Citynerd put out a video this week about Project2025, which fills the space vacated by a rather empty Republican Party platform, and its impact to transit, sustainable development, etc. While this video might trigger some, I thought it was a thoughtful summary about how its implementation might/will provide a serious challenge to many things that this community finds important around issues that address climate action.
I think this would be political suicide for any politician(s) who propose this, given the lack of existing alternative modes of travel (adequate transit & connected and widespread bike infrastructure). I think it would be better to follow in Austin’s footsteps by introducing parking maximums.
This would influence loan requirements from banks that still require a certain amount of parking to be included in developments.
It would be viewed as anti business for sure, but if it only applied to lots with 100 spaces or more, it would pretty much only be taxing publicly traded REIT entities
There’s clearly a local mindset that revolves around the car because, frankly, that’s how it’s always been in everyone’s collective local memory.
We have a chicken and egg sort of situation here regarding how we think about parking.
Getting over that hump requires retailers, services, and hospitality having confidence that their walk shed customer base makes up a substantial percentage of their business. Of course, we can’t have that confidence without proof, and we can’t have that proof without more feet on the sidewalks.
Given that Raleigh’s center struggles like other cities with more & more folks working hybrid or remote, we have to find ways to do a few things:
This right here!!! I’m not a super fan of chains, but the OTT restaurants we have in DTR are places that I will NEVER visit myself. We need more of what folks actually consume regularly with more modest pricing and you will have a lot more customers walking through the door IMO.
And those feet on the ground that busy establishments provide are the gift that keeps on giving. It’s the reason why small retailers in strip malls want to be co-located with busy grocers. For example, when I and others walk from our homes to Publix, we pass other retail/services storefronts. That sort of traffic is important to urban businesses. They don’t want to rent in places where nobody ever passes their business by foot, and they know that they can’t rely on folks driving to them (and likely paying to park), when that puts them in direct competition with the suburbs.
Yep - High end retailers are fine. But need more every day type businesses.
Corner deli / bodega
Convenience stores
Small Target like the one on Hillsborough
Pharmacy
Dry cleaner
etc.
I almost completely agree with you. I work as a remediation contractor for NCDEQ cleaning up current/former drycleaning sites (a few have been discussed at length on this forum 
) and I would NEVER recommend to open a DC business around where people live. Just not good practice. Mitigating vapor intrusion and air quality issues keeps us very busy, not to mention the soil and groundwater contamination they cause. Besides, with folks WFH and fewer and fewer going to regular church services, who uses drycleaners these days?
Well, I do, but more of a once a month thing than a weekly one to be sure.
What I’m about to say is probably a little less for this thread and more towards the wild ideas for Raleigh, but for shopping I was hoping that the Urban Outfitters was going to lead to more national retailers downtown. With the new train station, I was hoping the RUS Bus station going to be was actually going to be a shopping center similar. This was going to remind me of the train station in Hamburg where there’s shopping right there once you get off the train. Other shopping options such as the Oculus in NYC (although smaller), The Fulton Center, or something similar. This would give an active place where people could travel downtown via the train, do some shopping, and then head back out. It would be ideal long term when commuter rail would come in. Even an expansion to the train station to where there would be shops similar to Union Station in DC.
Turning the Nexus block into a shopping center or I guess just east of Smoky Hollow would be other options.
City Center DC is an example of an outdoor shopping Mall. M Street is another good shopping district.
We’re just really missing shopping for normal people.
When that Urban Outfitters opened, I rolled my eyes. It was not because they were downtown and part of the Dillon project, I was because it was “banished” to the outside corner of the action. Urban Outfitters needed to be adjacent or across the street from Weaver Street Market to form the nucleus of a shopping district near the food hall.
I can’t even remember the last time that I used a dry cleaner.
That said, it’s easy to imagine a business that offered laundry, tailoring, AND dry cleaning, but the dry cleaning was sent to a central location away from residential exposure.
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Completely off topic, but I will never not speak up against someone spewing misinformation. Feel free to move this post if necessary.
Each of the last ten years has broken the record for the hottest year on record. The effects of which, even within this country over the past year alone are far too numerous to list, but look no further than the LA wildfires just last month.
Science isn’t political. It’s facts.
WMO: WMO confirms 2024 as warmest year on record at about 1.55°C above pre-industrial level
NOAA: 2024 was the world’s warmest year on record
AP: Earth breaks yearly heat record and lurches past dangerous warming threshold
Don’t worry, we will “magically” not have any more hottest years because the government just won’t be producing the data anymore.
Oh why didn’t I think of that, phew, we’re all saved. 
Speaking of spewing your misinformation:
these posts would like to have a word with your posts 
90 second Summary of the “man made climate change” scam
https://www.instagram.com/p/DGWunPItsDr/
Al Gore and his climate scares…
https://www.instagram.com/p/DFqb0pNy3DA/
We should investigate the data and see where it leads, not tell people “it’s settled science” because science is NEVER settled. But people who want debate and science tested and experimented vs. politically motivated “shut up with your misinformation” is never a good position to be in.
You do realize that they’re finding out that the wildfires were largely caused by humans and power company sparking that ignited dried brush that the state of California refused to do vegetation management on ? Everything isn’t always “cLiMaTeChAnGe” greta.
The fact that you responded with a pair of Instagram posts, one of which is from a man who identifies as someone who “seeks to glorify god in everything he does,” is simply pure comedy.
The problem we face in the US and the world at large, whether it be climate change, racism, transphobia, etc. is purely an education problem.
And when people choose to be educated via social media, well, you not only prove my previous point, but also prove that the world is headed for very dangerous times.
Be smarter. Read a book. In fact NATO has a great library of books on climate change for you to check out when you’re done burying your head in the sands of Instagram.
Please stop correlating black people with someones sexual preferences. It’s insulting.