Great expectations

Virginia has a host of ambitious projects underway

Published March 1, 2020 by Richard Foster

There was perhaps no greater portent last year of Virginia’s rising fortunes than the news that the Old Dominion had regained its perch as the nation’s No. 1 state for business.

After eight years, CNBC once again ranked Virginia No. 1 in its annual Top States for Business study. The business news network cited Virginia’s successful bid to land Amazon.com Inc.’s $2.5 billion HQ2 East Coast headquarters as the deciding factor. The headquarters, which will employ 25,000 workers by the end of the decade, is under development in Arlington County.

“By the numbers, Virginia is not only the best state for Amazon; it is America’s Top State for Business,” CNBC wrote in its July 2019 article announcing Virginia’s top ranking. “The state has the nation’s best workforce, including the fourth-highest concentration of science, technology, education and math (STEM) workers. Strong school test scores, small class sizes and a wealth of colleges and universities make Virginia’s education system the best in the nation. And with Virginia Tech announcing plans to build a new campus adjacent to Amazon’s HQ2 focused on innovation, things could get even better.”

And yet, Amazon was just one of many ambitious projects and undertakings that got underway in Virginia last year.

In July 2019, Dominion Energy Inc. broke ground on its $300 million Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind (CVOW) pilot offshore wind energy project, which will erect two 600-foot-tall, 6-megawatt wind turbines 27 miles off the coast of Virginia, which are expected to be online later this year. But that was just a precursor to Dominion’s September 2019 announcement that it planned to build an $8 billion, 220-turbine wind farm — the nation’s largest — off the same coastal area by 2026. It’s part of Dominion’s goal, announced in February, for achieving net-zero carbon dioxide and methane emissions from its electricity generation and gas infrastructure operations by 2050.

Also in Virginia Beach, Venture Realty Co. and music superstar Pharrell Williams unveiled plans to partner on the development of a $325 million mixed-use, surf park complex. It’s expected to begin construction in a couple years and be in operation by 2024.

The View at Tysons development will include the 600-foot Iconic Tower. Rising higher than the Washington Monument, it will be the tallest building between Philadelphia and Charlotte, North Carolina. *Rendering courtesy Clemente Development Co.*

Northern Virginia saw forward movement on major development projects such as the $1 billion Virginia Tech Innovation Campus in Alexandria, as well as the $2.9 billion expansion of Metrorail’s Silver Line and the $1.3 billion mixed-use development The View at Tysons.

And some projects, such as Richmond’s proposed $1.5 billion Navy Hill downtown redevelopment project, weren’t realized.

In health care news, the $150 million Inova Schar Cancer Institute opened in May in Fairfax County. And in Roanoke, Carilion Clinic launched fundraising for its proposed $100 million cancer center with a $1 million donation from Carilion President and CEO Nancy Howell Agee and her husband.

And in education, the University of Virginia kicked off its landmark $5 billion “Honor the Future” fundraising campaign. The largest such initiative by any Virginia public university, it’s also tied for the biggest public higher education campaign in the nation.

The following pages of The Big Book take a deeper look at these and many other events from the last year, exploring how Virginia’s economy has performed across several key sectors, including economic development, ports and shipping, construction and commercial real estate, accounting, law, banking and finance, insurance, hotels and more. And like always, you’ll find a host of valuable, up-to-date reference lists covering everything from Virginia’s largest public and private companies to the commonwealth’s top conference hotels and craft breweries.