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Official Wake Campus Development Thread

Mixed use developments have to have location going for them at a minimum in order to work. Here in DFW, they usually put them close to a rail line, but that honestly doesn't mean shit other than checking a box during the sales pitch. I think in this case, the location is good enough to work with. It's all the other stuff that has to follow. You have to put restaurants below that people will give a shit about and eat at. And while you don't have to put a bar below the apartments, there has to be a good bar or two in the area. Without these things, it will not be an attractive place to live. We have like 4 of the damn things in my little suburb. One of them attracts people.

Who is going to live in those apartments? My guess is a few students whose parents are of means, maybe a few well-heeled donors who then have a place to stay in town, maybe some Pepsi employees? I don't know WTF is even around there anymore.

I would absolutely love to see something blossom there, but I'm always skeptical of the mixed-use sales pitch. At least SOMETHING is being discussed though, and this is one of those cases where something is better than nothing.
 
EatLeadCommie said:
Mixed use developments have to have location going for them at a minimum in order to work. Here in DFW, they usually put them close to a rail line, but that honestly doesn't mean shit other than checking a box during the sales pitch. I think in this case, the location is good enough to work with. It's all the other stuff that has to follow. You have to put restaurants below that people will give a shit about and eat at. And while you don't have to put a bar below the apartments, there has to be a good bar or two in the area. Without these things, it will not be an attractive place to live. We have like 4 of the damn things in my little suburb. One of them attracts people.

Who is going to live in those apartments? My guess is a few students whose parents are of means, maybe a few well-heeled donors who then have a place to stay in town, maybe some Pepsi employees? I don't know WTF is even around there anymore.

I would absolutely love to see something blossom there, but I'm always skeptical of the mixed-use sales pitch. At least SOMETHING is being discussed though, and this is one of those cases where something is better than nothing.
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Yeah, that doesn't sound like enough people to support a whole lot of retail five nights a week.
 
Biff Ochocinco Tannen said:
Yeah, that doesn't sound like enough people to support a whole lot of retail five nights a week.
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It’s honestly would be better if they just built a big park there with decent facilities. Make it a place that gives families a reason to go there for something other that sports events. It’s too big of a leap to develop that area from being desolate 300 days of the year to a place where people want to live. Just clean it up, make it a community resource, and build from there.
 
I want to know where people are supposed to park and tailgate for football games.
 
If you could pedestrianize the area between campus and the stadiums, you could see a lot of foot traffic to a mixed use type space

Hide your keys
 
TownieDeac said:
If you could pedestrianize the area between campus and the stadiums, you could see a lot of foot traffic to a mixed use type space

Hide your keys
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Yeah, it would go a long way if wake made the sidewalk along University twice as wide and installed a proper crosswalk with stoplight to crossover to Baity Street
 
Long overdue. That area has been a wasteland for way too long and it's not helping the game day experience. I don't get back to town much but it seems like the whole corridor along Univ Pkwy between downtown and campus has been in a slow-motion decline for thirty years. No more Carreta, no more IHOP, no more Ziggy's. . . . 90s Deacs weep.
 
inspectah said:
Long overdue. That area has been a wasteland for way too long and it's not helping the game day experience. I don't get back to town much but it seems like the whole corridor along Univ Pkwy between downtown and campus has been in a slow-motion decline for thirty years. No more Carreta, no more IHOP, no more Ziggy's. . . . 90s Deacs weep.
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Problem is that Wake isn’t really doing anything to address University far as I know, just Baity Street. For some reason Wake hasn’t made any effort to extend campus in that direction, which is fine, but I don’t think they are going to be successful trying to develop a little mixed use outpost in an area of blight.
 
do students venture out much these days? or are they all still eating on campus? seems like some quick service restaurants like a Chipotle, Cava, whatever might appeal.
 
BarcaDeac said:
do students venture out much these days? or are they all still eating on campus? seems like some quick service restaurants like a Chipotle, Cava, whatever might appeal.
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Little bit of both. There are a ton of shuttles running around now with classes downtown, so things are more easily accessible.
 
bym051d said:
Ziggy's moved to HP. No idea how well they're doing there.

We could hear occassional concerts from HPC baseball games.
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Last I heard it was largely defunct. The Ziggy’s owner couldn’t get it worked out with the COHAB space landlord and so they aren’t doing a full concert slate anymore. I think he’s going to try to do some isolated live music events, but not sure where.
 
Here's an aerial view of the area from Google.

I'm skeptical about the redevelopment potential of the area. The Wake campus is about 1 mile away (depending on where you start and end) and is separated from the site by a 4 lane road. It's just too far and that's one big reason that the area has never been redeveloped. It works pretty well as a satellite sports campus but that doesn't seem to be enough to spark the surrounding area to life. There are almost no other people living in the immediate area.

The current small shopping center (College Plaza) on University across from the Joel consists of a couple downscale eateries-Elizabeth's Pizza and Jimmy the Greek's, a dollar store, a second-hand clothing store, a pawn shop, a tobacco/vaping shop, a rent-to-own appliance store and a discount mobile phone store. That lineup tells you everything you need to know about the retail environment of the area.

I wonder how much money Wake plans to sink into this. Wake has put a lot of $ into the downtown redevelopment and that has succeeded to some extent but there are many empty spaces in the buildings that were supposed to attract tech/research companies. Also the downtown redevelopment project benefitted from a lot of historic preservation tax benefits for all the old Reynolds Tobacco buildings.

deacon Blvd.jpg
 
For all the jokes about a monorail over the years, a monorail, tram, or some other efficient every 5-10 minute transportation is necessary to turn that space into more than a satellite campus. Without that, it's another failed project.
 
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