Vero Beach Landmarks Guide: Gardens, Museums, Historic Buildings and Bridges

The City of Vero Beach lists 13 properties on the National Register of Historic Places, from the Vero Theatre and the Maher Building downtown to the Driftwood Arcade on the beach (City of Vero Beach, National Register).

The full Vero Beach list reads: Driftwood Arcade (the Driftwood Inn breezeway), Indian River County Courthouse, Judge Henry F. Gregory House, Maher Building, Old Palmetto Hotel, Osceola Park Historic District, Pueblo Arcade, Royal Park Arcade, the Vero Beach Community Building (now the Vero Heritage Center), Vero Beach Diesel Power Plant, Vero Beach Railroad Station, Vero Beach Woman's Club and Vero Theatre (City of Vero Beach). The city Historic Preservation Commission reviews National Register nominations inside city limits.

The city list is not the whole story for Indian River County. McKee Botanical Garden describes itself as listed on the National Register and as a Florida Heritage Landmark (McKee Botanical Garden), yet it does not appear on the city page, so a search of the city list alone misses one of the best known Vero Beach landmarks. Separate guides cover the Driftwood Resort, the old Indian River County Courthouse, the downtown arcades and Maher Building, the Vero Beach Diesel Power Plant, the Vero Beach Woman's Club and the Vero Theatre.

McKee Botanical Garden, at 350 US Highway 1 in Vero Beach, is open Tuesday through Sunday from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm, sells its last ticket at 4:00 pm and closes Mondays and major holidays (McKee Botanical Garden).

The Vero Beach garden covers 18 acres of historic jungle landscape with more than 10,000 plants, and the Children's Garden closes at 4:30 pm daily (McKee Botanical Garden). The garden cafe serves lunch without garden admission. The phone is 772-794-0601. Daily ticket prices sit on a separate ticket page, so the visit page does not quote them.

A practical tip for Indian River County residents: during its centennial, McKee is offering $5 admission with ID on Community Days weekends, and the page lists October 17 and 18, February 20 and 21, and April 17 and 18 (McKee Botanical Garden). The page promises four such weekends but names only those three. The McKee Botanical Garden guide and the Waldo Sexton history guide cover how the garden was built.

The Vero Beach Museum of Art, at 3001 Riverside Park Drive, is open Monday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. and Sunday from 1 to 4 p.m., with adult admission of $12 (Vero Beach Museum of Art).

Seniors 65 and older pay $11 and students with ID $5 at the Vero Beach museum, while members, children 17 and under, and U.S. veterans and active duty military with ID enter free (Vero Beach Museum of Art). Last admission is 4:15 p.m. on weekdays and Saturdays and 3:45 p.m. on Sundays. Bank of America cardholders get free entry on the first full weekend of each month, and admission is free for everyone on the second Saturday of each month.

Parking is free in Riverside Park. From I-95 at Exit 147, State Road 60 runs east over the Merrill P. Barber bridge, and the first traffic light on the beach side turns into Riverside Park (Vero Beach Museum of Art). Construction on a new campus is under way, and as of October 14, 2026 the sculpture parks and cafe are closed indefinitely, so the outdoor sculpture is off the itinerary for now. The Riverside Theatre guide covers the theater that shares Riverside Park.

Round Island Riverside Park, run by Indian River County at 2200 South Highway A1A, has a 400 foot boardwalk built for watching manatees on the Indian River Lagoon (Indian River County Parks).

The Round Island park sits 7.5 miles south of 17th Street and A1A, covers 82.8 acres and is listed as open 24 hours (Indian River County Parks). It has two boat ramps, a canoe launch, a pavilion with a grill, 28 parking spaces plus 12 boat trailer spaces, and restrooms. A footbridge leads to a small island with trails, an observation tower and a fishing pier, and the Round Island South Conservation Area adjoins it to the south.

Indian River County rules at Round Island bar pets, fireworks, remote controlled aircraft and golf, and the park page reminds visitors that manatees are protected by the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972, the Endangered Species Act of 1973 and the Florida Manatee Sanctuary Act of 1978 (Indian River County Parks). The Round Island Riverside Park guide and the Humiston Park beach guide cover the barrier island parks.

The Vero Beach Railroad Station, the Vero Heritage Center and the Vero Beach Woman's Club are three downtown Vero Beach buildings on the city's National Register list (City of Vero Beach, National Register).

The Vero Beach Railway Station at 2336 14th Avenue now serves as an exhibit center for Indian River County history (state marker, Vero Beach Railway Station). The Heritage Center nearby was built in 1935 by the Federal Emergency Relief Administration and the City of Vero Beach, was fully restored in 1993 and added to the National Register, and houses the Indian River Citrus Museum (Vero Heritage). Vero Heritage, a nonprofit, says it maintains the building at no cost to the city.

The Vero Woman's Club dates to 1915; its clubhouse went up the following year on land the Indian River Farms Company donated, near the state marker at the corner of 21st Street and 16th Avenue (state marker, City of Vero Beach). The Vero railroad station guide, the Vero Heritage Center and Citrus Museum guide and the Vero Beach Woman's Club guide cover each building, and the Gifford Historical Museum guide and the Hallstrom Farmstead guide cover two more history sites outside downtown.

Historic Dodgertown is at 4000 26th Street in Vero Beach, the former spring training camp the Dodgers used from 1948 until 2008 (state marker, Baseball and Dodgertown).

The 2014 state marker at that address says Walter O'Malley built the 6,500 seat Holman Stadium there in 1953 and that the O'Malley family took over management of historic Dodgertown as a year round multi-sport complex in 2012 (state marker). The marker does not record who runs the complex today, so the Historic Dodgertown 2026 visitor guide is the place for current events and access.

The two Indian River Lagoon crossings are landmarks too. The 1950s Merrill P. Barber bridge on State Road 60 had a steel bascule span and a tender's booth; in the 1990s it was replaced by a fixed concrete arch high enough to show the Atlantic, and the old causeway became Royal Palm Pointe, with a city park on the river where the bridges marker stands (state marker, The Bridges). The Merrill P. Barber bridge guide and the Alma Lee Loy bridge guide, on the 17th Street crossing, cover both.

The 19 Vero Beach landmark guides fall into gardens and museums, parks and beaches, downtown buildings and bridges; the table pairs common questions with a key fact and the guide.

Four Vero Beach guides stand slightly apart from the table: the Driftwood Resort guide on the oceanfront inn whose breezeway is on the National Register list, the Humiston Park beach guide, the Laura (Riding) Jackson Home guide and the Riverside Theatre 2026 visitor guide. The Driftwood Arcade entry on the city National Register page is the official anchor for the first of them (City of Vero Beach).