Virginia Beach says radar's blocking Oceanfront overhaul

VIRGINIA BEACH

Along the Oceanfront strip, 15th Street and 34th Street aren’t that different.

But what developers may build at those locations are worlds apart because of a radar used to protect the country’s coastline.

The Federal Aviation Administration earlier this month told a Richmond developer that he couldn’t construct a building taller than 110 feet on 15th Street, at the fishing pier, without blocking the radar and causing, “an unacceptable risk to the overall air defense mission.”

The developer, Steve Becker, had asked permission to build a 165-foot hotel – about 15 stories.

That notice came seven months after the FAA cleared Virginia Beach hotelier Gold Key/PHR Hotels and Resorts for a 200-foot building on 34th Street. The decisions are unfair, Becker said.

“We’re going to fight at every step,” he said.

Virginia Beach officials said they believe the difference between the two properties is that a tall building stands in front of the 34th Street site, already blocking the radar. There’s no similar obstruction on 15th Street.

Still, the FAA denial came as a surprise to Beach officials, who have been waiting for the federal government to help resolve the clash between the national security radar and Oceanfront redevelopment. And some are concerned that the recent decision doesn’t bode well for the city’s suggestion that the federal government should relocate the radar.

The radar system, which looks like a giant golf ball, sits at Oceana Naval Air Station. P lacing it at a different location, such as Fort Story or the Chesapeake Light Tower, as city officials have suggested, probably would cost millions of dollars.

“It’s insult to injury,” said Steve Herbert, a deputy city manager, about the recent FAA decision.

U.S. Department of Defense officials are still reviewing the Pentagon’s own study of the radar and its effectiveness, said Cheryl Irwin, a spokeswoman for the department.

“They want to do it right,” Irwin said.

The radar has crimped the city’s plans to give the Oceanfront a face-lift with taller hotels and office buildings. Last year, the federal government told city officials that buildings taller than about 10 stories, or 110 feet, at several sites, including the location of a proposed convention center hotel, would threaten homeland security.

Virginia Beach paid a consultant, Parsons Brinckerhoff Quade & Douglas Inc. , $29,755 to conduct its own radar study. According to that study, the radar was already blocked at certain locations because of existing structures. But for 66 percent of the Oceanfront, a new tall building could further degrade the radar’s view. The Dome site and Rudee Loop, both city-owned properties that Beach officials have targeted for major development, are among the locations where a tall building could block the radar.

The city warned that it could lose $26 million a year in tax revenues over the next 50 years if the Oceanfront can only be redeveloped with 110-foot buildings. The FAA’s restrictions on the 15th Street project are what city officials have feared, Herbert said.

“Exactly what we thought was going to happen is happening,” he said.

Deirdre Fernandes, (757) 222-5121,deirdre.fernandes@pilotonline.com