The groundbreaking starts construction of a high-quality 6,000-seat outdoor performing arts theater and waterfront park that will serve three major needs: cultural arts, contemporary entertainment and city festivals.

Participants in the groundbreaking ceremony included Mayor James W. Holley III, City Manager Ronald W. Massie, Deputy City Manager H. Timothy Little, Industrial Development Authority Chair Roger Brown, Rising Tide Productions President A. William Reid and Burrell F. Saunders of CMSS Architects.

Reid described the project as a �world class facility that is unique in the United States. It will be the envy of the country. It will be the best facility of its kind in the country, and the only one on a waterfront.�

�This project contains all of the right elements to support its success,� said Reid, who was active in development of the 20,000-seat amphitheater in Virginia Beach. �The size is exactly where the trend is going for music and performing arts venues,� he said, comparing the proposed center to successful sites like Wolf Trap in Northern Virginia and Chastain Park in Atlanta.

Reid said a 6,000-seat theater will fill a market niche in Hampton Roads between larger venues like the Beach Amphitheater, Scope and the Hampton Coliseum and smaller venues like Willett Hall and Chrysler Hall. He said the theater would include 3,500 covered seats and another 2,500 to 3,500 seats on a raised berm behind the covered seats.
 

Architect Saunders, whose firm designed the Virginia Beach facility, said the Performing Arts Center will be on a 10-acre site, 40 percent of which will be dedicated to a waterfront park. In addition to serving as an attractive urban space in downtown Portsmouth, the park will serve as the venue for community events, festivals and cookouts.

Portsmouth Riverfront  Performing Arts Center

Saunders said the Performing Arts Center will be covered with a tensile structure like the one used for the Millennium Dome in London. He said the translucent material was originally designed for astronaut Neil Armstrong�s space suit. Saunders said the architectural plan is mindful of the waterfront setting and Portsmouth�s historic past.

Mayor Holley said, �Portsmouth is truly on a roll. Our Renaissance Portsmouth Hotel and Waterfront Conference center is nearing completion just up the waterfront. The Westbury housing community is under construction to replace the Ida Barbour public housing not far from here. Our Curtis Strange golf courses are attracting national attention. Our Portsmouth Corporate Center is moving along. All over the city you can feel the momentum of a city on the move.�

He said the city �continues to stress high quality development� in providing facilities for use by residents of Portsmouth and other Hampton Roads localities as well as visitors to the region.

City Manager Massie said, �We are very pleased that our discussions with Bill Reid have resulted in a proposal that meets three critical needs in one setting. By working hand-in-hand with Rising Tide Productions, the City is able to obtain a major new attraction that neither of us could have developed on our own.�
Massie said, �Bill Reid knows the national cultural arts and entertainment market, and the City knows the outdoor festival needs of our community. It is a case of win-win.�

He noted that the principle of public-private development was similar to that employed recently by Portsmouth in development of the Renaissance Portsmouth Hotel and Waterfront Conference Center, and by Norfolk in development of the new MacArthur Center mall.

Massie also credited many Portsmouth officials for working on the concept and bringing it to the stage of public announcement, including Deputy City Little, Economic Development Director Douglas Smith, and Ports Events Executive Director Linda Lamm.

Smith said producing a venue of high quality was important for two reasons. �First,� he said, �it is consistent with our desire to raise the quality bar in Portsmouth in everything we do, which improves the chances of success while improving our image. Secondly, it will allow us to bring in both contemporary music acts and cultural events whose guests demand a high quality experience, as well as meet the needs of community festival events.�

Smith said the �urban waterfront feel� of the proposed facility �would be unique in the region and would make the image and draw of the facility even more powerful than suburban facilities usually associated with outdoor theaters.�
Massie said the arrangement of public ownership of the facility and private management would allow public control of the quality level, hours of operation and public uses of the facility while ensuring professional management by an experienced firm. The two entities are still studying various revenue streams such as naming rights, beverage-pouring rights, sponsorships, premium seating and parking to determine how they would be shared. He noted that, as is the case with the City�s new golf facilities, the users of the facility will ultimately bear the costs involved in developing and operating it.

Bill Reid is a 20-year veteran of the entertainment and arts industry. His experience involves promotion of more than 2,000 live concerts, creation of five new entertainment venues, and management of multi-million-dollar businesses.
In January 1998 he started Rising Tide Productions Inc. to develop, promote and manage various aspects of the entertainment and arts industry.

He earned his bachelor�s degree from Hampden Sydney College in 1976 and a juris doctorate from Wake Forest Law School in 1979. He joined Cellar Door of Virginia in 1981 and became president of and partner in that organization in 1983.

Reid also has been involved in the creation of the Boathouse in Norfolk and several other innovative projects, such as production of a symphonic adaptation of the music of Led Zepplin that has been performed in Virginia, Georgia and Colorado.