State Fair set to open Thursday at new Caroline County site

For the past 18 months, the State Fair of Virginia has been talking through the logistics of bringing hordes of visitors, plus funnel-cake vendors and racing pigs, to a new site in rural Caroline County.

Now, the planning is giving way to the real thing.

The State Fair opens Thursday at The Meadow Event Park, off Interstate 95 near Kings Dominion, after a 63-year run off East Laburnum Avenue in Henrico County. The event could attract a quarter-million people over 11 days if the weather cooperates.

Construction of the $81 million complex along state Route 30 is complete, but the 348-acre site was hardly idle last week. Workers swung hammers on the roof of a heritage music hall, trained scores of volunteers and tended to other final preparations.

“We’re in good shape. We’re just setting up for the fair,“ spokesman Jay Lugar said.

This year marks the first year since 1945 that the fair hasn’t been held at the Strawberry Hill complex, which is now Richmond International Raceway. Atlantic Rural Exposition Inc., which operates the fair and is now known as The State Fair of Virginia Inc., sold the property for $47 million in 1999, allowing both the fair and raceway to expand.

In Caroline, the fair has replaced racecars with racehorses. Meadow Farm was the birthplace of Secretariat, winner of the Triple Crown in 1973.

The new site—officials are discouraging the term “fairgrounds” because of its varied, year-round use—has been designed to showcase its history and rolling, pastoral setting. A group of stable buildings has served as the architectural inspiration for the ticket plaza and other new buildings. The foaling shed where Secretariat was born in 1970 has been preserved and moved to an area dedicated for equestrian activities.

Even the popular midway won’t be visible from Route 30, which divides the event site with ticket plaza and equine area south of the road and the agricultural and entertainment areas north of the road. Pedestrian access is provided through a tunnel.

“We wanted people to see green space,“ Lugar said.

Caroline officials said the fair is fitting well into the community and will boost the county’s profile.

“For the fairgrounds to preserve the birth stable [for Secretariat] and the grounds itself, we couldn’t be happier,“ Caroline County Administrator Percy C. Ashcraft said. “We hope the fair has a long and prosperous time in Caroline.“

But for a time, fair officials were jockeying to stay in eastern Henrico. After selling the Strawberry Hill complex to the raceway, fair officials proposed a new site near Interstate 295 and Williamsburg Road. The plan met strong community opposition and was dropped.

Henrico regrets losing the fair and the throngs of visitors it attracts annually but hopes it does well in Caroline, Henrico County Manager Virgil R. Hazelett said.

“It was not a huge revenue loss, but certainly it did carry a large name and prestige in Henrico County for a number of years,“ he said.

Fair officials said the move to Caroline, about 20 miles north of Strawberry Hill, provides a setting to match its mission to promote the best of Virginia’s agriculture and animals and presents new opportunities to attract visitors from nearby Fredericksburg and from Northern Virginia.

The Meadow Event Park has room to accommodate about 14,000 parked vehicles, compared with the 9,000 at Strawberry Hill when the property was sold, Lugar said. This year, fairgoers will pay a $5 per-vehicle parking fee. Trams will carry visitors from grassy lots to the site’s entrance.

The fair has kept last year’s gate prices—$11 weekdays and $13 weekends, excluding rides—and included concerts in the price of admission.

“We’re very happy with what we’ve got here,“ Lugar said. “We’re right off the interstate in a nice, rural location. It’s a beautiful site. We’re ready for people to come.“