Recent Articles from Mark D. Robertson
What’s behind Hampton Roads’ outmigration?
Young people have been leaving Hampton Roads in recent years, and area leaders say learning why is the first step toward fixing the problem. A June survey conducted by the Hampton Roads Workforce Council, Hampton Roads Executive Roundtable and Richmond-based Fahrenheit Advisors found that 25% of 511 residents surveyed said they were unsure or thought […]
Roanoke City Council approves zoning changes — again
A residential zoning do-over in the Star City is done. At least for now. On Sept. 16, Roanoke City Council voted 6-1 to adopt zoning amendments that will allow greater housing density and eliminate single-family-only housing City Council adopted similar zoning amendments in March, but several city homeowners, including Republican mayoral candidate David Bowers and […]
Home truths
The summer of 2024 brought better news for prospective homebuyers in Hampton Roads, with median home prices in the region starting to decrease and the number of homes for sale at a near four-year high. The coastal region of Virginia has seen the same strains on the market as the rest of the country — […]
Va. Tech Carilion med school plans new building, doubled enrollment
In 2010, the first class of students arrived at Roanoke’s new medical school, a partnership between Virginia Tech and Carilion Clinic. And nearly 15 years later, the Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine is undertaking ambitious growth plans. The medical school is in the early stages of planning a new 100,000-square-foot facility that would allow […]
Growth on the horizon
Patients in Hampton Roads will have another option for health care in spring 2025 with the opening of the 98,000-square-foot Bon Secours Harbour View Medical Center in Suffolk. Construction is moving along on the $80 million facility, which will include 18 inpatient rooms and four operating rooms in the expansion of its existing health care […]
$1 billion data center campus moves forward in Pittsylvania
With more than 70% of global internet traffic flowing through Virginia data centers — mostly in Loudoun County — the commonwealth is the world’s undisputed data center capital. And Tom Gallagher’s development group wants Pittsylvania County to claim a stake in that action. Gallagher represents Anchorstone Advisors SOVA, the developer planning to build a potential […]
Lead generation
Imagine the opportunity to hear Thomas Jefferson speak on today’s most important societal issues. That’s exactly the aim of The Williamsburg Institute, a new collaborative effort between the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation and William & Mary. The nonprofit institute is aimed at providing immersive opportunities for leadership development, specifically among three demographics: business pr[...]
Taubmans give $25 million for Carilion cancer center
Carilion Clinic will soon break ground on a new building for an expanded cancer program thanks to a $25 million gift from a Star City family, the largest ever made to the nonprofit health care system. The gift from former Advance Auto Parts CEO Nicholas Taubman, also a past U.S. ambassador to Romania, and his […]
NoVa residents feel pressure to pay high rent, mortgages
A spring survey showed more than half of residents polled in the greater Washington, D.C., area are concerned with making rent or mortgage payments in 2023, highlighting the lack of affordable housing in the nation’s fourth largest metropolitan area. Fifty-two percent of D.C., Maryland and Virginia residents polled by Gallup and the nonprofit Greater Washington […]
Micron expects to expand Manassas facility soon
Bolstered by hundreds of millions of dollars in state and federal funding, semiconductor manufacturing in Northern Virginia soon will be expanding. In May, Idaho-based Micron Technology applied for federal funding through the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act, which allocated more than $52 billion in subsidies for domestic companies researching and manufacturing semiconductors, to expand its […]