@John - good points here.
I think this is true and will also present a lot of challenges for Raleigh and similar cities as we try to upfit downtowns to attract the money/talent while still needing to support/maintain/expand suburban infrastructure where the vast majority of people continue to live.
According to the 2018 State of Downtown Raleigh report there are only about 17k people living within a mile of downtown. A very small percentage of our overall population of ~470k people.
Will we be able to justify continued investment in our downtown if only a small % of Raleigh’s population lives there? I know that population is growing and I know that denser downtown development generates much higher tax revenue per acre than suburban environments.
I’ve been thinking about how Dix park presents an example of this tension between urban growth and our suburban reality. How do we make Dix a “park for everyone” if it’s a pain in the ass for most everyone to get there because they want to drive there and park onsite?
To be clear - I am not in favor of adding any more parking in Dix - just looking at this from the likely perspective of a lot of Raleigh’s current population.