VIRGINIANS OF INTEREST
Carthan and Brian have been friends for more than 30 years and share a passion for all things Virginia! They lost touch for many years, but reconnected in 2020 while Carthan was involved with the Economic Development Office for the City of Petersburg and Brian was working on the Medicines for All Project at Virginia Commonwealth University. Both talked frequently about various issues facing the Commonwealth and started kicking around the idea of a podcast. Both Carthan and Brian consider themselves a bit technically challenged, so when the opportunity to host a podcast at Blue Ridge PBS in Roanoke presented itself, they jumped in with both feet!
We hope you enjoy the conversations!
VIRGINIANS OF INTEREST
E45: Fort Monroe Holds 400 Years Of American History
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Fort Monroe looks like a postcard, but it reads like a full American biography. We sit down with Scott Martin, executive director of the Fort Monroe Authority, to trace how a sandy spit at Point Comfort becomes a coastal defense powerhouse, a cradle of layered Virginia history, and a place where the story of freedom is literally written into the ground.
We talk about why Fort Monroe is called Freedom’s Fortress and why the 1619 landing narrative matters right now, including the evolving memorial work that helps visitors connect trauma, resilience, and the long arc of American identity. Along the way, we hit the lesser-known chapters too: the fort’s engineering legacy, famous figures who passed through, and the role Fort Monroe played as the Army’s intellectual hub for training and doctrine that shaped modern military thinking.
Then we shift to what happens next. Fort Monroe is a massive adaptive reuse challenge with aging infrastructure, complicated transitions, and a coastline that forces every plan to take sea level rise seriously. Scott shares how world-class landscape architecture, walkability, food, lodging, public art, and restored wetlands can turn this National Historic Landmark into a destination that strengthens Hampton Roads and the Commonwealth, not by copying other cities, but by building a quality place you cannot duplicate anywhere else.
Subscribe for more stories of Virginia’s people and places, share this episode with a friend who loves history and design, and leave a review with your favorite Fort Monroe memory or the change you most want to see.
Welcome And Scott’s Path
SPEAKER_00And now, from the Blue Ridge PBS Studios in Roanoke, Virginia, it's the Virginians of Interest Podcast with your hosts Brian Campbell and Carthen Curran.
SPEAKER_01Welcome to the Virginians of Interest Podcast. My name is Brian Campbell. I'm here with my friend Carthon Curren, who has a special guest.
SPEAKER_04Special indeed. Scott Martin is with us, who is the uh executive director. I think that's the right title, Scott, or is it a different title? The Fort Monroe Authority.
SPEAKER_02And close enough, you are you are on track. Okay.
SPEAKER_04Well, Scott and I go way back, and I'm so happy he could be with us because he is his leadership is so needed at a place that is so special called Fort Monroe. We'll get into that in a second. Scott, just for our listeners, can you give us a little bit where you where you background, where you grew up, where you went to college, and and some of your previous career spots and and the path that got you to Fort Monroe? And then we're going to get into that and all the amazing things you have going on currently and are planning on that very special historic part of the Commonwealth.
SPEAKER_02Oh man, well, I appreciate it. And thank both of y'all for making time uh to hear a little bit about Fort Monroe, that is indeed a very special place. Um, so I grew up in Hopewell, um, son of a local government manager who spent my whole life growing up saying I'm never gonna be like my dad and go into government. And then looky here. Um, you know, things run in the family. Went to Fishburne Military School for high school and uh then went to Lynchburg College for a couple years for college and realized that it was time to go away. It was just Virginia was just doing too much Virginia on me and transferred out with my wife now. Um we were just dating at the time, to Boise State University in Idaho and wrapped up undergrad and graduate degrees out there, which was a really big inflection point in my life for thinking about place and how economic development is the sustaining type, and we'll get into this, is driven far more by the quality of your place than some incentive check you write to bribe someone to come to your town. Um, that was a dynamic experience because Boise is one of the fastest growing cities in the nation at that time. Came back to Virginia Carson, which is where you and I met. I was very fortunate to work in Franklin County. Love Franklin County, my good folks there for nine years. Um, and that taught me how important people are to building community. You can talk about governance, the structures, all you want. It's the good-hearted folks and the one-on-one relationships that make it work. And then I pivoted to the nonprofit world of urban park design for about the last 15 years, working in Louisville, Kentucky, Southern Indiana, uh, Chattanooga, and did a lot of work with World Urban Parks globally and Sydney, Calgary, Monterey, Mexico, um, thinking about how we build place and how those places drive urban growth, livability, and job creation and wealth creation and just places people can survive, um, and spend a lot of time on that. And then very fortunate to be recruited by by Karen Merrick and the Fort Monroe Authority Board last year to take this opportunity to do something we think can be pretty unique globally at a Virginia landmark and in the Hampton Roads area that's so close to my heart.
SPEAKER_01Thank you. Brian?
