Trump's Mar-a-Lago Club to get new, larger helipad for Marine One landings in Palm Beach

• A new, larger helipad will be built at President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach.
• The new concrete pad will be 10 feet wider to accommodate larger, heavier presidential helicopters.
• The helipad is a requirement of the White House Military Office and the U.S. Secret Service.
• A previous helipad was built in 2017 and demolished in 2021 as a condition of its original approval.

A new, larger helipad will be built at President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach.

The town's Landmarks Preservation Commission voted at its Oct. 22 meeting to approve a certificate of appropriateness that allows for the reconstruction of the helicopter landing pad, along with a concrete walkway and recessed safety lighting.

The new concrete helipad will be 60 feet in diameter, which is 10 feet wider than the concrete pad that was used during Trump's first term in office by Marine One, the name for a helicopter when it carries the commander in chief. The first helipad was approved and built in 2017, then demolished in 2021 after Trump left the White House. The removal was a condition of the Town Council when the pad's design was approved.

The new pad will also be 8 inches deep, with an 18-foot long and 5-foot wide walkway connected to a nearby service road. The landing area is on Mar-a-Lago's west lawn, in the same location where it was from 2017 to 2021.

The larger size is needed for the larger helicopters used by the U.S. Marine Corps to carry the president, said Harvey Oyer, attorney with Shutts and Bowen and representative for the Mar-a-Lago Club.

The Marine Corps last year began using a new Sikorsky VH-92 Patriot for presidential transportation. That helicopter replaced two older models that had served as Marine One.

The VH-92A has a maximum weight of 27,700 pounds, more than 5,000 pounds heavier than the VH-60N and more than 6,000 pounds heavier than the VH-3D, the two previous helicopter models used by the Marine Corps, according to documents filed with the town that include details provided by Marine Helicopter Squadron 1.

Having a helipad at Mar-a-Lago is a requirement of the White House Military Office and the U.S. Secret Service, he said. The helipad and walkway will have a non-glare finish, Oyer said. "We don't want it to stand out," he said. "We want it to blend in as much as it possibly can."

No members of the public commented on the plans.

According to the letter of intent from Shutts and Bowen filed with the plans in August, Town Attorney Joanne O'Connor and town staff reviewed the Town Council's 2017 approval and said the council will not need to approve the reconstruction "since the Town Council Approval covered multiple terms of office for President Trump."

Rick Gonzalez of West Palm Beach-based REG Architects designed both the current and former helipad plans, town records show.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation signed off on the plans earlier this year, Oyer said. That was a necessary step because Mar-a-Lago is a National Historic Landmark and the trust has preservation easements on the property, he said. The trust also approved the 2017 helipad plans.

The National Trust found in reviewing the plans that the helipad would not destroy any historic materials or features, and no landscaping — aside from turf — or trees will be altered or removed, wrote Claire Jones, associate director of the trust's easement program.

The National Trust also noted that the helipad will be built with "non-glare, pigmented concrete to minimize visual impact," she wrote.

The helipad faced some pushback from residents when it was first proposed in 2017, with one neighbor's attorney telling town officials at the time that noise from the helicopters would disrupt residents' way of life. But the Marine Corps said that the helipad was necessary for security reasons.

It was rarely used during Trump's first term, with the first recorded use in April of 2017 when a Trump-branded helicopter landed and remained on the concrete pad for about 24 hours when Trump was at Mar-a-Lago. The Trump Organization's helicopter raised questions about how and when the helipad would be used.

While the Town Council had said in its approval that the helipad could be used “for business related to the presidency only,” a town official at the time told the Daily News that approval did not specify what kind of helicopter could land there. The same helicopter landed there again in December of 2017.

One Marine One landing at Mar-a-Lago happened in 2019 when Trump visited the Herbert Hoover Dike around Lake Okeechobee.

As a condition of approving the helipad, Palm Beach required that it be demolished when Trump left office. A permit for the pad's removal was requested in February of 2021, and the helipad was gone within two weeks.

Kristina Webb is a reporter for Palm Beach Daily News, part of the USA TODAY Florida Network. You can reach her at [email protected]. Subscribe today to support our journalism.