A rendering of the proposed new state office building at 1401 E. Broad St. (State documents)
The state government recently gave a glimpse of its vision for a new downtown office tower.
Last month the Virginia Department of General Services presented designs for a 316,000-square-foot office that’s proposed for 1401 E. Broad St., where the 15-floor Virginia Department of Transportation Annex office currently stands.
The new building, should it come to fruition, would effectively replace the James Monroe Building at 101 N. 14th St., where a number of state agencies, including the Virginia Department of Education and the state Treasury, reside.
The Monroe Building, which is currently the city’s tallest building, was built in the late 1970s and has myriad issues relating to safety, Americans with Disabilities Act compliance and general design inefficiency.
With those deficiencies in mind, DGS began reconsidering the state’s office needs about four years ago, but the plans to vacate the Monroe Building were caught in a back-and-forth between Gov. Glenn Youngkin and the General Assembly throughout much of the last few years.
In 2023 Youngkin had proposed moving many state offices out of downtown and into private spaces in the suburbs, rather than building anew downtown. But a DGS study last year ultimately pointed toward the state needing a new office building downtown, per a Times-Dispatch report.
The existing VDOT Annex office would be razed. (Mike Platania photos)
The fate of the Monroe Building – and a potential new tower – remains unclear for now.
In presenting the plans for the new building to the Virginia House of Delegates’ Appropriations committee last month, DGS Director Banci Tewolde said that the decision over the Monroe Building is ultimately up to the General Assembly and that options could be to demolish it, mothball it or declare it surplus and sell it. The building sits on 3 acres and was most recently assessed by the city at $78 million.
Tewolde said the new office building would accommodate all the state’s necessary office and swing space as well as over 800 parking spaces. Its cost is estimated to surpass $400 million. The state agencies currently based in the Monroe Building would temporarily relocate to other state buildings while the new office is built, or lease space elsewhere.
The state is also considering selling a vacant plot it owns at 7th and Main streets downtown.
The state had initially considered building a new office at the site of the now-demolished Virginia Employment Commission office at 703 E. Main St., but a study the state commissioned last year led them to the VDOT Annex site instead.
Tewolde told the committee that Youngkin has proposed to sell 703 E. Main St. and transfer the proceeds to the state’s general fund. The vacant 1.25-acre site abuts a Dominion Energy office tower that’s set to be converted into hundreds of hotel rooms and apartments.
Tewolde, who was appointed by Youngkin last summer to lead DGS, declined an interview request.
The office project comes as the state is going through a broader master-planning process of the 46-acre Capitol Square area. Tewolde, through a spokesperson, said there is no update available on that process.
Another state-led real estate project also made progress in recent days.
Last week the state’s Art and Architectural Review Board (AARB) voted to approve preliminary plans for the new Commonwealth Courts Building proposed for 900-908 E. Main St.
The new courts building would replace the entire Pocahontas Building complex along Main Street with a new, 300,000-square-foot structure that’d house both the Supreme Court of Virginia and the Virginia Court of Appeals. Last summer the AARB voted to approve demolishing the roughly 100-year-old West Tower of the Pocahontas Building to make way for the new, 13-story courts building.
Local architecture firm Baskervill is leading the design of the new courts building with D.C.’s Fentress Architects, and representatives from both firms provided the AARB a first-look at the Commonwealth Courts Building at last week’s meeting. After some deliberation, the AARB voted to approve the preliminary design.
Demolition of the Pocahontas Building is planned to begin in late 2025.
$1,265 per Square Foot….Really?!
at least! but probably more
Yup, that’s total project cost. I’m guessing there are several factors contributing to that:
The existing building likely has asbestos and is on a difficult site. Demo will be in the millions. As a state project, it requires DEB review which includes life cycle cost analysis of the systems. That means the first cost of the mechanical systems will likely have a higher initial cost. Soft costs on a state project are higher than private development. Project management, DEB review, environmental impact reports etc etc all contribute to that cost.
Huge problem with our society — even when it is clear that a project will be a net benefit to emissions and not impact nature there needs to be long expensive reviews.
or we could just allow teleworking and save taxpayers this $400MILLION+ along with their gas money from not having to leave their home and get on a computer in a different building for absolutely no reason
Yeah, some combo of Youngkin’s plan to lease underused office space somewhere and WFH would likely save the State many millions of dollars — but VA’s legislature is slowly changing into IL’s it seems where saving money becomes anathema.
assuming you don’t have your own employees if you think teleworking is efficient for employers
It really probably depends on the business and the employees.
If you know, you know! Government employees need to held accountable by showing up to a work space. I was one. I know.
Most of the people I have had to work with who “telework” haven’t been doing much work. Some take days or even weeks to respond to emails and telephone calls.
