NEWPORT NEWS — The history of the North End Huntington Heights neighborhood and Newport News Shipbuilding are closely intertwined.
The shipyard was established in 1886 as the Chesapeake Dry Dock and Construction Co., and the historic neighborhood sprouted up around it. In the early 20th century, the neighborhood was considered the height of luxury and home to many of the city’s elite — including shipyard presidents and city mayors.
Today, the shipyard’s enduring success means the neighborhood abuts Virginia’s largest industrial employer, with a workforce of 25,000 and facilities that span more than 550 acres along 2 miles of waterfront in the city’s southern end.
But residents of North End Huntington Heights say growth in recent years has made the shipyard a problematic neighbor — and living in its shadow, a burden.
Access to on-street parking is a daily turf war between homeowners and employees, who don’t have adequate parking at the shipyard. The thousands of workers who do secure spots in adjacent parking lots flood the sidewalks and streets during shift changes. Those cutting through the neighborhood often leave a trail of debris: chip bags, plastic bottles filled with urine and beer cans scattered along the sidewalks and stuffed in bushes along the Warwick Boulevard thoroughfare.
Then there’s the noise. The sound of machinery can be heard throughout the day and into the night.
Longtime Huntington Heights resident Robin Stippich said problems started a decade ago and gradually grew worse as the shipyard kept hiring more workers. As a result, she said a once desirable and beautiful neighborhood “has become run down and forgotten” and has seen continuous regression.
“I would like the city to start treating this like the historic area that it is,” she said.
She and nearly 30 other residents spoke with The Virginian-Pilot and Daily Press this year about their frustrations, discussing communication with the shipyard in trying to address the issues, and posing suggestions about what could be done.
Newport News Shipbuilding declined to make anyone available for an interview. Instead, it answered some questions by email. Other information about the company’s actions has been gleaned from written communications between shipyard officials and residents, which were shared with The Pilot and Daily Press.
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Parking wars
The North End Huntington Heights neighborhood, which stretches from 50th Street to 72nd Street, is part of the city’s Residential Parking Permit Program, which designates on-street parking for residents’ exclusive use.
But they say shipyard employees and Navy sailors assigned to ships at the facility regularly use parking spaces in Huntington Heights — which makes it difficult for deliveries or inviting visitors.
The problem stems from the lack of parking spaces on and around the shipyard, which union officials say is “very limited.”
Charles Spivey, president of the union representing 9,700 shipyard employees — United Steelworkers Local 8888 — said parking has been an issue for years and many employees park “wherever they can” to be closer to work.
While the shipyard has numerous entrances along Huntington and Washington avenues, Spivey said many of the employee parking lots are a 20-30 minute walk away. If employees have a 7 a.m. shift, he said they may often arrive one or two hours early to ensure they can get a decent parking space and get to work on time.
Spivey said he knows several people who were terminated because they couldn’t arrive on time due to parking challenges.
Inadequate access to parking at the shipyard was also documented in a recent Navy report commissioned in the wake of a series of suicides by sailors. Of more than 7,500 parking spaces needed just for Navy personnel, only about 3,400 were available within walking distance of the shipyard.
Responding to questions about parking, Newport News Shipbuilding spokesman Todd Corillo said employees have access to thousands of spaces across multiple locations — including a combination of owned lots and garages, as well as leased facilities. In addition to parking facilities near the main shipyard, the company offers several offsite locations to supplement parking and provides shuttle services to and from the parking areas.
Newport News Shipbuilding managers also have been engaged in discussions about the issue with residents. Tom Cosgrove, the corporate citizenship and government relations manager, and Gary Artybridge, the community relations manager, wrote in an October letter to Stippich that parking remains a “key pain point for the company, our employees, our customer, and our neighbors.”
In that letter, they said the shipyard, the Navy and the city are in discussions about the matter. A team representing all three entities meets monthly to discuss meaningful solutions while addressing long-term options, they said.
When parking issues spill into the surrounding neighborhood, enforcement is the Newport News Police Department’s responsibility. It has two officers who enforce parking in restricted and permitted areas, according to city spokesperson Kim Lee. She said they address parking issues on a complaint-driven basis as well as on regular patrols.
Police Capt. Alison Funaiock emailed Stippich last fall and said the department met with the Navy and the shipyard and told them they would start towing illegally parked vehicles. In the email, Funaiock said the department towed 34 vehicles and ticketed 35 in its first Huntington Heights towing operation. Fines for residential parking permit violations could range from $20-25, as outlined in the city code.
However, residents claim the towing doesn’t happen often enough to deter illegal parking.
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Growth of the shipyard
Even as residents grow more frustrated, shipyard activity is not expected to slow anytime soon. Employment numbers have fluctuated over decades, but have grown from about 17,000 workers in 2000 to 20,000 in 2010 to 25,000 today.
Corillo said Newport News Shipbuilding plans to hire for more than 2,500 skilled trade positions this year and is taking aggressive action to meet that goal. Furthermore, the company also is hiring for salaried positions, including entry-level engineering positions.
The hiring spree is meant to help replace soon-to-retire workers and to ensure the workforce can tackle the company’s current backlog of work — estimated at $47 billion as of March 31.
At the shipyard, construction is underway on three Gerald R. Ford-class aircraft carriers: USS John F. Kennedy, USS Enterprise and USS Doris Miller. In addition, the company continues the midlife overhaul of the USS John C. Stennis and provides fleet services for the Navy aircraft carrier fleet worldwide. On the nuclear-powered submarine side of the house, it continues to build for the Virginia- and Columbia-class submarine programs.
