It looks like the developers are using the tactics of their opponents in areas where they feel high density growth is needed.

They look like citizens. They sound like citizens. And now they are starting to act like citizens.They are showing up at public hearings wearing T-shirts proclaiming that they are “Citizens for Better Life” and taking sides in the hottest debate in Fairfax County: growth and what it should look like.

But Citizens for Better Life is not an ordinary citizens group. Instead of coming from the community where the projects would be built, Citizens and other groups like it are organized by the builders themselves.The counter offensive, led by the architect of a proposed development off the Dulles Toll Road in Vienna and Northern Virginia’s leading building trade organization, takes a page from the neighbors it is up against in the battle over dense growth in Fairfax.

“A lot of people are telling me I’ve got to be insane to get involved in this,” acknowledged Christian J. Lessard, the architect behind Citizens for Better Life.

Lessard’s Vienna-based firm, the Lessard Group, is designing the vast Parkview community, a proposal for nearly 2,000 homes that developers are seeking to build off the toll road in Vienna, as well as the controversial MetroWest development near the Vienna Metro station. Read the rest at The Washington Post

I can not imagine this working, as the backlash will be strong and swift. The one benefit is that it allows the developers side to be heard at meetings and on TV, something that a 3 piece suited spokesperson can not convey.

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