How Point Comfort Shaped History
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I've got a lot of questions that are more in modern history, but why don't you I'm always sort of surprised. I use a picture of Fort Monroe for all of my Zoom calls, which has nothing to do with you or this thing today, but but growing up in that area, I just thought it it held such a special place in the hearts and imagination of Virginians, particularly that area. Give us give us an ex a quick history lesson on um when was Fort Monroe built and and why is it such a uh iconic and significant place in American history.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's um yeah, it's remarkable. And and and I am gonna snob out with a little Virginian here. Is this one of those places that can only happen in Virginia? Um Point Comfort, as it was called, obviously inhabited for 12,000 years by um the post-Misissippian cultures, the Native American communities here. We knew most recently is the woodland community, woodland nations of the Kiptopeak tribe, the Nansamans, the Powhatan Nation of Confederacy, and and all of that. And what it is to go back, uh, for folks who don't know, is the Hampton Roads area is all about the movement of sand. At the end of the day, and you know what? At the end of the day, it's all gonna be about the movement of sand um in Storms. And this sandbar uh has a sister across the Hampton Roads Bridge tunnel that folks may have stared at when they were stuck on traffic. Um, are two spits of land that were likely formed by deposition of hurricanes and large storm events, but really are the outflow of the Appalachians. Um, I sit on a sandy beach that, quite frankly, is every bit Bath County is anything else, because that's where the sands came from, and storms move them up or down, but it produces the prominences that stick out into the harbor, and that's the important story here is this piece of land as it juts out is where cultures are going to meet. So when the Native Americans were working here, if they were fighting amongst themselves, this was a very important defensive point. When the Spanish, Portuguese started poking around coming up the bay, this was an important point. And then when Captain Smith arrived and the British colonists, while they landed at first landing, they named Point Comfort, Point Comfort, because as y'all know, at First Landing, not a good place to be in a soap. They came around the corner here, anchored, and they built their first defensive battlement here to protect Jamestown uh from the Spanish incursions when this was really much a prominent spot. And what's neat about here, I can nerd out on this all all day long. Sorry, y'all. It's that you're all done. So we all know the starving time story of Jamestown, right? They were they were just suffering. Well, the fun fact is this the soldiers they left here at Fort Monroe were literally getting overweight. Um, there's so much oysters, sturgeon, clams, everything was here. These cats were getting fat uh while everyone was starving forever to Jamestown because we're on the Chesapeake Bay. It's literally Eden here. Um, you know, you think about everything that's here. So this became a fort for a long, long time. And ultimately, that's how we got to Fort Monroe. Because after the War of 1812, always a bad look when your nation's capital burns. Just not, you know, really not a good thing. So the governor of Virginia, with then President James Monroe, cooked up a deal and said, Hey, uh, this can't happen again. How do we stop it? Well, let's deploy point old point comfort at this point because it sticks out, as I mentioned, into a fort to protect not only DC and the Chesapeake, but Hampton Roads, Richmond, and most of Virginia. So, and I love this because it just makes me laugh. I never think of this name. Governor Campbell, whose first name was Dave. I don't know why I think of Dave as an unusual name in the 1820s. Uh Governor Campbell.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, right. Governor Dave said, All right, feds, we'll give you old point comfort uh to build a fort, which the feds did and we'll get into. And then and then he was wicked smart almost. He said, When you're done with it, it comes back to the Commonwealth Virginia, reverts back. And that's why I'm talking to you today as the administrator and leader of this site that's a Commonwealth of Virginia property. Now, Governor Day blew one thing. Um, he didn't say what condition it would come back to the Commonwealth of Virginia in. So when the defense brought it back, it came with some, oh, how do we put it? Uh improvements, uh liabilities, deferred maintenance, all the things. But we'll, you know, we'll get into that. But the point is it came back to the Commonwealth, which is how we got here today. Now, whilst it was a fort, um, it was the site of many significant events, not least of which was 1619, when it was still the British Colony Fort. And it was the arrival site, because you would check in here before you moved upstream to Williamsburg or Janestown of the arrival of the first enslaved Africans on the shores of a British colony. That happened here. Um, Robert E. Lee, integral, uh big role here in building out Fort Wool, the island, which is our sister fort out in the middle. Edgar Allan Poe was stationed here. And fun fact, still really difficult to have a functioning heroin addiction and maintain a military career. So he he washed out here as well. Um, but he was here. And and then Chief Blackheart was here. Um, any really arc of American history begins to touch Fort Monroe was the launching point of coastal defense artillery for our nation because that's how we defended our shorelines. The school of artillery was here during the Civil War. It was always in Union territory because it was simply impregnable. Um, there was no way the Confederacy was going to get it. So Hampton and this footprint was always in Union hands, which meant it became a beacon of freedom and how it got its name of Freedom's Fortress for African Americans who bravely crossed Confederate lines to seek freedom here, which resulted in the contraband decision, uh, which led to the Emancipation Proclamation. Um, so the straight line of freedom from arrival of African Americans in 1619 to the journey of freedom that continues to this day literally happened within 200 yards of itself uh on this landscape. Again, this is Virginia stuff. You can't make these narratives up, and they don't come together anywhere else in our nation. It's absolutely stunning.
SPEAKER_04Well, there's a well just also in 1620. That's when actually women were first uh landed here that's exactly right, Carthen.
SPEAKER_02Yep. And they didn't stay here very long, they moved upstream as well. So you're exactly right. So all those narratives meet here. Um and and so it was a Ford for many years. Um the I I won't go, we can go into the military stuff later. It but every major impact of U.S. warfare somehow touched this. You know, the strategy all the way up to the strategy for the Persian Gulf War was written here at Fort Monroe when it was the trade doc headquarters. This is where Schwartzkopf got the ideas, they formulated the campaign strategy. So this has always been a site of innovation. Uh, this has always been a site of what does it mean to be an American? And then we have the ecology story that wraps the whole thing. We're on the Atlantic Flyway, one of the most dynamic locations in the Western Hemisphere for migrating waterfowl. In the center of 1.7 million people, the 37th largest MSA in the United States of America, um, and the sixth or seventh most active port by tonnage. So all the stuff we know happens on or around this location.
SPEAKER_01The picture I used on Zoom had people always say, is that a moat? So explain uh why the the other thing people haven't been there, it is a fort surrounded by a moat.
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_02I think you just described it very well. Um it is a fort. Yeah, and and what's always fun is when a new governor comes in, I get to be the one that says, Hey, you know, no matter how bad things get in Richmond, uh, you can come down here, we have a fort and a moat, and you can pull the bridge up, and they won't get to you. And they always, yeah, it's always good for a chuckle. You're the one governor in the United States that gets a fort. Um
1619 And The Road To Freedom
SPEAKER_02not bad.
SPEAKER_01Well, tease that a little bit if you don't mind, but the 1619 project, the Portuguese ship that sort of ran aground. And and then there was also a berth. So tell us a little bit about the 1619 part.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, very timely because the African Lion Memorial is now, um, we're recording this at the end of July, at the end of August this year. We will introduce the next sculpture. So the White Lion, um, what happened was with the slave trade is the Portuguese had initiated it in what is now present-day Angola, and they were primarily bringing human beings as cargo to their colonies, Brazil and Central America. British privateers seized one of those boats in the Caribbean, seized the human beings inside it, and then brought them up here to the closest British colony and arrived on these shorelines. Uh 20 and odd individuals. We think it was 32. And the sculpture that you just pointed to is we have the first record here of the first African-American child baptized um in a British colony uh on the shoreline. The family, the descendant family is still with us, the Tucker family, very uh important family in Virginia that are civic leaders, business leaders across the state, uh, can trace their lineage uh to Anthony, Isabella, and then baby William. And to have that through line, um, and that through line that contains every part of trauma, hurt, pain, but also resilience, hope, creativity, um, really the American experience writ large is recognized now on this site. And that's a new story. As I grew up, my grandparents were in Ocean View Suffolk. I've got photos of me, like y'all, at the Chamberlain, scared to death. My granddad's gonna pop me in the back of the head because I behave out of sorts or you know, walk in the pet cemetery, all the stuff. That story was not brought forward to me either. Um, so it's really interesting. People say history's done. History is never done. As we learn these new stories and as they inform and shape us, that's really where the power begins. And again, I can say this as a Virginian who uh lived in other states, man, it is so good to be home where these stories are our stories, and to get the privilege and the obligation to carry them forward as well is only we can do is really a remarkable opportunity.
