Cycling industry rolls into Roanoke
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Roanoke is on a roll with bicycling enthusiasts. Already known as a mountain-biking mecca — earning a rare Silver-Level Ride Center designation from the International Mountain Bicycling Association — Virginia’s Blue Ridge region has broadened its brand by becoming the site of a national bicycling championship this summer and persuading the nation’s premier women’s cycling
Turning on a dime
Driver shortage affecting trucking industry
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Though many American consumers may not think about it much, trucks move just about everything they buy, use, eat, drink and wear. The U.S. trucking industry hauled 72.5% of all freight transported nationwide in 2019, according to the Arlington-based American Trucking Associations. Why should anybody care? Because the ranks of truckers are shrinking: Last year,
Forward motion
Front Royal sees port-driven progress
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Shenandoah is known for apple blossoms, but something else is popping up this spring in Front Royal: a new 340,000-square-foot warehouse logistics center. About a half-mile from the Virginia Inland Port, the center is one of roughly a dozen projects in the region built by Equus Capital Partners Ltd., a commercial real estate agency based
Rocket Lab to boost Eastern Shore space biz
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The Eastern Shore and Accomack County are well-acquainted with the rockets’ red glare. One of the oldest launch sites in the world, the NASA Wallops Flight Facility launched its first rocket on July 4, 1945. Given its history, it seems fitting that Wallops’ rocket business got a big payload boost in late February when California-based
Martinsville moves forward on reversion
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Exactly when it happens remains up in the air, but the city of Martinsville is set on downsizing to town status. It’s been about a year and a half since Martinsville City Council set in motion the complicated process of dropping the locality’s status as one of Virginia’s 38 independent cities and morphing it into
(In)land of opportunity
Richmond, Front Royal terminals expand port shipping capabilities
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Now more than 80 years old, Richmond Marine Terminal is hardly acting like an old-timer. Nestled along the west side of the James River, about five miles south of downtown, it’s one of two inland ports operated by the Port of Virginia — terminals situated in the interior of the commonwealth that extend the reach
ODU mapping tool to help site wind turbines
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The answer, they say, is blowin’ in the wind. In August 2020, Old Dominion University won a $775,000 grant from the Department of Defense that will help create a “wind energy siting solution,” enabling offshore and onshore wind-energy developers to avoid potential conflicts with military operations and trainings. The ODU grant followed Dominion Energy Inc.’s June 2020 installation
Fairfax indoor ski resort plan may spur economic flurry
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Vail. Breckenridge. Aspen. Fairfax? You read that right. Skiers — someday — could swoosh over fresh powder at an indoor ski resort if everything falls into place for a proposed public-private partnership project on portions of the I-95 Landfill Complex in Lorton. Fairfax Peak, as the project is known, would feature a 450,000-square-foot indoor snow
A whole new ball game in Va. Beach
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Attention, athletic leagues: The $68 million, 285,000-square-foot Virginia Beach Sports Center is open for business. “We’re ready to get this party started,” says Nancy Helman, the city’s director of sports marketing, who celebrated the facility’s Oct. 1 debut with Mayor Bobby Dyer and other city officials. The cavernous structure has 12 basketball courts, 24 volleyball
Canceled oyster fest hits Urbanna’s wallet
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Here’s a pandemic casualty unlikely to appear on Dr. Fauci’s radar: The annual Urbanna Oyster Festival, traditionally set for the first weekend in November, has been shucked off. Citing risks from COVID-19, the Urbanna Oyster Festival Foundation, the event’s sponsor, called off the festival for the first time in 63 years, setting in motion an