Virginia Tech Delays Potomac Yard Campus Opening, Citing Construction Supply Issues
A major piece of Alexandria’s rapidly developing Potomac Yard neighborhood is sliding its timeline back by several months.
Virginia Tech is now eyeing a 2025 opening for the first academic building of its $1B Innovation Campus that was previously set to deliver in August for the fall semester, the university announced last week.
The university cited “construction supply chain issues” for the delay, which was first reported by the Washington Business Journal.
Virginia Tech said the building is now expected to open for next year's spring semester, which starts in January. Students enrolled in the Innovation Campus graduate programs have been studying at its Falls Church campus since 2020.
“Our vision remains unchanged,” Virginia Tech Innovation Campus Executive Director Lance Collins said in a release. “We are building a community perfectly positioned to connect talented students with Northern Virginia’s growing tech ecosystem.”
Rising 11 stories and totaling 300K SF, the Academic Building One phase is the first of three such buildings the university plans to construct. Two more academic buildings, each about 150K SF, are planned but have not broken ground. The university is also planning to build startup and corporate offices, student and faculty housing, and retail on the 3.5-acre site.
The campus, focused on programs like engineering, data science and analytics, was announced in 2018, along with Amazon's announcement that it would build its second headquarters two miles to the north. The graduate institution is primed to act as a pipeline of talent for Amazon HQ2, which is expected to house 12,500 employees at completion.
Virginia Tech's Potomac Yard development is next to the site proposed for a $2B entertainment district, including a new home for Washington D.C.’s NHL and NBA teams. Team owner Ted Leonsis, the CEO of Monumental Sports, announced last month that the Washington Wizards and Washington Capitals would move from their 26-year home in downtown D.C. to the Northern Virginia neighborhood in 2028. The Virginia General Assembly still needs to approve the state’s portion of the funding.
Also under development at Potomac Yard are a 93K SF Inova healthcare facility and a 571-unit multifamily project with 37K SF of retail, both from Stonebridge on its Oakville Triangle site.
