Durham Development Watchlist - June 2019

Original Post: https://www.buildingbullcity.com/2019/06/durham-development-watchlist-june-2019.html

Great update!

A. Always glad to see more dense housing and multi-use going in downtown. I wonder what will end up happening to that huge surface parking lot next to where Vega will be going. I used to park there pretty often when I worked downtown a few years ago (because it was free, instead of paying $8 a day to park in Durham Centre). I cant recall--I think it might be city-owned? I wonder if they're planning to put another parking deck there, or maybe sell it to a developer. Would be a great place for even more multi-use development though, rather than more parking. It's prime real estate!

D. I wonder what this dense development on 3/4 sides means for Bull City Ciderworks and Wine Feed. Seems like the land will be too valuable in a couple of years for it to remain 1-story/undeveloped. But those businesses both seem like great candidates for moving into the bottom few floors of a multi-use development, eh?

F. Also great to hear about the museum!

G. It will be really interesting to see this corridor continue to develop as both CH and Durham continue to grow. Wonder how much difference the Durham-Orange County light rail would have made in terms of how sprawling the development here continues to be.

Bullcity Cider and Wine Feed could both do something similar to Dram and Drought have done in Raleigh. I am so excited to see what the ballpark area looks like in 5 years.

By the way Dave I don't think these have been added to the development map?

Thanks Mitch

I haven't been adding these "watchlist" developments, but I probably should. I will make a new category/color for these "subject to change with limited information" developments.

It may take me a week or two to update the maps as I am traveling this week.

Durham has really killed it this cycle so far.  Raleigh's gotten a few more large-scale projects this cycle, but considering it's close to twice the population size of Durham, the Bull City's recent development is really promising.  I mean, not even ten years ago it was hard to say Durham really had a skyline, but when I was there about a week and a half ago the view coming in from the south on 147 is, well...maybe imposing isn't the right word, but it felt like I was driving into a legit city.

I agree! Maybe it's the proximity of the new mid-rise buildings going up to the highway, but when approaching on 147 now I feel like we're at the point where someone who is unfamiliar with the city who is driving in must think "oh, that must be downtown".

Just wait until the Food World project starts coming up. We will have 10 story commercial on that side too. It will be a very nice entrance into DT.

I always forget just how close that is to downtown, despite driving by it 5 days a week for over a year at one point.  147 just really separates it physically and mentally from "downtown", but it's literally only a football field away from Bull House! Hopefully the two sides of 147 become better-connected in the future. I don't know if this means a pedestrian bridge, or a tunnel or what, but we need something.

Do you have any links to info on the development that is happening there? I searched it but could only find this TBJ article about it's sale in March for $12 million, but it's behind a paywall.

Edit: I found a Reddit post with some scuttlebutt that it might be mixed-use, but it seems like it's all speculation on the fact that it's zoned with the potential for mixed use up to 150 feet in height. Nothing conclusive, and the owners declined to comment at the time of sale/purchase.

Agreed - I would love to learn more about that project if anyone has any more/definitive info.

Also, I updated the map with the rumored/limited info watchlist items!

Dave @ Building Bull City wrote

Also, I updated the map with the rumored/limited info watchlist items!

Awesome! Where do you mostly catch news about new developments? Triangle Business Journal?

Mitch wrote

Awesome! Where do you mostly catch news about new developments? Triangle Business Journal?

TBJ and N&O usually. I have some alerts set up, but for the "verified" development projects, those typically end up being my sources.