Del Ray Appears On Most Endangered Historic Places List In Virginia

ALEXANDRIA, VA — While Alexandria has strict protections for its Old Town historic buildings, one neighborhood is being spotlighted for being an endangered historic place.

The Town of Potomac Historic District, now Alexandria's Del Ray neighborhood, is on Preservation Virginia's Most Endangered Historic Places list. It is among 11 historic places on the list.

Preservation Virginia releases the annual list during National Historic Preservation Month to bring attention to endangered historic locations. The group seeks to highlight these places to seek actions from governments, organizations and residents to preserve the places. It has highlighted 170 places in Virginia, and only about 10 percent of the historic sites on the list are now gone.

The Town of Potomac Historic District references the Town of Potomac, which was founded in 1908. The town formed from the emerging Del Ray and St. Elmo neighborhoods north of the Alexandria city limits. The town was ultimately annexed into the City of Alexandria in 1930. The historic district is now on the National Register of Historic Places and Virginia Landmarks Register.

Preservation Virginia notes that Del Ray has a mix of "Foursquares, Bungalows (many Sears kit houses), Colonial Revival, Folk Victorian, Mediterranean Revival, modified Queen Anne and Tudor Revival houses." But the neighborhood is under the threat of the original historic district houses being replaced by new, larger houses.

Demolitions of about 75 houses in the historic district happened in recent years, according to Preservation Virginia.

"The popularity of the neighborhood’s architecture, scale and walkability is jeopardizing the very characteristics that have attracted people to it for years," Preservation Virginia shared. "Many recent residents and developers in need of larger living space are demolishing the historic, mid-sized houses to build new, often outsized and out-of-character houses in their place."

The group suggests preserving and renovating existing houses is more environmentally friendly than new construction with more waste and need for new materials.

Preservation Virginia said a local process isn't in place to slow down or prevent historic district buildings from being torn down. The group suggests creating an overlay district with guidelines and an architectural review board, which currently reviews buildings in the Parker-Gray and Old Town Historic Districts as well as 100-year-old buildings.

"The creation of an overlay district must be done with a collaborative approach with input and consensus of a majority of residents," Preservation Virginia noted. "Reasons and benefits of establishing a local overlay district need to be investigated and discussed to ensure that the overlay helps to manage change and protect the original scale and character of the neighborhood, but also be flexible enough to welcome growth and innovation."

The list also includes Bristoe Station Battlefield in Prince William County, enslaved people's dwellings, historic sites tied to the African American waterman of the Virginia Chesapeake Bay, the historic grist mill Chapman-Beverly Mill in Broad Run, the last headquarters of the Virginia Federation of Colored Women’s Clubs in Hampton, writer Willa Cather's birthplace in Frederick County, and several historic high school locations.