This sounds like a chance for Virginia to take the lead among all states to make telework a standard practice, not a band-aid to a temporary crisis. The cat is now out of the bag, and at least 2 generations of workers have proven work efficiencies and collaboration don’t suffer with telework. Forward-thinking policy might open the door to attracting and retaining better talent, while saving a huge amount of money – all the while avoiding building something that will probably be obsolete in 20 years anyway. The real question is how quickly will office obsolescence move?
Whoa!! I think the Monroe bldg embarrasses all of VA and (seems fascist in a boring kind of way, out of date before it was even drawn on paper, badly designed, looms menacingly over the interstate (they should put a roaming eye spotlight on top! That at least would be funny.) And the new design looks nice! Modest, not too fancy, blends in nicely. But it seems SOMEONE thinks VA is flush with cash and it is burning a hole in somebody’s pocket. Regardless, the Monroe bldg needs to be torn down and that won’t be an easy thing to… Read more »
Sorry, Shawn, but I have to disagree. The state has estimated that demo of the Monroe building will take 19 months or more – and while I have not yet seen a cost estimate, because of asbestos abatement, etc., the cost to take down Richmond’s tallest building will be quite high. If the building was assessed at $78 million, the state could not only save a tremendous amount of money, but actually MAKE a tidy sum if it sold the tower. Even for pennies on the dollar, the state would come out way ahead as opposed to demo’ing the property… Read more »
Slipek…… oh boy….. Anyhow, even though I may have been confusing by focusing on aesthetics (and, sure you can find some eggheads to tell all the uneducated eyes that what they think is ugly is actually beautiful, maybe even get a law passed that says that they have to repeat it, I am more practical than to say that we should tear down a perfectly useful or repurpose able huge bldg merely because almost everyone thinks it is ugly. I am saying it has to come down because I have heard that it is not legally usable in its present… Read more »
We’re in agreement on a couple of points, Shawn: Dr. Slipek – who I greatly admire & respect – does get a bit entrenched on preserving a bit too much of what’s simply “in the way & needs to go”. The Coliseum being a classic example. Which is not to say that I don’t 100% appreciate his tremendous knowledge when he dons his historian’s hat because he often gives over some amazing tidbits about how modern-day Richmond came to be. Still – I don’t see eye-to-eye with him on a LOT of things – the Coliseum being one of them… Read more »
Bah. I wish Richmond wouldn’t settle for such an ugly building. You can yell all you want. That will just make my life more interesting, but I will continue to point out fallacies. I’d be willing to bet it has negative equity. It’s oppressive inside too, and people say it makes you sick and that it would be cheaper to tear it down and rebuild (something nicer?) than to renovate, and from what I know about brutalist buildings, I BELIEVE it (love it when water gets into the poured concrete and gets iron reinforcements and the rust starts to blossom.… Read more »
condos and mixed-use retail at the lower levels – and yes – a cool restaurant on the top floor! my vote for Monroe.
What’s the deal with the color brown in the glass tower rendering? Is that the official color of the commonwealth’s buildings? Almost any other color would be better. Or just go with clear!
Is brown so bad? I don’t think so — some browns aren’t great, but I don’t want it to be GREEN — maybe pink or yellow would be interesting, but it would you’d need a color theorist to see if it would be complimentary to the neighborhing buildings, adjust the hues, the saturation, etc….
I might be way off, but I think the rendering is attempting to depict lighting of very late afternoon/early evening – as in after sunset, just before or around dusk. I think it’s more a case of the overall lighting as opposed to the building being strictly clad in brown or bronze. Then again, I might be completely wrong on that assessment.
Another dull drab building with no architectural style. Why do almost all of our buildings look like Lego building blocks!
It’s not BAD. Why? Cost. Time was governments often spent no end of money glorifing themselves like Louis the XIV —- NYS’ capitol the taxpayers actually had to cut them off and demand they stop building; it was never finished, an entire central tower was never built! One of my favorite details is there was some elaborate carving going on in one of the stone walls by all these Italians on scaffolding and they were told to stop where they were — the carving just stops abruptly to this day!! It is truly a masterpiece in its details but was… Read more »
The new state office building at 14th & Broad? Yeah – just a bit. Very much the trend in downtown RVA architecture for new high-rises. HOWEVER – the courts buildings in the 900 block of E. Main are utterly spectacular – true, CLASSIC legacy Financial District muscle – keeping the spirit of the architecture of 100-plus years ago. Those two new buildings are gorgeous — orders of magnitude gorgeous. I can’t wait to see them constructed.
Please…get rid of the Monroe Tower and slow down on removing some of the great remaining buildings downtown. Absolute pity on E. Main, and I’m sure Supreme Court is in the crosshairs…but geez…
Save $400,000,000 PLUS — rent local space and remodel/repurpose existing Monroe. It can be done…even by spending $100,000,000 to complete taxpayers save $300,000,000. We have to change the mindset that everything must be torn down.