SPEAKER_04Great. Some other historical footnotes about Fort Monroe, of course. Robert E. Lee is a young, recent graduate, uh and uh from West Point, he and his new bride, they were he was based here, and I think his first son, first child was born at Fort Monroe. Uh another interesting footnote, Jefferson Davis was in prison. Uh was it two, two, three years? Um two years. Two years. Two years, and his wife was here as well. So she they both were there.
SPEAKER_02Verinah was here. Yep. She was able to come and be with him as well in the post-Civil War, you know, reconstruction era. Yep, you're exactly right. Those are two of the famous stories. What's interesting, just to nerd out on Robert E. Lee for a second, you know, that's when West Point was all about engineering. Right. You know, they were our top our nation's top engineering school. And you came to Fort Monroe because they actually taught you how to build forts here. That's why we have probably one of the strongest built forts in the United States, is it was a teaching and learning laboratory for our soldiers who were engineers at the time. Right. And and this is where you this is you know, innovation. We think we always think of data centers, all that stuff is innovation. No, innovation has always happened here. It looks different. Um, and so he came here and did that. And what's funny, of course, is then his career had nothing to do with building forts. You know, the Mexican-American War and everything on the Western frontier, they were not building stone forts anymore.
SPEAKER_04So Right, exactly. So then give us a little time level, time dates here as the as Tom evolved, the United States Army they're continuing. I guess they've they had the fort from which date to until they closed it and the Commonwealth assumed it. How how long was that?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, good question. I mean, it was 1834 when the fort was finished, all the way up to 2011, when the Commonwealth of Virginia and then President Obama through the National Monument brought the National Park Service in. So it was, you know, 200 years of of service here. Interestingly, and I don't want to let this story drift, Fort Monroe has always had dual personalities, though. We talked a little bit about the Chamberlain. There have always been resorts here as well. The resorts were co-located, and this is the era of the great railroad resorts. So when you think of things like the homestead that we know very well, uh White Sulper Springs, um go dirty dancing and put Mountain Lake in there. This was one as well. In fact, the rail line ran from DC, Philadelphia, right down here, and this is where you would come for your vacations at the Hygia, the Sherwood End, what became the Chamberlain, one of those great classic 1800s East Coast establishments that had its own Donald Ross golf course. It had, I'll get the number wrong, but the scale begried a 20,000 acre-ish duck hunting um experience on the eastern shore connected to it. And you would sachet and walk along the seawalls and all that stuff as well, co-located with the military. Now, during times of war, the military would take over those establishments to house soldiers do training, like War I, Spanish American war mobilization. And then they would flip back into this resort identity as well.
SPEAKER_01Why? Yeah, you know, and I'm gonna I'm gonna point a personal privilege here. So not only did I grew up there, but then I was, I think you remember the story. I was stationed at Langley Air Force Base. And in the 1980s, it's when the government began to realize that we have a lot of bases that we probably ought to close. And then I'll attribute this to primarily Paul Tribble, who had been the first district congressman and then the U.S. Senator. Um, it was always on the list. Fort Moreau was always on the list, but but for about 10 years, they said, well, we'd like to turn it over, but there's this problem of unexploded ordinance. And I remembered thinking they were the they were the cleverest people around at not getting their bases closed. Tell us a little bit about this this decade, and I remember it at least a decade of where they avoided the the the budget acts uh but by saying, no, no, no, you can't that nobody wants to come in here because we've got all these bombs that are unexploded. One, what's the history of that? And how are you dealing with unexploded ordinance?
SPEAKER_04I have a story about that.
SPEAKER_01Go ahead. Go ahead, Scott.
SPEAKER_02Well, Scott, we don't is not allowed back. Let me just leave it at that. He's a he's a we'll get to that. Um, you know, it everything's a political decision, and politics isn't a bad word. Uh, you know, it's how we make decisions in public. And I think you're exactly right. Is this was a gem for the U.S. Army. You would hear, you know, the people who were staged here at Fort Monroe towards its last years, if you didn't, if you colonels were all over the place. This was a high-ranking spot because it had almost an academic background. It was almost, you know, a West Point-ish campus. This was a think tank. So the Army was not really keen to give up one of its best posts. You know, it's one thing to be at Fort Bliss, bless their hearts, or Fort Bragg. It's another thing to get Fort Monroe with this beautiful view and this incredible setting and access to the Pentagon, close access to DC, close access to all the defense infrastructures and the think tanks at UVA, tech, UNC, you know, everything's here. So that's why the military was, you know, not speedily to get rid of it. Now, two hurricanes come, much like you experienced at Langley, and the cost of maintaining this as a military base where its functions can frankly be performed elsewhere, um, made eventually it just made too much sense. Senator Warner did some great work, Senator John Warner, that is, um, to get this thing in good shape prior to it going through closure and winging into seawalls and infrastructure like that. Um, but it just became a make-by decision for the Army. And there were efficiencies by unifying at Eustace that made sense as they moved things around. But it was really hard emotionally for the Army to give it up because so many servicemen made so many memories here. The buildings here have such mass and power. This is hard stuff for the army to give up because this defines in many ways army culture, and we have an obligation to carry that and sustain that forward because it contributed so, so much. Now, the unexploded ordinance, yeah, it's a thing because as I mentioned, we were the coastal artillery defense um, you know, center of excellence, as it would be. So, yes, occasionally you will find things, but it's not like we're a firing range like something out west, like Yuma Proving Ground or you know, heaven forbid, some nuclear training site in Nevada. Yeah. Um, it is a manageable part of our existence. But is it a real part of our existence? You damn right it is. Uh, you put a spade in the ground here, we're gonna do our homework first.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, exactly. But by the way, uh tra Tradoc, you said that earlier, it stood for training and doctrine command, correct? Yeah. Which was which was uh I didn't know the Schwarzkoff story, but it was where the army would develop its plan. So in other words, it was really sort of an intellectual um I agree with you too. Didn't they don't they also have an airport? So there were lots of other benefits that the they were there, they were all these little hidden gems that if you got stationed here, it made your life a much much easier, which was another reason that they've that they uh drugged their feet, correct?
SPEAKER_02Correct, correct. And Tradok, um, you know, that was our response as a nation to the lessons of Vietnam, which is we're not going to repeat that again. We have to get better at warfare. So the army that existed and was successful in Grenada, Persian Gulf War, that modern army was created by the folks who were stationed and working here. Um they really structured it and rebuilt our military really from here in a lot of ways. So you're right, it was that think tank. And then there was kind of a madmen vibe out here in the 50s and 60s. Yes, you lived in this house, you had servants that helped you. They were, you know, privates and enlisted individuals. There was an airport, so you had your own. If you were a high-ranking general, yes, literally you would wake up, be curried to the airport, get shuttled up to the Pentagon, Belvoir, work for the day, come back home. And I had this picture of a martini waiting at some point as well. So there was a there was definitely an aesthetic here.
