Stoke Space and Relativity Space Advance LC-14 and LC-16 at Cape Canaveral

Two private rocket companies are moving toward first launches from neighboring pads at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. Stoke Space's Launch Complex 14 and Relativity Space's Launch Complex 16 sit close together along Missile Row, and both sites are further along than at any earlier point in construction, according to a September 6, 2026 NASASpaceFlight.com report by Alejandro Alcantarilla Romera and Chris Bergin.

LC-14: Stoke Space's Rebuilt Mercury-Era Pad

LC-14 is the pad that sent John Glenn into orbit aboard Friendship 7 in February 1962. Stoke Space rebuilt it with a compact footprint and a red tower, and the outlet's latest aerial images show a site with little visible construction activity left, which it reads as a sign the groundwork is largely finished. Stoke's fully reusable Nova rocket is still in Washington state. Per the report, the company has completed proto-qualification and structural verification of Nova's first stage and is building and testing first-flight hardware, with second-stage work running in parallel. A first launch campaign is still tracking to later this year or early next year if the vehicle holds schedule.

LC-16: Relativity Space Still Mid-Rebuild

Relativity Space's Launch Complex 16 previously supported Terran 1's single 2023 flight and is now being rebuilt for the larger Terran R, a partially reusable heavy-lift vehicle. NASASpaceFlight reports the site is shifting from civil construction into activation. Crews are stacking lightning towers, the Horizontal Integration Facility is energized, its bridge crane has passed a proof-load test, and the transporter-erector's upper strongback is already inside as cleanroom outfitting continues. Rails for the transporter-erector are down and visible in satellite imagery, site power is live via two 22 kV feeds, and work is wrapping up on water and propellant systems. On the vehicle side, Terran R's first stage has completed structural qualification, the second stage has moved through cryoproof testing ahead of a first hot fire at NASA's Stennis Space Center in Mississippi, and engine integration has begun on the first-flight booster's thrust structure. Relativity is still officially targeting late 2026 for Terran R, a date the outlet calls ambitious with tight timelines already showing.

Project Forge, Previously Reported

The pad work at LC-16 is only part of Relativity's broader Space Coast plan. Space Florida unveiled Project Forge on July 21, 2026, when Gov. Ron DeSantis announced it at the Farnborough International Airshow. Reach Commercial Real Estate covered the capital investment and job figures tied to that announcement in a separate post. Per NASASpaceFlight's September report, the preliminary list of Project Forge facilities includes a payload processing facility at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, the LC-16 expansion covered above, an upper-stage test site, and a new manufacturing facility. The report also states that Relativity CEO Eric Schmidt has said Terran R is expected to help deploy his own orbital data centers.

RCRE Take

LC-14 and LC-16 sit inside Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, federal property under lease to Stoke and Relativity rather than land that runs through Brevard County permitting. Pad construction there does not add county-recorded commercial square footage on its own. The pieces of Project Forge still without a named parcel are the payload processing facility, the upper-stage test site, and the new manufacturing facility, and those are the pieces that would land in the county's industrial market if built. Brevard's industrial vacancy was already tight before this announcement.

Does Brevard County permit construction at LC-14 or LC-16?

No. Cape Canaveral Space Force Station is federal property, so construction on the launch pads themselves does not go through Brevard County's building department. Permitting only becomes a county matter if Project Forge's remaining facilities end up sited on county land outside the federal boundary.

How much is Relativity's broader Brevard expansion worth?

Reach Commercial Real Estate reported in August 2026 that Florida Today put the Project Forge-linked Relativity expansion at $565 million in capital investment and 590 jobs in the first phase. No parcel or address has been published for that investment as of this writing.

Sources

• NASASpaceFlight.com, "Cape neighbors Stoke and Relativity advance LC-14 and LC-16 toward first flights," by Alejandro Alcantarilla Romera and Chris Bergin, September 6, 2026

• Space Florida, Project Forge announcement via Gov. Ron DeSantis at the Farnborough International Airshow, July 21, 2026, as cited in the NASASpaceFlight report

• Reach Commercial Real Estate, "Relativity Space Brevard Expansion: $565M and 590 Jobs Reported," August 31, 2026

• Image credit: Stoke Space company blog, photo of the rebuilt Launch Complex 14 pad

• Image: Stoke Space, Launch Complex 14

Written by Cassandra Hartford, founder and CEO of Reach Commercial Real Estate. She has worked in Brevard County commercial real estate for 18 years, representing buyers, sellers, landlords, and tenants across Florida's Space Coast.