Visitors bureau says so long to Transit Center

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Visitors bureau to depart Transit Center, citing expense and declining tourism

By Lisa Provence

Since the stylish, glass-walled Transit Center first opened in spring 2007 on the east end of the Downtown Mall, the Charlottesville Albemarle Convention & Visitors Bureau has been a tenant in what was the city’s first LEED-certified building. That long-term relationship will soon end.

Even before the pandemic turned the mall into a ghost town, the number of visitors finding the tourist center was down, says Albemarle Supervisor Ann Mallek, who serves on the CACVB board. “The decision was based on the very few interactions held in a building with very expensive rent,” she says.

The bureau announced plans for two mobile visitor centers—likely Ford Sprinter vans—to replace brick-andmortar locations downtown and in the former Crozet train depot and “to reach and interact with even more visitors, by meeting them where they are located,” according to a release.

Mallek says at events such as the Heritage Harvest Festival, “I was handing out hundreds of brochures. I’m very much in favor of mobile vans.”

Councilor Heather Hill, the city’s representative on the CACVB board, says a pilot test moving the visitors bureau to the Old Metropolitan Center in the center of the mall earlier in the year revealed a “resistance to the public going into buildings.” She favors a hybrid model that offers more flexibility and reduces costs.

“Everyone is rethinking how much office space they need,” she says, “and not expending dollars on space we don’t need.”

The visitors bureau is funded from 30 percent of the city and county’s lodging tax, and pays the city $45,000 a year to rent the Transit Center space, says CACVB Executive Director Courtney Cacatian.

Charlottesville-area lodging occupancy rates through July of this year were down

STAFF PHOTO The Charlottesville Albemarle Convention & Visitors Bureau plans to leave the Transit Center, where it’s been housed since the center opened in 2007