When landscape architect Tyler Silvestro first moved to Richmond, the rectangular strip of land that separates the James River from Dock Street just downstream of Great Shiplock Park appeared to have little to offer. 

“It looked as it had for the past 30 years — vacant, desolate, isolated, behind a fence,” he said. “But it had this really cool quality of being kind of the forefront to the riverfront.” 

Several years later, the 4-acre parcel now known as Dock Street Park is being fast-tracked for a makeover that could offer residents a new access point to the river and restore a site that was once a concrete plant to a thriving natural environment. 

The pace of transformation has been rapid. In 2023, conservation groups including the Capital Region Land Conservancy placed the land under an easement and transferred it to the city for use as a park. (An adjoining acre went to the James River Association for the creation of the James A. Buzzard River Education Center.) Richmond opened an “interim” version of the park to the public in 2024 while continuing to craft a longer-term plan for what it should look like. 

That vision was unveiled Thursday by Silvestro, a partner at landscape architecture firm Marvel, which is also involved in the Mayo Island overhaul and work at Belle Isle.

“The goal is not to completely renovate what’s already been built, but it’s kind of to enhance it,” he told Richmond’s Urban Design Committee. 

The conceptual plan that got the UDC’s blessing Thursday will undergo further revisions over the next few months before coming back for additional review. But the warm reception it got from committee members indicates that the broad strokes will likely remain intact.

“It’s kind of a mix between a front porch and a park,” said member Jessie Gemmer. 

The plan put together by Marvel would largely preserve the series of curving paths laid down in the interim Dock Street Park while adding gathering spaces including a “hammock grove” and picnic area, extensive native plantings and discovery gardens for children. 

“It’s really a planting plan with paths,” Silvestro told the UDC.

By far the most ambitious feature is the “James River get-down,” a major re-grading and redesign of a steep slope leading to a wooden dock on the James that would allow visitors to actually go down to the riverfront. 

Right now, “you can literally stand in this park and see the river, but between you and it there’s about a 13-foot drop, a very severe, steep slope,” said Silvestro. “So there’s a real kind of psychological barrier and a visual barrier between yourself as a parkgoer and the riverfront right now.” 

Throughout the park, planners hope to repurpose stone already at the site for steps, pavers and other features. The hammocks being proposed would be suspended between wooden posts and grouped together in a grove area. In another part of the park, a small amphitheater would be created by embedding granite steps into a berm planted with perennials. 

Silvestro warned the Urban Design Committee that the site faces some heavy constraints. Because it lies in a tidal floodplain, portions are occasionally inundated by water. A sewer easement runs through the middle of the park, and a 35-foot river protection zone stretches inward from the water’s edge. The Capital Bike Trail also runs along part of the perimeter. 

“There’s a lot of things we cannot create here,” he said. “We can’t build buildings. No septic. We’re not truly trying to do any kind of underground utilities of any kind.”

Also not part of the plan: parking, although UDC Secretary Ray Roakes said city staff were considering the “larger picture of access and parking” throughout the whole section of riverfront around Dock Street.  

UDC approval of the conceptual plan came with only two recommendations: that potential locations for art installations be identified, and that any lighting installed should be dark sky-compliant.

“What do I have to say when there’s so much love going into the project already?” asked member Conor O’Donnell. 

Contact Reporter Sarah Vogelsong at svogelsong@richmonder.org