SPEAKER_04Carthen? Uh and just again, back to some historical figures. I think Dwight Eisenhower's son, John, was married at Port Monroe. Yep. And was it was Ike and Douglas MacArthur uh stationed at Fort Monroe at some point during their career?
SPEAKER_02Briefly, they were. There's not a major general who hasn't moved through here in one span of time or another. So they were they were all around. Marshall was around for a bit, uh Bradley was around. Um they weren't stationed or or you know the commanders here at the unit, but they were certainly in and out and moved through this space.
SPEAKER_04So before we get into today's status of where things are and and the amazing, I think, and exciting development plans that you're that you're leading the charge for on behalf of the authority and the commonwealth.
Base Closure And Unfinished Business
SPEAKER_04Let's talk a little bit of the history of the community adjacent to Fort Monroe, Phoebus, which is of course technically you're in Hampton, Virginia. Uh Fort Monroe is in the city of Hampton, right?
SPEAKER_02Uh uh technically technically we are yeah, we are in the city of Hampton, um, much like a college campus, you know, much like UBA is in Charlottesville.
SPEAKER_04Exactly. So the the History about Phoebus, I think people would find that interesting, which is going through its own, I would say, renaissance, and it's a little downtown.
SPEAKER_02But the Yeah, Phoebus is Phoebus is all its history has always been very much connected to Fort Monroe as a neighborhood. First it was independent city, then Hampton absorbed it with when Warwick County and Hampton all, you know, the Tidewater went through its let's be big cities phase. It was Elizabeth City County, my fault. Warwick County was Newport News.
SPEAKER_04Newbor news, right?
SPEAKER_02Um Yeah, so Phoebus was absorbed, but it's always had a Waterman angle. It's always had a strong African American, rich heritage there. Um post-Civil War reconstruction, I'll make the case. Because this was Freedom's Fortress and always under Union hands, and the Confederates essentially burned Hampton to the ground in retreat, it repopulated with a very strong African American population base. And you can almost make the case, I think, that Hampton is one of the first reconstruction cities in North America. The Hampton Institute grew out of Mary Peak's work here at Fort Monroe as one of the first HBCUs with Booker T. Washington, Franklin County native. Have to get that in there. And and and that grew here. You still see the Waterman culture here, which we we sometimes miss. Um there was a very strong African-American tradition of oystermen and crabbers out here that came out of Phoebus. So you have that relationship. And then the supporting neighborhood that supported the activities of the government here, which was Carthagin, when the base closed, the red flag that I think went up on everyone's plate of, oh my gosh, you took this much economic activity out of Fort Monroe when the army abandons it, that giant sucking sound is left. What happens to Phoebus and Hampton? Much like we would think about Martinsville when the furniture industry is retreated and textiles changed as well. So there's there's definitely a relationship we'll get into there economically.
SPEAKER_01Before we get into modern times, can you also quickly, Poe, Ed Ground Poe, what did he do at Fort Monroe?
SPEAKER_02Well, we don't know a whole lot. We know he was stationed here, we know he went AWOL here. Uh or well, better stated, he paid someone to take his seat here. Yeah. And then what we've learned interestingly recently is he did one of his last readings, public readings of his work before he pass before he died, here at what is the chamberlain today.
SPEAKER_01Nice, nice.
SPEAKER_02Um, so there's a lot of Poe stuff that that I think it feels very fertile to me as territory we have yet to explore fully.
SPEAKER_01Great.
SPEAKER_04Well, perhaps we should uh look at opening up Poe's pub at Fort Monroe.
SPEAKER_02The opportunities are endless. With music at you know, you can hear the cure and the Smiths playing nonstop. So we'll just we'll connect that in.
SPEAKER_04Um prior to coming to Fort Monroe, you you did incredible work in Chattanooga, which is one of my favorite cities on on the Tennessee River, and you did some wonderful stuff there. But when you were looking at taking this assignment, Scott, what obviously I the things you've talked about drew you here back to Virginia being one of them. But when you saw this opportunity, what were some of your first thoughts? And then if you can get into a little deeper dive as to what I you've kind of you've gone really beyond the conceptual plan, or that's pretty well set what you would like to see happen in the next five, ten years uh at Fort Monroe and from a development standpoint.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and I'll zoom out a little bit on that. And this thank you for asking that, Carth. And I like the way you frame that too. Um So I've what my midlife crisis in this space, because we all go through them, um, was rediscovering the power of public spaces to shape urban cities. And and what I mean by that in the fancy, not fancy way of saying it is imagine Manhattan without Central Park or New York City. You can't. That public landscape makes Manhattan a place you can viably raise a family in. It gave it resilience, it gave it a robust response to depressions and successes and everything else. Um, that's true across the globe. It's the these big cities where growth happens, and regardless of what we want to think our values, I'm I'm driven by spreadsheets. Wealth creation and job creation is driven in these urban environments and looks to be increasingly done so. But that doesn't mean all urban areas succeed. Um and and when you look at the ones that do, there is a universal lesson to me that they do it because they build a quality place that you want to live. You mentioned Chattanooga. Chattanooga is a case study. It was the most polluted city in the nation in 1972. It was bleeding people left and right. Um, and it turns itself around by saying, what makes us special? And for them, it's to you nailed it, Tennessee River, the outdoors, lookout mountain, the battlefields. They've got some real assets there in terms of natural ecology and topography that they flipped. And Senator Bob Corker is the one who led it, who flipped the script and said, I'm never going to compete with an Atlanta and I don't want to, or a Nashville, but I can be me and that can work for us. Boise was much the same way. So I looked at Fort Monroe through the eyes of someone who went away and said, Oh my gosh, Hampton Roads is the number 37 MSA in the United States of America. And y'all have probably talked about this or around this with other folks. Hampton Roads has a hard time thinking about itself that way. Lord knows the nation doesn't think about it that way. Um, and we can get into what that means. But when I looked with that global lens to to Fort Monroe, Carthon, you can't help but go, oh my gosh. 565 acres, a UNESCO site of memory, a national landmark, a national historic landmark, ecology off the charts, bullseye in within 1.8 million people. There's not a top 50 metro in the United States of America that wouldn't get it. It's left leg to have this. And and to have the opportunity to say, how does this asset continue to shape and drive our region? Because it's a competitive advantage for our region that cannot be stolen or duplicated by Denver, Des Moines, Phoenix. Pick your competitor. And it moves in the same space as some iconic public spaces, such as the Presidio in San Francisco, Governor's Island in New York, Table Mountain in Cape Town, the Rocks in Sydney. Yet we haven't yet figured out how to frame it that way. That doesn't mean we haven't tried, and we'll get into how I think we should try it. But that's what it is at the end of the day for our region. And selfishly, for my career, there's just not a better opportunity to say, do you really mean what you say you mean? And do you really believe in this than Fort Monroe and what that gives us here in Virginia?
