W.C. & A.N. Miller acquired more than 300 acres here in 1929 and laid out the first curvilinear development of that scale in the District, routing streets to preserve trees.
Two things define Spring Valley, and a buyer needs both. The first is the plan: W.C. & A.N. Miller acquired more than 300 acres in 1929 and laid out the first curvilinear development of that scale in the District, routing streets to preserve existing trees rather than imposing a grid on the ground. The second is a material disclosure that no other neighborhood on this site carries — a roughly 660-acre Formerly Used Defense Site covering about 1,600 private properties along with American University and several embassies. Both belong in the conversation before an offer, and the second belongs there first.
During the First World War the American University Experiment Station operated on this ground as a chemical-agent research site. Ordnance was rediscovered in 1993, and the area has been under investigation and remediation since. The contaminants of concern are arsenic in soil, perchlorate in groundwater, and munitions debris. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers leads the work, with the Environmental Protection Agency and the District's Department of Energy and Environment involved, and a public information repository is maintained at the Tenley-Friendship Library. None of that is a reason not to buy in Spring Valley. It is a reason to buy with the record in front of you rather than a summary of it.
The site boundary does not track neighborhood boundaries, and individual properties within it have been through different levels of investigation and clearance at different times. Do not accept a general answer. Ask USACE directly about the status of the specific parcel, review the file at the Tenley-Friendship Library repository, and raise your own environmental questions in writing during the study period rather than after settlement. If a seller or a listing states that a property is or is not affected, ask for the document that says so. As of August 2026 the investigation record remains the authoritative source.
The housing is detached and dates largely from about 1930 onward: Colonial Revival, Cape Cod and ranch houses on the curving streets Miller laid out. Miller also built the Spring Valley Village shopping buildings from the late 1930s, which is why the commercial frontage here reads as part of the original development rather than something later grafted onto it. There is no local historic district and no homeowners association. The Spring Valley-Wesley Heights Citizens Association, incorporated in 1952, is a voluntary civic body holding no architectural review authority and levying no mandatory assessment. What governs construction is the zoning, so confirm the lot's zone at the DC Office of Zoning before you design.
Spring Valley trades in the range where the District's split residential rate applies. Under D.C. Code §§ 47-812 and 47-813, Class 1B property — residential with no more than two dwelling units — is taxed at $0.85 per $100 of assessed value up to an indexed threshold and $1.00 above it, and the Office of Tax and Revenue publishes that threshold at $2.558 million as of August 2026. The Homestead Deduction, $91,950 for tax year 2026, and the 110 percent cap on taxable assessment growth under § 47-864 both attach to an owner-occupant, but the cap ends with the transfer. A long-held house may therefore be carrying a tax figure well below what the next owner will pay. Model from the new assessment.
Spring Valley feeds Hardy Middle School and then MacArthur High School. The elementary assignment is address-specific rather than uniform across the neighborhood, so pull it for the exact house from the DCPS boundary tool. That is a boundary statement and nothing more.
Spring Valley sits within Washington, DC — that guide covers the zoning, permitting and site constraints that apply across the wider area.
Artur can confirm what applies to a specific address here — lot, zoning, association documents and school assignment — before you write an offer.
