The 2020 redesignation of the New River Gorge as a National Park and Preserve brought millions of annual visitors to the region. Smithers, an incorporated community 30 minutes from the National Park, is adapting to the new economic growth by developing vacant sites and brownfields such as Longacre. The ~26-acre site was the historical home to a coal camp and coke oven production facility throughout the early 1900s. However, today it is a remediation effort away from being a gem in West Virginia as it sits flat and above the 100-year floodplain, a rarity in West Virginian river communities.