SPEAKER_01And let me I've got a specific question. I think the problem is twofold. First of all, Virginia's separate cities and counties. Having grown up in that area, you know, the reason it's you, I'm people are always shocked when they realize that it's, you know, essentially almost as big as Charlotte, but nobody thinks of it that way, right? So that you got the separate cities and counties. That's one problem. The other one, you wake up every morning and when you pull the trap back, you look out onto the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel, which ever since I've been a kid, has had some degree of uh of uh misery with it, right? Meaning uh if I'm in Williamsburg and need to go to Norfolk for a meeting, I immediately begin to just get depressed and sweating and so forth because I'm is it going to be backed up to Mercury Boulevard? You know, how bad is it gonna be? There's all I don't know how much how much is this uh bridge expansion and the renovation costing? What's the price tag on this thing?
SPEAKER_02Oh my gosh, uh I'll get it wrong. I should know that number. I it's a line. We're north of two two billion, two and a half billion. But it is It's the biggest highway project in the nation right now.
SPEAKER_01So it's a it's a year or two away from how far away is it from being completed?
SPEAKER_0218 months, and they are on schedule. I know it's horrible and scary to say that thing, but they are on schedule.
SPEAKER_01But don't you think when I tell people and they see my Zoom picture and I said you should stop, they go, Oh, well, I would, but by the time I get that to that exit, I'm so stressed out that that you both uh benefit and you suffer from geography, meaning you sit right at the foot of a major traffic jam. So do you think once that bridge gets finished and hopefully traffic moves faster and smoother and everything else, that that also affords you another opportunity for people to give um Fort Monroe a second look because they haven't been sitting in traffic for 20 minutes?
SPEAKER_02Oh, I have I I have no doubt. So, and here's my lived experience that informs that. Louisville, when I was there, had the same problem. It was called Spaghetti Junction. It was the worst backup in the heartland of America. Similar project, the doubled capacity, added a new bridge. And it solved the problem. I know, and look, I'm the first guy who will scream new lanes don't solve problems. I now do that with a caveat. If your population is not growing and the Hampton Roads is not growing in population, it will solve the problem and it will get things better. I believe, from what I've seen and what you know, the learned experience and lived experience is that the fix, when it's done, is gonna do something transformational for Fort Monroe because it'll put us a dependable, and you said the main thing, Brian, dependable, I can trust it, 20 minutes from downtown Naufic. That will change our region. And psychologically and emotionally, that'll take longer to catch up. There is there that's gonna be a that's gonna be a minute. People aren't gonna believe it. But it is gonna change the region, and we, to your point, are gonna be in the dead center, I mean of the 37th largest MSA, largest port in Virginia, hard stop. And Monocle magazine just released its list of best cities on the globe to live in. Seven of the top ten around the globe were port cities. Something magical happens if you get design right at these port cities. It just works. And we're gonna have a chance to do that here.
SPEAKER_03Savannah is a perfect example of Charleston or Charleston. Either one.
SPEAKER_02So and Long Beach is an example of the opposite, right? Where they just build for commerce and have it built for people. Right. So we've got to intentionally build for people. Exactly.
What Fort Monroe Looks Like Now
SPEAKER_04So some maybe for our listeners, Scott, bring folks up to date. Uh let me back up. After the army, after the Commonwealth took over, the Fort Monroe Authority was created. So the authority itself is what 20 plus years old now? Okay. And talk about some of the to our listeners that don't have never been there, what structures I mean, it's just a unique place outside of the historic fort, then around it kind of describes some of the structures and what you see on property, either vacant property or or rehabbing existing property, what the the master plan looks like in Fort Monroe in a in a new day.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and these are long projects. You know, there is a good degree of nothing's happened at Fort Monroe out there. And that that's not true. Right. Um, a lot's going on that no one can see yet. Uh the army still owns land out here. The army is still leaving. So they are still cleaning up things. We still don't have total control. Um, you had to do all the land swaps, you had to do all the utilities. We've got utility work ongoing because the army left things um, just give you an example. Love the army, bless their heart, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. The pipes here are a little bit old. We buy 50,000 gallons of water a month from the sewer water district here. We pay to treat 400,000 gallons a month because of salt water intrusion into our existing pipes. This is just kind of the older infrastructure stuff that has to be solved. Um, so when it came back, we work on work on that. But to your to your question, Carth, and on helping folks understand what Fort Monroe is, it's massive. I mean, the thing is, it's massive. It's 565 acres. We're nearly the size of Central Park. We have 1.5-ish million square feet of buildings, a lot vacant. Many are historic or contributing historic structures. We have double the number of historic buildings at Fort Monroe to Waynesburg. Just to frame that. Um we have seven and a half miles of shoreline. We have the deepest water port on the New Pernew side outside of New Bruno ship. Um we have the Chamberlain as an assisted living. There are about uh 650 people that call Fort Monroe home every day. So we have a marina with 300 slips. Um, we have four restaurants. Um, there's a lot of stuff that's happening here of just adaptive reuse of the existing army structures. Now, the lift we need to take, though, is you can't just turn an army base into somewhere people want to hang out. You know, the army had a design aesthetic, which was move a soldier from here to here, right? Not build a beautiful place, not build an iconic public landscape. So what we need to do, and we're doing it now through a design process, is taking the bones here, which are fantastic, and then layering on urban landscape architecture and design to make it a place that can then shape the trajectory of Hampton Roads in Virginia. It's the same exercise Governor's Island is going through in New York right now, and the Presidio just spent really, they're kind of wrapping it up now. They're there. And they're actually the most visited national park in the national park system. And they netted $18 million in revenue last year with no entry fee. But they did it like we have to do it by saying, no, no, no. What was done served its point. It did it very well. Let's not kid ourselves. The Army was always adding and subtracting stuff out here. We now have to intentionally say, how does Fort Monroe shape the region and the state in 2050? And what moves do we make on the land that both activate its existing built infrastructure, welcome new infrastructure, protect its cultural and ecological resources while it's being a place people can live, work, and play? And that's the exercise that we're in uh in right now.
