Downtown South development

Oof. Omaha’s is right downtown, next to the College World Series field. It’s a great size/location for events like that and the Olympic Trials because it’s big enough to have decent nightlife, but small enough that events like that really take over the city in a fun way.

Raleigh could absolutely have all the same advantages.

4 Likes

This is a silly argument. The reality is that downtown south is an opportunity zone along a major highway, with a bullish investor and bullish developer, within striking zone of downtown proper and within what will eventually become the greater downtown urban area. This is where it’s going to happen, or we can keep waiting for the state government to donate 10 acres to the cause.

18 Likes

A post was split to a new topic: Raleigh and pop culture

Take a look what happened in Austin in 20 or even 10 years of time. Similar in Nashville. With the current momentum I am optimistic

1.5 miles is a bit of a walk but how nice would be a light rail from DTS through downtown Iron Works to North Hills. Eventually the entire North South corridor will be pretty dense. I could also live with DTS being it’s own destination at first similar to North Hills and eventually growing the corridor in between

7 Likes

1.5 miles is exactly the distance from my apartment near Transfer Co. Food Hall to the Publix grocery store. It’s a walk but not really unreasonable.

8 Likes

Not the distance so much, but the quality of the walk.

7 Likes

Yup. 1.5 miles in NYC feels short. 1.5 miles in Phoenix feels like an eternity.

5 Likes

I personally can see the gap filling in within a decade or two.

I mean look at what’s happening surrounding Dix with Park City development and the park hasn’t even broke ground.
Let’s say this is developed with 5 years.


Taking the distance from there to Downtown South is only .43 miles. Is it really out of the realm of possibility that we start seeing rezonings happen along S Saunders?

Also I believe there’s a greenway planned

16 Likes

Maybe. Hopefully. But not even if it will be, not in the next 15 years.

The city ain’t funding 2 stadium projects in that time and if they are going to spend that money (I am on record that they should not), I’d rather it be for the pro team we already have and not a minor league soccer stadium that may hypothetically become an MLS stadium someday in a place that may hypothetically be closer to downtown. That seems pretty silly.

My whole point was that if you want a downtown stadium for a team that will draw crowds like the shadowy sources are supposedly speculating, DTS does not currently provide that.

Not to throw cold water, but…
Neither Nashville nor Austin share their development with another town. Unfortunately downtown Raleigh has to compete with Durham, RTP, and North Hills for development. And, if DT South comes to fruition, it’s just another competitor.

5 Likes

Okay list start thinking positive and let negative thinking go away it new year lets start by bring in god the keys is the person who how to do stuff right

2 Likes

Sort of my point, Dix Park has not changed really at all since the city purchased it years ago. We have discussed Park City for eternity, still has not broken ground. South Salisbury/ Wilmington Street has not changed at all during the last 3 years I have lived here.

Lots of studies and surveys though.

I tend to agree with your take. It really seems like a decent amount of new development is starting to march south with the Platform being the northern bookend. Plus, an increase in amenities in this area is just going to spur additional development which will spur additional amenities and so forth. The snowball is rolling, now it’s just a matter of how quickly it gains momentum.

A nice greenway installation will also do wonders for connectivity. Especially with all of the new bike infrastructure going in around downtown… man that sure would be awesome :star_struck:

20 Likes

If you compare to the timeline to NH. Which is further away then DTS….

NH main district was redeveloped around 15 years ago. NH east started picking up around 10 years ago. And now, just within the past 2-3 years have things really picked up to fill in the gaps to DTR with Iron Works and all that going on in that area. It takes time.

So while I do think DTS and DTR will eventually grow together, it won’t be instant. And considering DTS has not even broken ground yet, DTS itself will probably take 10 years or so to fully build out.

7 Likes

Knowing that a significant percentage of the single family homes between Downtown and Downtown South are owned by just a few groups (see below), makes me think it’s almost completely inevitable that this part of Raleigh will redevelop and evolve as an extension of downtown.

15 Likes

Not to drag our frenemies from Charlotte into this :smiley: , but I saw this on the Charlotte Business Journal site and it’ll be interesting to see how they handle this. Two professional teams with their hands out wanting stadium upgrades or full-on new stadium in the Panthers case.

https://www.bizjournals.com/charlotte/news/2022/01/18/revamped-city-economic-committee-begins-work.html

2 Likes

Exactly. We can lament the loss of some natural AH in the cleft between DT and DTS, but ultimately that whole swath of land is wildly underutilized and ripe for redeployment. Comparing it to the timeline for North hills is an apples and oranges comparison for multiple reasons, the two biggest of which being that North hills is more than twice as far from downtown as DTS is, and North hills was an unproven concept at the time. 20 years from now the whole South saunders and Wilmington corridor will be urban, and hopefully the suburban style subsidized housing will be redeveloped into something more dense.

10 Likes

I think the other thing worth noting here is that the City is currently expecting the Southern BRT route to be complete by 2027. This route will run along Wilmington St and would have a stop at DTS. When BRT is done well, it’s not too different from light rail (dedicated lanes, signal priority, raised platforms, etc.). GoRaleigh has been pulling inspiration from projects like the Pulse in Richmond, which has been incredibly successful and beat ridership projections early on.

It’s unclear yet whether or not there will be dedicated lanes on Wilmington, but, if the New Bern Corridor is any indication of what’s to come on the other routes, then I expect it will. That turns this into a 7-10min ride from Moore Square, even with gameday traffic. We all know how bad traffic gets on Edwards Mill when there’s an event at PNC. Imagine sitting in that same traffic and seeing a bus fly past you in its own lane, then a bunch of people getting off right next to the stadium.

In my usual way-too-wordy fashion, I’ve been trying to say this: I really do think a stadium would work well here, even if the goal is walkability. It’s not a downtown stadium, and I’m not going to call it a downtown stadium. But, like @Kevin said, it is an urban stadium, it’s close to downtown, and it’s on a corridor that’s not only ripe for development, but planned for transit-oriented development.

31 Likes

Thanks for the info, @svp !

The Downtown South project will be hosting its quarterly public meeting on February 16th, 2022, from 5:30 - 6:30pm. This meeting will be held via the Zoom link below.
This meeting is open to the public. Please share the below Zoom link with anyone who may be interested in learning more about the Downtown South project.
ZOOM INFORMATION:
Link: Launch Meeting - Zoom

8 Likes

Here is the most recent Downtown South Notice of Public Meeting information for anyone that wants to join.

ZOOM INFORMATION:

Link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82655432447

6 Likes