Owners of Route One businesses are cleaning up and it shows. When the Southeast Fairfax Development Corporation (SFDC) looked to Richmond Highway businesses for nominees of its annual Mary Thonen Beautification Awards, there was no shortage of qualified properties.
Winning once again: Belle Haven Towers, BB&T Bank at Sherwood Hall Lane (soon to be Virginia Commerce Bank), Cherry Arms Apartments, Huntington Gateway Luxury Apartments and Townhomes, Montebello Luxury Condominiums, Mr. Kleen Car Wash, Taco Bell and The Travelers Motel. Cooper Center received an award for the first time, while Engleside Shopping Center received their first award since 2000.
Other businesses that were given an honorable mention by the SFDC were: Hybla Valley McDonalds, Meadow Woods Apartments, Penn Daw McDonalds, South Meadows Condominiums, SkyView Apartments, Washington Square Apartments and Woodlawn McDonalds. Sacramento Center hasn’t received an award since 1995 and Riverside Park Apartments, Applebees, Boston Market, Brown’s Mazda and Green Olive Restaurant received notice for the first time.
The Mary Thonen Beautification Award is an annual award that recognizes local businesses and property owners for their outstanding contributions to Richmond Highway beautification in the form of landscape improvements. This annual award, presented by the SFDC Board of Directors, was created to honor long-serving SFDC board member Mary Thonen.
Individual business owners are encouraged to make the landscape in front of their businesses and along the service drive medians more appealing to the eye. SFDC believes that attractive landscaping brings more consumers not only to the individual businesses who landscape but also more consumer traffic to the highway as a whole.
SFDC does not have specific minimum qualifications for nominees, but looks for businesses that have landscaped both their storefront area and their service drive medians with a mixture of trees, shrubs and colorful annual plantings.
For more information call SFDC at 703-360-5008 or visit the Web site at www.sfdc.org