SPEAKER_04And and as a follow-up, yeah, I know you have used or spoken to the designer uh I'm having a senior moment, the bridge, the linear bridge in New York, the uh the Highline? The Highline. Uh haven't you been engaged with the the the group that was connected to that and using maybe some of those thoughts and strategies at Port Monroe? Is that that's a fair statement?
SPEAKER_02100%, Carthus. And we put a call out. Yeah, we put a call out for for architects to come here and take a look. And we had I'm very proud. Um, I'm very proud because we had proposals from the best firms in Brisbane, Australia, all the way to Rotterdam, fly here on their own dime to take a look. Now, these are the folks who have designed the last eight Olympic Games. The Queen Elizabeth Park, Roddard. I'm talking if you've walked a great global city, you've walked their landscape. And these folks were here. And I know they were here because I got a call from our coffee shop the day they were here going, hey Scott, I got 20 people here in tight jeans and glasses that look like they cost more than my house. I was like, Yeah, those are landscape architects, they're gonna get a damn latte. Um and the response I got back from everyone is both damning and good though. Their response was universally, I had no idea. I had no idea Hampton Roads was here or this big. I had no idea Fort Monroe had this history. I had no idea you had this ecological wildness. I had no idea you had this recreational, just over and over again. I had no idea. And because they were blown away by what's here and the capacity. We then juried them in. Fun fact, first time the dean of landscape architecture at UVA and the Dean of Design at Virginia Tech and the Dean of Skull of Design at Hampton, one of the few HBCUs with an architecture program, were ever asked to sit on a jury for a Virginia landscape. We literally had to fly them in from Greenland, Brownsville, Texas, and Atlanta, where they're working on projects to work on a home project. And it was so cool to have them in the room. And I'm so excited by the partnerships that are emerging with UVA, Tech, and Hampton in design right now. Because we have like the best minds in the world in Virginia. And to deploy them here on our own home is so cool. And they universally, unanimously couldn't agree on squat. Like they couldn't agree what temperature the thermostat should be at. They couldn't agree on what we were eating up for lunch, but the jury within five minutes uh through the panel picked Hargraves Jones as our designer unanimously. And that was a tremendous vote of confidence. And Hargraves Jones was selected, I think, because um they're the ones who did Christie Field at the Presidio, they did Queen Elizabeth Park in London, they did the Sydney Olympic Games, they did Chattanooga's Waterfront, they did Nashville's Waterfront. Um, they are really the ones who have shaped a lot. Scissortail Park in Oklahoma City that's draw driving that city's uh rebirth and revitalization with Native American inclusion and really elevating that voice. So they are the architects of record. Mary Margaret Jones is the architect record. It's the first time a female architect has designed at Fort Monroe that we know as well. So lots of neat synergies coming together.
A Bold Vision For Public Space
SPEAKER_04From 1620 to that, that's a that's quite a journey.
SPEAKER_01Well, I was gonna add that question. Maybe you don't have an answer for it. I was gonna ask, what do you think it's gonna look like in 25 or 30 years? And maybe you don't want to answer that question because you don't want to get ahead of the architect. And as a follow-up, can we get a retirement home, both of us, Brian? I mean, yeah, I want a nice one. I don't want I want to be on the Chesapeake Bay, but go ahead. But what do you think it's without giving away too much? How do you um how did this is so exciting? What do you think it's gonna look like?
SPEAKER_02Well, I'll tell you first, Brian, man, it is so freaking humbling. Um, if you don't approach this landscape with humility and and the ability to be wowed and amazed and be very comfortable with, I don't know, you probably need to leave this room because the stories, the legacy, and the potential all want to meet together. And how you ruthlessly design your way through that space with boldness to say things like, and this is hard as Virginians, that history is not done being written at Fort Monroe. This is not a museum piece. This is not something we're gonna set in a box and point at and look at. This thing has to be dynamic. It has to welcome new people to write new histories, inspired by the histories and the stories that are here. Climate change is front and center. We are at 1.5 feet of elevation. 1.5 feet means we're wet. That's simply for me a business problem to solve. That's not political. How do you design for that change? And then how do you make that change, which is coming part of the experience? Imagine, Brian, if you will, working somewhere where your lunch break is suddenly walking to see an emerging wetland and watch a yellow-crowned night hair and hunt for a snake. We can deliver that in the center of a top 50 metro area. I'm sorry, the Presidio can't hold my frickin' beer.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Um, or you're an artist or you're an innovator, and you can actually walk the steps of the African Landing Memorial. And if you have any sensitivity of soul, anything at all, to feel that energy and then take that back to your workplace and let it drive you. This is the space where stuff wants to happen. And to answer your question about design, we know it wants to happen. We are doing nine months of shut your pie hole and put your pencils away and let this landscape speak to you, both its past and its future. And then let's see how we respond. We know we're going to be a place where more people can live. We know that we're not going to have a lot of business space because we know y'all know it all around the state. The need for office space is absolutely cratered. So, how do we become a place where maybe you work at home or you work from a home office instead of an office building? But we're part of the deal in enterprise that Doug and his team at the Regional Alliance are leading with how do we become a defense industry, maybe think tank again? How do we become a hub for innovation? We know art has a huge role to play here. We're very much inspired by Fogo Island off Newfoundland, where a community that's a very isolated community, cotton industry driven, when the cotton industry collapsed, they hit and rebuild themselves and they rebuilt it around lodging and place and culture and nature in their community. So we know lodging is going to be a part of it here. And we know that food's going to be a big part here. Because I don't think we're playing the Chesapeake Bay food up nearly as strongly as Virginia should be playing it up. Uh we have a, you don't have to fry everything that comes out of the ocean, believe it or not. So how do we bring, not that that's a bad idea, but how do we bring the best chefs and the best culinary artists to this landscape and built artists and visual artists and performing artists? The richness here juxtaposed against the military history and the pure strength and resiliency of the fort. Man, there's some really neat things that want to happen. Carthagined it earlier, the Highline. We use that as an inspiring point because the Highline, if anyone's been there, if they had just paved over the Highline and made it, you know, a straightforward elevated pathway, that would have been a you know sad trombone.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_02They instead added art and plants. And it's the mix of that garden aspect within that highly urbanized vertical environment that really hits your senses, makes you step back and go, wow. You know, we can play in that lane here. Um, craziness in the winter is amazing here because we get this push of birds from the North Atlantic. We can literally get puffins here and gannets and birds you think, and no one in Hampton Roads like appreciates that because we're all stuck on the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel, pissed off all the time. But if you slow down and appreciate it, we have four seasons here that bring you a new part of living on the North Atlantic every day. And again, we're gonna be able to deliver that in the center of a top 50 U.S. metro area. Um, that's the way the design is pushing. The idea that history has yet to be written. We can be the front end of design. And quite frankly, we have the bones here and the access to really wicked, smart graduates that are coming out of our colleges, innovation that's happening at the shipyard around the defense industry, and the arts and culture of the Chesapeake Bay, that that's a really sweet spot to hit. Our job is to humbly respond to those, acknowledging we won't know all the answers. You can't script everything, but how do we set the stage on this place for those folks to take it in ways we can't even imagine today?
