KSC Visitor Complex contract awarded

The company that has operated the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex for the last 15 years will keep the job for another 10 to 20 years.

NASA said Friday that Delaware North Companies Parks & Resorts won a 10-year contract to manage and operate the Visitor Complex, which now includes the Astronaut Hall of Fame. The deal also provides for 10 additional years worth of options, which would be decided based on the company's performance.

"I don't know if there are words that go past thrilled, but the team here has done an extraordinary job," said Bill Moore, chief operating officer of the visitor complex.

The financial terms of the deal are unknown because they’re based heavily upon turnout at the facility. NASA's past contracts with visitor complex vendors called for the companies to be paid based upon a sharing of the center’s profits. So it depends heavily upon attendance.

About 1.5 million people per year attend the complex. The basic adult admission is $38, but that doesn't include add-on tours and experiences as well as spending done at the theme park style concessions and shopping sites throughout the facility. No tax dollars are spent maintaining or operating the complex. It's self-sustaining, NASA said.

The complex has undergone tremendous change under Delaware North’s control the past decade and a half, including the financial rescue, remodeling and reopening of the then-troubled Astronaut Hall of Fame and the addition of a multi-million dollar simulator ride called the Shuttle Launch Experience. Revamped security, refurbished displays and more up-close behind the scenes tours were among other enhancements spearheaded by Delaware North.

The next decade — or two — of the center’s growth is spelled out partly by the terms of NASA’s request for bids for the contract awarded Friday.

The space agency has specifically demanded that the Astronaut Hall of Fame, now about eight miles away, be relocated onto the main visitor complex grounds. It could become part of a larger museum with the feel of an interactive science center. Additionally, NASA wants the vendor working on plans for the display of one of the space shuttle orbiters, after they’re retired.

The orbiter Discovery is already promised to the Smithsonian, but other museums and science centers are in the running for the remaining two orbiters, which will be retired after completing five final missions scheduled this year. Moore and KSC Director Bob Cabana have been lobbying for one of the ships to be permanently displayed here, near their long-time home port.

"It's hard to imagine that, for all of the thousands of men and women who've worked to get the orbiters into space, that one of them would not be here to be celebrated," Moore said. "I can't imagine that.