VIRGINIA BEACH — Riding the high from the popular inaugural Jackalope Festival held at the Oceanfront last weekend, city leaders are eager to keep the action sports momentum rolling. Roughly 10,000 people attended each day of the three-day event despite the cool, windy weather, according to the city.
Jackalope featured skateboarding, bouldering, base jumping and freestyle motocross on the beach. World-renowned skateboarder Tony Hawk participated, and spectators were able to watch for free.
“The energy and excitement around the Oceanfront this past weekend, even though it was not 90 degrees … exceeded expectations,” City Councilman Worth Remick said at a meeting Tuesday.
Now, plans are in the works for a series of skateboard and surf events to be held throughout the city, Deputy City Manager Taylor Adams told the council.
“Surf and skate and BMX and all manner of other action sports are just sort of authentic to who Virginia Beach is,” he said.
Adams also provided details about the findings of a recent study on enhancing the city’s burgeoning sports tourism industry. Action sports rose to the top for drawing visitors to Virginia Beach.
Victus Advisors of Park City, Utah, updated its 2016 study on “what it is we are missing” in terms of sports facilities to attract overnight visitors, thereby increasing city tax revenues, Adams said. The city paid the consultant $44,860 for the update.
The firm’s top recommendation was to create an indoor/outdoor action sports event park for skateboarding, BMX, climbing and other activities. The study also recommended an outdoor baseball complex with at least eight fields and a stand-alone tournament ice hockey facility.
An action sports venue could generate the most annual hotel room night stays — an additional 35,000 — including during slow winter months, according to the study.
It also highlighted potential opportunities for expansion or improvement to existing sports facilities, including the 50-meter pool at Princess Anne Family YMCA, Hampton Roads Soccer Complex and Princess Anne Athletic Complex.
Adams pointed out that the recommendations didn’t focus on where new venues could be built, as some resort area stakeholders had expected.
Earlier this spring, Capstone Development pitched an idea to the city for a mixed-use project near the convention center that would include apartments and retail. Some members of the Resort Advisory Commission pushed back on the proposal, saying they wanted a master plan for the area that would heed to the sports tourism study findings before considering any future development.
When asked by a council member about possible locations for any new venues, Adams made one suggestion.
“If you were to look at construction of an action sports facility, I do believe that proximity to your convention center and your sports center would be something that should be considered,” he said.
The city has allocated nearly $20 million in the budget over the next several years for sport tourism enhancements, City Manager Patrick Duhaney said.
“That could be some seed money for some of these initiatives,” he said.
Adams cautioned that evaluation of what the city already has should come before any decisions to build.
“It would be important to have a conversation … to understand fully what optimization of existing facilities look like before we make considerable capital contribution to new facilities,” Adams said.
The city originally commissioned Victus to conduct a sports tourism feasibility study in 2016, which led to the construction of the Virginia Beach Sports Center at the Oceanfront. The $68 million indoor facility, across the street from the convention center, opened in the fall of 2020. It features 12 basketball courts that can be converted to 24 volleyball courts, and an oval-shaped 200-meter hydraulic track that meets NCAA standards.
The 2016 study concluded the sports center would generate $4 million of spending in the city’s lodging industry and provide more than $600,000 a year in city tax revenue. An audit earlier this year revealed that while it generates tax revenue through hotel stays, it’s also costing more than expected to operate and maintain.
The updated sports tourism study concluded that sports events in Virginia Beach generated nearly 133,000 room nights in fiscal year 2021-22. The sports center generated nearly 40% of those. Indoor sports represented 55% of the overall contracted room nights generated versus 45% for outdoor sports, according to the study.
The majority of economic impact from sports are driven by multi-day events that draw overnight visitors from within a five- to six-hour drive time range, according to the consultant. Victus representatives surveyed the public, and conducted interviews and held focus groups with the local hotel and restaurant associations as well as existing area sports facilities and sporting event organizers to compile its report.
Meanwhile, the city’s Convention & Visitors Bureau intends to organize an action sports series this year with 17 events held across the city including at the Oceanfront, Mount Trashmore and Woodstock and Williams Farm skate parks.
Councilman Chris Taylor asked at the meeting if the series would be more geared toward local participants or if it could draw out of town visitors as well.
Adams said the events are expected to attract professional athletes who will travel to Virginia Beach.
“The next step for us in tourism is creating opportunities for our community athletes to compete against world class athletes from other parts of the country and around the world,” Adams said.
The City Council will vote next week on spending $125,000 from the Tourism Investment Program for the action sports series.
Stacy Parker, 757-222-5125, stacy.parker@pilotonline.com