SPEAKER_01Well, real quickly, um in nineteen thirty. There was a storm of 1933 where there was six feet of water on Dodd Boulevard at Langley Air Force Base. 70 years later, uh Isabel hit um and you had six feet of water on Dodd Boulevard and and at Langley again. So you're getting devastating natural disasters every 70 years, essentially. Is that you said it's a business problem? I agree with you. You shouldn't use it as a reason not to do something. But is that part going to be part of your your design? The idea that you sit and that by the way, the Hampton Roads area is sliding into the impact crater from the great meteor that hit millions of years ago, in addition to rising tides. So you're you're right, tides are rising twice as fast as they are in Wilmington or Charlotte or anywhere else. Is that just that's just something you have to factor into the design, right?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I I mean I mean to your point, water is undefeated. Yeah. Um but so that's that's posit number one. And none of the planning that had been done out here to date had yet taken that into account. We start from there. Yeah, correct. So but the good news is there are solutions. And it's it's not scary. In fact, uh, if I may, and and a little preview of coming attractions, the army maxed out Fort Monroe. Like if it could be used, they used it for a use. I think you're gonna see us retreat. You will see a smaller footprint. We won't be as big. Um, and by that I'm saying built structures, roads, infrastructure. We'll be more naturalized and we'll have more wetlands and marshes and things like that, but we're Hampton Roads, that's what we do. But that allows us to then focus our investments and our defense mechanisms, both hard and and soft scale, on a smaller footprint that's defensible, that can last over time and be resilient. We'll make those decisions. Um and and we have the ability to do that because we say we're a public landscape, which means ecology, preservation, activation, and development all have a space. Let's program intentionally for each.
SPEAKER_04Carson?
Designing For Water And Resilience
SPEAKER_04Uh a couple of things. Do you uh I know this is well down the road, and it's probably a long ways off because of the lease with the Chamberlain, but do you see that perhaps one day being repositioned back into a hotel?
SPEAKER_02You know, I really don't, Carthen. Um, and I think because that's on an 80-year lease, so that that won't go. But we have a variety of other buildings that we think make great sense for lodging. And we have a a person in here helping us with it. Now I'm gonna name drop for a reason. His name's James Lima. He was Mayor Mike Bloomberg's director of public finance. He's the guy who figured out the stack for the Highline in Brooklyn Bridge Park. And if you know anything about Mike Bloomberg, if it doesn't cash out, we ain't doing it. I mean, these things have to make financial sense. He's building that model for us, and lodging is a critical piece of that. We've already identified a number of structures here that we think make sense. And I think what's fun, and now I'm betraying a little bit of our thinking, it's not probably going to be about a flagged hotel. We think there's a niche space where it's our own owned entity possibly or our own flag, and we keep those dollars generated here instead of sending them off to an ownership group out of state, out of city. And then play up on that. And again, Fogo Island, we think is a great model. There are other models, but smaller scale, Carthen. I think you'll see us move into the bed and breakfast. I think you'll move, we'll move into those. You guys have traveled all over the globe, you see them all over, from Lisbon to Barcelona, where you have the short-term rentals that are co-located with apartment buildings inside the building sometimes, where some rooms are rented and some are lived in. There's some really neat models we're seeing globally that we think makes sense, especially for the vacant buildings we have out here that want to speak to it. Because imagine, if you will, um if Fort Monroe is the one place in the Hampton Roads where I don't need a car to have my experience if we are completely walkable. I park once and I'm done. Y'all mentioned Savannah and Charleston earlier. Those are outstanding models.
unknownRight.
SPEAKER_02Imagine if we have the same model here, because we can do it. This place was built for the pedestrians.
SPEAKER_04Absolutely. The second question is the uh you're you're getting the support. I would imagine from what I've heard today, what Brian and I have heard today, the General Assembly's got to be pleased with your vision and how things are progressing. I hope so. The money committees in particular, the money committees.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah. I mean, thank goodness Senator Locke's leadership has been absolutely critical. Um, the good thing is Fort Monroe is a nonpartisan issue as it should be. Governor Yunkin put the single biggest investment in here, $50 million for infrastructure, because Carl Group will tell you if your infrastructure ain't working, I'm not going to invest in you. I mean, these are just and and Governor Spamberger has followed right behind. Excellent. Um, because it's this is bigger. This we all want to protect and leave Virginia the better than we found it. I haven't found anyone, Republican or Democrat, who doesn't feel that way. Um, when you come to Virginia, it should look like Virginia. Um, telling the tale out of school, Brian, sorry to burn you up, but Carthen and I brought a little company called McArlaids to Virginia a few years ago in Franklin County together and jointly, and I'll never forget bringing them up to 20. They said this looks like Virginia should look. And that to me is what sealed the deal is we should be what we are. And Fort Monroe is a big part of that story. We should always look like Virginia. Now, you can hear it in my voice and my enthusiasm. I think there's a voice for contemporary architecture and some new design out here. And and and I think Virginia can be new again. And, you know, the Battle Abbey has shown us the way, the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts has shown us the way. We can honor our past and boldly lean forward on these landscapes together. Um, and the assembly, General Assembly has been behind us. I think we have a we have a big job to do ahead of us, Carth, and to let the whole state see it as the state's asset. This is not just a Hampton Roads asset. Absolutely. There are only three states in the nation that have this. It's California, New York, and us that have this sort of asset to deploy. Right. How do we do it at that level of thinking matters. And it should have outsized influence beyond the cultural and historical stuff we do, also the economic um in the forward casting thing. And it's it's fun. And then we'll do a statewide tour. I make the case that this is a bigger project than Arlington Yards that I think a lot of your listeners will still remember from Northern Virginia. When that was like, oh my gosh, that's the biggest project in the state. We can do a stadium there, we can do this there. I'm sorry. This is a UNESCO site in the center of your second largest MSA with seven and a half miles of shoreline, completely owned by the state. We're playing at the deepest end of the pond here. How do we move at that scale?
SPEAKER_04Well, you could probably take a tagline from its namesake, Fort Monroe. President Monroe's time in the White House was referred to as the era of good feeling. So that'd be a good positive way. Were you around back then? No, I just I read a lot.
