This story by Liberty Darr was first published in The Other Paper on June 25, 2026.
It’s no surprise that Beta Technologies, the electric aviation tech giant, has plans to build an empire in the Green Mountain State.
But the company has now publicly showcased some preliminary plans to build out its campus off Williston Road in South Burlington to nearly 100 acres over the next decade. And it is buying swaths of property to make it happen.
An informal sketch plan proposal for a new 100-acre master plan was submitted to the city’s Development Review Board last week. The new approach, which Beta officials call “adaptive campus master planning,” would ultimately replace the 40-acre master plan the city had previously approved when Beta sought to build out its current 188,000-square-foot manufacturing facility in 2023.
In a cover letter to the Development Review Board, Beta states that previous master plan approvals, while successful at the time, proved to be too rigid for the rapidly evolving industry that the company is competing in. Even minor adjustments — like shifts in master plan boundary changes, or changes in building size — would trigger the need for full master plan amendments and repeated city review.
The new approach would effectively move away from this project-by-project review and shift to a long-term framework for Beta’s proposed development of the area.
“The hard work that went into that master plan really set Beta up for a lot of success,” Beta employee and engineer Alex Gagnon told the review board last week. “It sort of got us to where we are today. It took us from being an R&D company and gave us the chance to really think about how we could lean into manufacturing, and how we could do that in a really cohesive way.”
But as the company scales quickly, Gagnon said, it’s clear that bringing some control of the supply chain in-house is key to the company’s success.
“We’d like to do that here in Vermont, and this campus is going to be our opportunity to do that,” Gagnon said. “We’re going to go from just assembling planes to assembling structures here, to building our motors here, to building batteries here, and so we want to develop a campus that’s going to be able to support that over time.”
The master plan area spans several properties and is organized into three distinct development areas, which collectively include parcels currently owned by Beta as well as parcels owned by the city of Burlington at Burlington International Airport.
One development area hinges on access to the airport’s airfield. It would include airside operations and production, representing Beta’s core campus and primary center of operations. According to the letter to the review board from the company, the area would accommodate principal manufacturing facilities, a training center, supporting office and research space, centralized civic space, and functions related to inventory, distribution and delivery.
The second area would focus more on manufacturing parts and pieces that will get delivered to the assembly facility. Planned uses include facilities for production of aircraft components, along with employee- and campus-supporting functions such as child care, commercial services, parking and civic space.
The third area would accommodate support services, small-scale and specialty manufacturing and flexible operational infrastructure.
The master plan would include 17 existing buildings within 14 properties. The cover letter states that the buildings may be either retained, repurposed or demolished depending on future development needs.
The Other Paper in January and February reported the company’s initial buying spree. Those properties for the new master plan include:
• 154 Da Vinci Drive, the current assembly facility.
• 430 Da Vinci Drive.
• 123 Valley Road — Beta Kids childcare.
• 240 Eagle Drive.
• 3 Calkins Court, bought by the company for $1.9 million.
• 3060 Williston Road.
• 4016 Williston Road.
• 20 Palmer Court, bought by the company for $1.65 million on April 10.
• 3065 Williston Road, bought for $400,000 on April 14.
• 3069 Williston Road, bought for $450,000 on April 14.
• 3073 Williston Road.
• 3097 Williston Road.
• 4017 Williston Road, bought for $1.5 million on March 6.
• 4049 Williston Road.
• 2 Gregory Drive, bought for $3.3 million on March 20.
• 4095 Williston Road.
• 6 Gregory Drive, bought for $1.5 million on March 25.
According to city land records, the company has also closed on several residential properties in the Shunpike Road neighborhood, an area that directly abuts the development areas on Williston Road:
• 69 Shunpike Road, bought for $510,000 on Feb. 27.
• 4 Shunpike Road, bought for $300,000 on April 14.
• 251 Shunpike Road, bought for $620,000 on Dec. 18.
A Beta spokesperson who did not provide their name said these Shunpike homes will remain in use as housing, utilized to support Beta families in transition as they navigate the challenging housing market. The company held a meeting earlier this month with residents from the Shunpike neighborhood about the growth strategy. The same unnamed spokesperson said it was well-attended with approximately 25 people.
Other components of the unofficial proposal include traffic studies; improving surrounding infrastructure such as pump stations; building new traffic signals or road networks; increasing green spaces; and providing more parking.
While the proposal is still in its earliest inception, the company said it plans to put forward an official master plan proposal in July of this year.
“The community here in South Burlington really stepped up through this planning process,” Gagnon said. “It’s been great to work with staff to develop this new strategy.”
