Arlington’s Fire Station 8 has stood along Lee Highway for nearly a century, founded by African American volunteers who feared that white emergency crews would not protect them or their homes.
The county wants to replace the cramped, outdated facility with a modern one farther north, where response times lag well behind the county standard.
But the proposal, which the Arlington County Board is scheduled to vote on Tuesday night, has generated a swell of opposition — from African American neighbors worried that this proud yet painful chapter of their history will be forgotten, and from residents of all races who say a fire station at the county’s preferred site eight blocks north won’t solve the response-time problem. The controversy is the latest example of a persistent challenge in this densely populated county just outside the nation’s capital: The demand for infrastructure competes with a desire for green space, even as tight municipal budgets force officials to look for the most economical ways to build and preserve modern facilities.