SPEAKER_01So look, we're gonna re I could do this all day. You you you have you you you you do a really good job of your job. Uh number one. I I was already predisposed to to like this, but you've taught me a lot today, and you've got me even more enthusiastic about uh my old hometown of Hampton and what goes on there. But my question to you, and this I just thought about this as we were saying, you know, I think Fort Monroe is iconic the same way that the lawn at the University of Virginia, the state capitol, it's one of Virginia's great physical assets. None of those physical assets are gonna go through a transformation in the next 25 years. You are. So I mean, isn't that part of the isn't that part of the the the the ask? I feel literally like not only do you need to get down there to see what it's gonna look like later, you gotta get down there now to see what it looks like before the transformation begins. This will be something where where I feel like that um will be the most interesting story in the Commonwealth for the rest of my life, is the uh transformation that will occur at Fort Monroe. Um that's my final question, then I'm gonna turn over to Carthen. Do you know and how do you how do you begin to wake up every morning and get your arms around that?
SPEAKER_02Well, you're hired, Brian. Uh good. I'm stealing all of that. Um it's a lot. You you just the the trick with Fort Monroe, as with any big project or anyone who's starting their own small business, is your choices define you. We have so many choices. There's so many ands out here. We again are gonna have to be ruthlessly focused on what are our core market differentiating values that we can execute. Um, because I love this place. And it is, and I've got ADHD, and it is distraction mania because you go down one rabbit hole here, and there's something cool that happened over here, something awesome over here. So we really are gonna depend on being deliverable, ruthlessly focused on what we can do at the big moves that happen. That may seem non-sequential at first when you look at a 50-year build out, but we've got to march down that path to the point of when this new plan is adopted, Brian, we're gonna bring with it to the governor as an option. I hope she considers it, a deed restriction where we lock it down and we say for the next 50 years, this is the plan. We have the confidence in the plan and the discipline because we're gonna get a thousand good ideas thrown at us throughout the process. But again, back to Central Park. The Central Park we love and enjoy today is so because they have defended Frederick Law Olmsted's 1848 Central Park plan for that long. And its majesty and its power is in the duration of your commitment to one singular vision and to execute that. So whilst we talk short term and we, you know, hang the Edison lights, do the concert series, do the programming, yes, it's the longer-term plays of these iconic places, the lawn at UVA being a great example that you build towards, but you do it by starting today. And and not to be totally cheesy, this is our generation's moment, and this is our generation's opportunity. It's not going to come again. That's a little bit intimidating, but isn't it cool to be the ones that get to do it? Absolutely.
SPEAKER_04Amen, brother. Uh Carthen. I was just I was, you know, with your leadership, Scott, I'm wondering if there's a place for friends, friends of Fort Monroe, kind of a volunteer association, people that want to help, whatever way that might be. I don't know if that's something that exists now or that might be considered as an opportunity later.
SPEAKER_02But I just thought 100%. You look at all these global landscapes I share with y'all, they all are private public partnerships. There's there's a three-legged stool. It's private investment, public spending, and then philanthropic donor community-driven activities. That's that's the model. We have one, the Fort Monroe Foundation. Um, they just got a big grant this week, uh, $150,000 for capacity building from the National Trust for Historic Places. The first time they've gotten a capacity building grant because they see Fort Monroe and said, you know what? It's not time to invest in a project there yet. It's time to do something bigger at this inflection point and build your capacity to build that philanthropic organization to grow alongside you. Um, and there are a lot of fun models that'll go on. So to your point, yes, it has to be a yes and. And Virginia has lagged in this space. Um, this has been the art of the movement in Seattle and in New York, I keep mentioning Virginia. We kind of divide it, public or private. We've got to get comfortable with blending those together. And because if we look across Virginia, and I'm sorry, y'all, we got to shoot straight, the best maintained, best kept public landscapes we have, Mount Vernon, Monticello, Williamsburg, deliver at a higher level than some of our national parks. Petersburg National Battlefield. And I love it. I'm a National Park Service guy, so it pains me to say this. But where we ex we really begin to achieve excellence is where we bring all of the partners together and don't rely on just one or the other. And we see that as the model going forward at Fort Monroe for long-term sustainability. Financial sustainability.
SPEAKER_04For visitors,
How To Visit And Get Involved
SPEAKER_04for listeners who have never been there, there are uh two museums. I mean, the National Park Service runs the the old fort. You can tour that and then the Fort Monroe Authority has uh its own museum now, correct?
SPEAKER_02That's well the foreman, yeah. The Commonwealth runs both museums. Okay, the Commonwealth. Yeah, Commonwealth Virginia runs both the Casemate Museum, which is the long-standing historical museum here, and then our visitor center, which is our front door meeting facility, and we have meeting facilities here. So we're hosting conferences consistently out here where that are pretty interesting for folks. And they use the museums as the conference space as well. And then their walking tours and bike tours, galore, our park service partners here, who are the best partners we could ever ask for, uh, do their own guided tours, have park rangers out here as well. They just negotiated a better deal. They got the lawn in the center of the fort, and the Commonwealth Virginia got the $200 million fort around it for deferred maintenance and maintaining it. So the feds were better negotiators, but but we'll we'll follow through and meet our charge.
SPEAKER_04Well, Scott, as we close, we look forward to having you on maybe in a year to to get an update on just the amazing progress that that you have brought to bear and that's going to continue. And we thank you so much uh for joining us today on Virginians of Interest.
SPEAKER_01Well, it's funny, you said you're ADHD, both of us are ADHD, so this is we're convening of it, we're retiring the meeting of the annual ADHD Society here because we'd be here all day, right? Because there's more there, you've got more rabbit holes to go down, and we've got more rabbit holes to go down. But you've been a spectacular guest, and your your enthusiasm is contagious. And I I come down there a lot and I talk about it all a lot. I've got it in my as my Zoom background, so I will remain on your payroll and will continue to be an evangelist for what it is you're doing. Amen.
SPEAKER_02I appreciate both of y'all. And you know, Adele, and the final statement is, man, everything we talk about in terms of this thing we call urban living or Virginia Living, it all comes back to place. Right. And how we care for these places and how these places they really reveal who we are, but they also build up who we are. Um, I think that's the work that matters most.
SPEAKER_03I think so. Correct. Thank you again, Scott. Scott. Thank y'all.
SPEAKER_01Thank you for joining the Virginians of Interest Podcast. If you've liked what you heard today, please like and subscribe to this podcast.
SPEAKER_00Thank you for listening to the Virginians of Interest Podcast. To hear other episodes of this podcast, head to Virginiansofinterest.com.
