Best Stops Not on Metro: Westover

It always bugs me that so many young professionals in Arlington are completely ignorant to what's outside the Rosslyn-Ballston corridor and Crystal City/Pentagon City. It's like anything not on the Orange and Blue Lines must be a post-apocalyptic wasteland patrolled by Mad Max.

But if I'd never ventured off Metrorail, I'd never have found Potomac Overlook Regional Park or Carlyle or Arlington Cinema 'n' Drafthouse. So I'm starting a new series today called Best Stops Not on Metro.

We'll start the series with the one neighborhood The Green Miles would pick to live in that's not on Metrorail. Yes, over Shirlington. Yes, over Columbia Pike.

It's Westover, in west Arlington centered on Washington Boulevard. Some of its key features:

• Westover Market, a grocery store that features The Wall of Beer
  
• Lost Dog Cafe, with Arlington's best sandwiches, some of its best pizza, and its widest selection of beer (are you sensing a theme here?)
• Scoop Beauregard's, home to Arlington's best ice cream
• Ayers Variety and Hardware, one of Arlington's last remaining neighborhood hardware stores
• The very first location of Lebanese Taverna
• Its own post office and soon-to-be-renovated library

Westover may not have its own Metro station, but it's a 20 minute walk from East Falls Church on the Orange Line. In addition, the ART 52 or 53 bus lines run into Ballston.

CommuterPage.com has a great overview of the neighborhood as well as a slideshow, plus an interactive map.