The shipyard anticipates a strong hiring demand to continue within the next decade, Corillo said.
“While we will not speculate on future contracts, we remain committed to being an important national security partner and executing on our current contracts, which represents work for many years to come,” he said.
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Noisy neighbors
While parking may be the most sizable issue for Huntington Heights, noise, trash and traffic are other problems residents contend with on a daily basis.
Bryan Vick is a retired shipyard worker who lives on River Road beside Trinity Lutheran Church. He said one of the biggest culprits of noise is the sandblasting facility on River Road — which can stretch through 2 a.m.
“Those things sound like two jet air airplanes,” he said of the sandblasting site. “If you’re in an airport or something and there’s a big jet warming up, that’s what that sounds like. And they do it at night time. It just makes a constant hum.”
Vick said while he realistically knows the shipyard’s equipment isn’t going anywhere, he said “they need to put some type of sound barrier around these machines.”
Rick Tobin, who lives on Belvedere Drive, concurred.
“With this industry, they are aware of acoustics,” Tobin said. “They build submarines and aircraft carriers, with sound being a very big item. You don’t want the enemy to be able to hear you. But here we are as neighbors, not the enemy, and we sure do hear you.”
But Newport News Shipbuilding says the noise is within acceptable sound levels. Cosgrove and Artybridge said in their October letter that it is a 24/7 operation and “round-the-clock production schedule is necessary in order to meet our delivery commitments to our U.S. Navy customer.”
“When specific concerns such as the blast and coat facility come to our attention, we will review to determine what, if anything, can be done to address noise concerns.”
But they said some noise, such as crane warnings, cannot be fully mitigated.
“While we reduce the volume of the crane horn on 2nd and 3rd shifts when we have fewer employees on site, we cannot avoid them as the safety of our employees during crane movements is our most important consideration,” they wrote.
Corillo said sound measurements have been taken and the city has confirmed it is within all regulations.
“In good faith, we are evaluating options to mitigate sound impacts,” he said.
Traffic and trash are 0ther problems residents say lower the quality of life in the neighborhood.
In mid-afternoon, around the time of the shipyard’s shift change, it is not uncommon to see large groups of shipyard employees walking swiftly along neighborhood streets to reach their vehicles. Soon after, Warwick Boulevard, Huntington Avenue and all of the roads in between become heavily congested.
Tim Dolan, who lives on 57th Street, said he would like bigger speed bumps in the neighborhood to deter people cutting through from driving so fast.
“People are coming on 57th Street from both directions, sometimes going really fast with the speed,” Dolan said. “And, we’ve got some kids on the street.”
A shipyard employee who lives in the neighborhood and requested anonymity due to her job, said she regularly picks up litter left by other employees and that cleaning up the trash often takes hours. One particularly revolting but recurring find is plastic bottles filled with urine.
Employees caught urinating in the neighborhood have said restrooms on site are out of order, or they couldn’t wait during the long walk to their vehicles, Stippich said.
“I have also asked them not to urinate in the bushes and stuff,” Stippich said. “And (residents) have just been yelled at and told ‘there’s nothing you can do about it.’”
Spivey, the union president, said an insufficient number of porta potties and the long walk from the shipyard to a parking lot likely are contributing factors.
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Suggested solutions
The city and the shipyard have been engaged with efforts to address problems raised.
To assist with traffic concerns, the city has been working with the community to implement various calming measures, Lee said. In recent years, the city has completed several traffic signal and pedestrian crossing projects, as well as adding pedestrian flashing lights at 67th Street and Huntington.
Corillo said that for many years, Newport News Shipbuilding has engaged in an open and direct dialogue with its neighbors, including those in the North End Huntington Heights neighborhood.
“We are committed to being good neighbors, and will continue to work with the city and residents to minimize inconveniences and keep residents informed,” Corillo said. “We remind our employees and other stakeholders regularly of the importance of extending our behavior expectations at the shipyard into the community.”
In communications with residents, Cosgrove and Artybridge said they continue to remind shipyard employees about the importance of being good neighbors, including adherence to traffic and pedestrian rules, avoiding litter and using appropriate language.
“That said, we only have the ability and right to enforce most of those standards when they are on-site or on the clock,” they wrote.
Cosgrove and Artybridge said employees will occasionally volunteer to support clean-up efforts. But these are volunteer-led, goodwill initiatives — not a company responsibility.
Stippich would like the shipyard to enter into the Adopt-a-Spot program for the neighborhood along Huntington Avenue and Warwick Boulevard to help clean up. She also wants to see trash cans in all parking lot areas. Other residents say more porta potties and restroom facilities available as workers exit the yard would cut down on waste in their yards.
Huntington Heights residents say they know the shipyard, Navy and associated traffic are here to stay. Ultimately, Stippich hopes the shipyard will take more responsibility for the condition of the neighborhood and stop putting cleanup efforts on the residents and the city. She also hopes the city and police enforce the neighborhood rules, increase towing and make tickets for illegal parking more substantial. She also would like to see the public educated more on the history of the neighborhood.
“The residents of the area are frustrated and convinced, in some cases, that nothing will ever change,” Stippich said. “I disagree; if we band together and keep at it, we will eventually be recognized and these issues can be addressed.”
Josh Janney, joshua.janney@virginiamedia.com.
