Moore Square

Then eventually when nothing is done with Dix it will be underutilized and a drain on city resources. In an effort to recoup their losses the city votes to sell of portions of Dix for private development.

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Gonna be the turd in the hamper here and say I didnā€™t like the winning design at all. Looked like something that would age poorly. It showed complete contempt for pedestrians crossing through the park to go between neighboring blocksā€“something the park needs to facilitate when dense infill happens on the block to its east.

The design they ended up implementing may be ā€˜blandā€™ but I think it will fit in more with the historic blocks to the west and south.

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Speaking of the block to the eastā€¦ Anyone placing bets as to how long until we start seeing developers purchasing property and proposing mid to high rises east of Moore Square? I assume it will likely trend more residential with street level commercial spaces, but just a total guess.

I still REALLY want to see the federal government complex bounded by Person, Hargett, Bloodworth, and New Bern replaced. There is HUGE potential here.

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The block immediately east of Moore Square should be reserved for an incredible development but that probably wonā€™t happen.

Anything is better than an abandoned pest terminator building though.

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Itā€™s already happening. The pest control building was bought 2+ years ago, then leased back to Kill-o for a while. It shows that its owned by ā€œMoore Square Apartments LLCā€ which appears to be a subsidiary of Banner Property Management. They are the company behind the Lincoln and the Metropolitan.

Most of the rest of that block is owned by the city. The exceptions are the small office building on Martin, the Outpost, and the Raleigh Rescue mission.

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The Lincoln is pretty ugly so thatā€™s not really good news. Iā€™m guessing theyā€™ll eventually buy the rest of the lot from the city and build basically another Lincoln apartments.

Why is Durham getting all the decent looking apartment buildings?

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We need better than a 5-6 story stick built apartment building wrapped around a parking deck for this block. Letā€™s all pray they have loftier goals for this block. Then again, look at the Edison apartments on a prime blockā€¦ Raleigh will always find a way to disappoint. :frowning:

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If apartments are going here, they need to be more of the skyhouse-type.

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Yeah, but Skyhouse is also nothing to look at. What we need is good design. I just finished a walk around Wynwood in Miami and took a bunch of photos of a really cool midrise thatā€™s under construction there that Iā€™ll upload and share on one of these open threads soon.

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Oh, I agree 100%. It seems nowadays Raleigh gets the blandest architecture, and value-engineered at that. Architecturally, the skyhouse is nothing to write home about, but I would prefer it to the Metropolitan and its ilk.

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I think that the worst is The Lincoln.

Iā€™m hoping that if things come to fruition with S Saunders, other developers will see that you can do pretty and profitable.

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Letā€™s start a thread for this, like a ā€œvisiting/living other citiesā€ kind of topic. Iā€™d love to see other perspectives as well as highlights from othersā€™ travels. Iā€™ll be in Nashville in March so wanted to do that after I get back but anyone can start one now.

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Love this idea! I may travel a bit and will give me a mission while out and about.

Where should it be started? The Pub?

The design they ended up implementing may be ā€˜blandā€™ but I think it will fit in more with the historic blocks to the west and south.

I guess I just disagree with the premise that the goal of Moore Square should ever have been to ā€œfit inā€ with its historical context. Perhaps this is a wider discussion, but there is a time and place for design to recede or bow down to its surroundings. A signature square in a booming, up-and-coming part of downtown is not one of them. Special spaces and places should stand out from their surroundings. The variety and visual contrast from different eras of design is a huge part of what makes the best cities of the world so vibrant and interesting. Itā€™s not aesthetic homogeneity.

I do, however, appreciate references or nods to a siteā€™s past. And to that point, it is the new design that disregards two centuries of history by introducing the foreign geometry of an arc, not the original one.

It showed complete contempt for pedestrians crossing through the park to go between neighboring blocksā€“something the park needs to facilitate when dense infill happens on the block to its east.

I completely agree with you here ā€“ this was a complete drawback to the 2011 masterplan. Itā€™s worth pointing out though that the original winning entry maintained cross-circulation through the site, so itā€™s clear the designers were thinking about it. Iā€™m not sure what led to the evolution from this to the 2011 version. Perhaps the city thought the square was too divided in this scheme, which is also valid.

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Article with an update. Says itā€™s 75% done and should be finished by end of July. 5 more monthsā€¦

https://www.bizjournals.com/triangle/news/2019/03/05/status-heck-downtown-raleighs-12-5m-moore-square.html?iana=hpmvp_trig_news_headline

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No!! Empire profiting from public park land!!! Burn it all to the ground! Restore it to Piedmont prairie ecosystem, itā€™s oppressive

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Whatā€™s up with Empire? How exactly are they oppressive/someplace to be cautious of?

I didnā€™t use my sarcasm emoji. Iā€™m making fun of those that abhorred the Dix park master plan. Someone actually commented that the presence of a luxury hotel in the park would be ā€œoppressiveā€ to someone who couldnā€™t afford it.

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