Tyson’s Corner: America’s Next Great City
By: Matt Reichenbach
If you’re anything like me, convenience is key. Growing up in a Washington D.C. suburb definitely has its perks: a somewhat functioning metro, tons of great shops and restaurants, a very diverse population, and most of all, sprawling urban centers that feature great places to socialize and spend days exploring. Together, these aspects make everything so conveniently located that there’s never a shortage of things to do.
Tyson’s Corner, Virginia, is a city that represents this Northern Virginian style of living. With towering buildings, a huge shopping center boasting over 500 stores and 20 restaurants, Metro access via the Silver Line, and an outdoor pavilion that hosts free concerts for the public, Tyson's Corner offers a myriad of activities for those who want to experience the hustle and bustle of what it means to live in the DMV.
Every time I go home on break, I make it a priority to head to Tyson’s before I do anything else. In high school, I would spend Friday evenings shopping, hitting up Cava to grab some delicious Mediterranean fare (if you haven’t been, you haven’t lived), to then take the Metro into Georgetown to explore the waterfront. Over Thanksgiving break, I was overcome with a sense of old comfort to meet friends on the pavilion and catch up over my favorite Starbucks drink as shopping bags weighed down our wrists.
Tyson’s is my second home—my mom thinks I should get a frequent visitor card that can be stamped at the door since the frequency at which I go to the mall is out of control. Though being so close to the nation’s capital has made me a bit jaded when it comes to hearing tourists talk about how magnificent the Washington Monument is, (it’s just a concrete pencil, honestly), I never took living there for granted. When I manage to get home for break, I look forward to being in the middle of the bustle of it all: the white knuckled DMV traffic, overpriced Metro fares, and most of all, breathing in that ever so comforting smell of Tyson’s Corner Mall.