Is it actually off topic? Another city?
Cary and Apex are suburbs of Raleigh. A significant project like this in the Raleigh metro stands to impact our community massively. Seems like the exact sort of thing interested folks on this site would continue to keep tabs on.
I’m probably wrong saying off-topic. IOW, I predict that this community won’t hyper focus on this compared to say the new Raleigh City Hall. This is a raleigh-centric site so I choose to nudge a topic like this into a more general thread for organizational purposes. By all means keep sharing info and discuss.
Most other Apex news ends up in the “Show Off Things From Other Cities” thread. Makes sense that the discussion would migrate over there
Eh, I don’t see how a gated community in Apex will benefit Downtown Raleigh.
My hope is that this project will kickstart serious regional transit access for Apex. The meandering GoTriangle route 305 to Raleigh is better than nothing and the new GoCary all-day route to Cary is coming this fall, but this project will almost certainly justify restoring the former 311 bus to the regional transit center and connections to Durham and Chapel Hill, preferably as an express bus using 540 instead of NC-55.
It’s simple; these gated community people will drive to downtown and demand free parking.
If they are willing to drop Cary/Apex levels of money each weekend, let ‘em come and give them all the free parking they want.
No. I am not interested in prioritizing all the free parking they want to folks who will come in occasionally to the city center. I am more interested in prioritizing residential development that will yield more residents who will activate the city daily, both day and night.
That doesn’t mean that I don’t want folks to come enjoy the city from the burbs; it’s just that I don’t want to turn on the free parking valve at the expense of creating a truly urban city for its residents.
On the other hand, City Council recently extended the program of free parking up to 2 hours at City garages, no doubt at the behest of the DRA. “A survey conducted by [DRA] revealed that 88 percent of community respondents are more likely to visit downtown due to the free parking initiative. Additionally, 91 percent of storefront businesses report a positive impact on business health, while 95 percent of the community and 97 percent of storefronts support making the program permanent.” Ideology aside, on a pragmatic basis it appears the DTR restaurants, shops etc are anxious to have suburbanites come in. I don’t know how many more DTR residents would be required for the restaurants and shops there to thrive without suburbanites.
Thousands and thousands more. Let’s get DT proper to 25,000 and the city won’t need to focus on giving away parking.
That’s essentially tourism. While it can boost short-term revenue and is seen as a positive, relying heavily on external spending and activity isn’t a sustainable long-term strategy for a city. A resilient economy needs a strong foundation of local investment and engagement from within!
(I’m not saying to exclude or not welcome visitors from Cary/Apex. But a strong local economy should prioritize meeting the needs of its local residents first)
For now, I believe most decks should have free parking, and convenient street parking should remain paid. I agree the goal should be to increase DTR’s population so businesses can be mostly dependent on local residents instead of those driving in from suburbs.
The spending bill that passed the NC House this week apparently didn’t include any funding for the children’s hospital. The senate version from earlier this year had $600M. (It’s the second story down).