Business Expansion in the Triangle

Ken, you should make that pitch to Elon :slightly_smiling_face:

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Saw this just now. My company is moving to an undisclosed location at the end of the year, somewhere in the RTP area. I wish it was hereā€¦ Lol

https://www.newsobserver.com/news/business/article239716623.html

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The ambitious Hub RTP project ā€” originally known as Park Center.

Lol clever and inventive name. This is karma I was just telling someone we donā€™t have real towers in RTP.

So it this Raleigh 4th skyline or does Durham claim this?

Pretty sure it will be considered Durham (they put money towards the project as well)

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Why just work in RTP when you can live and play there too?!?!? :sweat_smile:

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Hub RTP is about 3/4 mile west of what would be a perfect location. Whatā€™s a perfect location, you ask? Starwood owns a vacant 95 acre former Nortel site dubbed ā€œPark Pointā€ which is just east of ā€œThe Hubā€. It borders the railroad between I-40 and NC54.

Unfortunately it seems Starwood is proposing a less ambitious (compared to The Hub) adaptive reuse project for this site that will nonetheless cost $100 million. Given its location at the nexus of a bunch of highways, transit (bus AND rail), RTP, the airport, and the biggest hub of amenities (hotels, restaurants, etc) in the RTP area, Iā€™d like to see them start from scratch, tack another zero onto their budget for the development, and link it together with the ā€œHubā€ somehow.

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Hub RTP website touts the office space as overlooking I-40 and views of RDU airport. https://hub.rtp.org/

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ooooooh, sign me up.

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ā€˜itā€™s a river of carsā€™ā€¦ I guess I-40 is closest thing the Triangle has to a water feature.

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Unlike the former Nortel site, RTP (er, its parent foundation) itself actually owns the ex-IBM plot of land thatā€™s the Frontier/Hub. I think that alone tilted the project in favor of its current site.

Then again, Iā€™m not too disappointed. If the Durham-Raleigh commuter rail becomes a thing, itā€™s inevitably going to need an RTP station. The Nortel/Starwood site is probably the best place for such a station anyways (not to mention a GoTriangle bus terminal relocation). If this consortium still owns this piece of land even after their tenants move in (and additional construction wouldnā€™t hurt those companies), isnā€™t there still an opportunity for more development?

The yellow areaā€™s the part of this property thatā€™s not a part of the main building adjacent to the NCRR (AKA future commuter/high-speed rail, in red); aside for the nearby power transformer (which I excluded from this region), they seem to just be old, hard-to-access parking lots or empty fields/tennis courts. I feel like thereā€™s more they could do with this potential gold mineā€¦

(btw, this is the $100M renovation youā€™re talking about, right?)

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Last week I was going to post a news fragment that seemed to un-officially confirm that Oracle was moving forward with their new campus in Nashville. This was to be just across river from downtown and next to the NFL stadium in ā€˜River Northā€™. The TN governor had just been in California for the negotiations. It was to start with 1,000 employees and grow from there.

Soā€¦ no chance of coming to the Triangle.

Butā€¦ the new mayor of Nashville, who seems to be a real anti-growth nut, has been running around like a bull in a china shop, pissing off the Amazon people and a couple of other tech companies, and is seemingly trying to sabotage the new MLS stadium. And spooking Oracle.

So not only is the MLS project possibly unraveling for Nashville, the Oracle deal is possibly back in play. The guys on UrbanPlanet are freaking out. A moderator from the Austin group mentioned they have a similar problem with their new mayor also helping to push away the Amazon HQ2 with a public letter that soured the deal. Some of these politicians can really be disasters.

Who knows where this will lead. Does the Triangle appear as a stable and welcoming location for these projects?

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Interestingā€¦ can you share the links for the news fragments, etc?

Wasnā€™t Microsoft going for Nashville as well but then made a b-line to us?

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That last 500 people operations came down to between RTP and Houston

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@niko I canā€™t link to the urbanplanet discussions as theyā€™re scattered about over there. Thereā€™s some twitter chat too.
But this one kinda sums it all up. https://www.newschannel5.com/news/metro-council-member-executives-concerned-over-mayors-handling-of-new-development

A blurb:

ā€œThe next headline I really would be anxious about seeing is: ā€˜Oracle declares that they are not gonna create a large campus in Nashville,ā€™ā€ Oā€™Connell said, citing the meetings that were reported between the Cooper administration and Microsoft that did not result in new Microsoft jobs in Nashville.

The MLS debacle is covered there too. Construction on the stadium was supposed to start, but the mayor doesnā€™t like the location agreed to by the prior administration, so heā€™s holding it up.

Nashville SC and Major League Soccer called for Mayor Cooper to sign a demolition contract over the weekend so demolition could begin on Monday, but that was not done.

This dude is nuking all the cool stuff going on there. Itā€™s just nuts. Maybe itā€™s time for these guys to look about 500 miles to the east on I-40ā€¦

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Richmond also spooking out companies. Costar. A major Richmond employer is now looking elsewhere to put a 3,000 person operation center unless the city of Richmond can sort itself together and approve the Navy Hill project.

Whomever is courting companies for Raleigh should really visit the CEO of Costar for a presentation of the future 40 story hotel + office tower methinks.

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Thanks! Gonna screenshot it and send it to John Kane !:wink:

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Nashville has budget problems. Big ones. The shine will come off that star soon. Probably is a country music song to describe their situation.

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Richmond is a cool city but a basket case when it comes to public policy. Henrico county and City of Richmond can not seem to work together. Should have consolidated years ago but sure segregation issues prevented that.

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You really shouldnā€™t assume anything like that especially when it is far far from the truth. Virginia is different from most states as they have independent cities and there has been a moratorium on annexations since 1979. By law they cannot combine school districts or anything else with the county. In fact some smaller cities have considered ceasing being cities at all and just merging with the county so that services can be combined.

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