s Siren Song?

We've seen this shift in the increase in people who are choosing bikes for transportation. They are mostly younger people who are sick of being stuck in traffic, of paying $3/gallon for gas, and who want better bike facilities. Communities like DC, NYC, and Arlington County understand this shift and are changing their environment in response. Older, less progressive communities like Fairfax are finding it difficult to move away from the older mindset of moving more people in more cars on wider roads.

In the immediate sense, employers don't directly benefit from reducing car trips or pay for increasing them. Employees benefit through better transit or pay through worse traffic on commutes, but the traffic impact also gets spread out to all other users of the roadways. The companies benefit in the long run, but often make choices based on short-term costs and benefits.

As a result, large employers like Northrop have strong economic incentives to choose sprawling areas with cheaper land, where they don't have to worry about sharing any space with pesky retail and only their employees, the region, and the company's long-term competitiveness lose out.

This dynamic often pits more walkable, inner jurisdictions like DC and Arlington against sprawlier ones like Fairfax, but not always. As Fairfax builds Tysons Corner into a real city, they'll face similar issues within the County. Will Metro be enough of an incentive for corporations to headquarter in Tysons, or will they continue to lean toward the easy yet harmful route of picking the sprawliest office parks?