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UNC-CH Carolina North Campus

orulz

By orulz
in The NC Triangle

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ChiefJoJo Town

ChiefJoJo

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Man, it seems everytime I read the paper about CN, UNC and town leaders are disagreeing over the campus plan. This time it's over how much housing will be built on the campus. I definitely understand the towns' position--they don't want to see traffic degenerate to the point it takes away from the liveability of the communities of Chapel Hill and Carrboro (which is very good at the moment). The idea being, if you provide housing where people work on campus, they won't have to commute via car or bus, a la NCSU's Centennial Campus. UNC would be wise to learn from NC State's mistakes when planning CN in my view. Make it mixed use and walkable please!

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plus2 Whistle-Stop

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The university's mindset in that article is ludicrous. They think there isn't a lot of demand for urban living in Chapel Hill? They think they would have trouble attracting enough residents?

The demand for urban living is huge right now, and I bet even higher in Chapel Hill. Also, there is nowhere near enough units in Chapel Hill to meet demand. If the Carolina North units are reasonably priced they will sell like hotcakes!

I would build as much residential as possible. It is a guaranteed sell and would reduce the need for car travel and dreaded parking spaces.

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orulz City

orulz

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If it's built over 50 years, then the first building should sit right at the NW corner of Estes & MLK, rather than on some grassy hillside, isolated in the middle of nowhere. UNC North needs to connect well to the outside world from the outset, and that intersection is the logical place to start. Build the campus inwards from there, rather than putting the densest area in the center and falling off to nothing at the edge like an academic Meadowmont. Sure, Estes & MLK isn't a very walkable neighborhood right now, but the idea is to make it into one. Plenty of room for private, commercial development to spread outwards from there, not to mention a very logical transit connection to downtown CH and main campus to boot. (Buses down MLK! Can't beat that for simplicity.)

UNC could also redevelop some (or, eventually, all) of their facilities complex at the SW corner of the same intersection.

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ChiefJoJo Town

ChiefJoJo

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N&O article on CN: committee report is released:

[Chapel Hill Mayor Ken] Broun was about to deliver, to UNC-Chapel Hill Chancellor James Moeser, a nine-page report developed over the past 10 months by the Carolina North Leadership Advisory Committee, which Broun moderated.

Under Broun's leadership, the panel reached consensus on the idea that Carolina North should be a model of sustainable design. On some details of this vision -- housing units and parking spaces being two of them -- the members could not agree.

The agreement on sustainable design as a guiding principle is a tremendous achievement. I sincerely hope it translates to the implementation of the campus.

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ChiefJoJo Town

ChiefJoJo

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UNC to hold public meetings on CN:

The university will host two sessions March 27. The first session will be at 3:30 p.m. in Room 2603, School of Government, Knapp-Sanders Building. The presentation will be repeated at 5:30 p.m. Parking is available in the N.C. 54 lot and Rams Head Deck. The School of Government parking deck is available only for the 5:30 p.m. meeting.

Campus Website

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ChiefJoJo Town

ChiefJoJo

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Plan 1 (Center): One potential site design for Carolina North would cluster development around transit stops.

20070327_center.jpg

Plan 2 (Grid): One potential site design for Carolina North focus development near existing roads, Estes Drive and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard.

20070327_grid.jpg

Plan 3 (Interwoven): One potential site design for Carolina North would orient the development north and south to preserve the Bolin Creek watershed.

20070327_interwo.jpg

I've always liked the idea of a future transit line extending from Carrboro to the CN campus via the rail corridor there. I doubt it's feasible, but how cool it would/could be to extend the Phase II 15-501/54 TTA corridor from Meadowmont down 54 to Roger Perry's East 54 project, then down the bypass, up Manning Drive to UNC Hospital, and (here's the problem-->) somehow connecting through McCauley St thru to the power plant and the rail corridor and on up to CN.

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orulz City

orulz

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^I've heard of a couple ideas to address the issue of extending the 15/501 transit corridor to Carolina North. One called for on-street running on S Columbia & W Cameron, and then using the railroad right-of-way from there. This would to go to Carolina North by way of Carrboro. The second option calls for on-street running up Columbia & MLK straight to Carolina North. This goes through the center of downtown Chapel Hill and allows for urbanization and densification along the MLK corridor. The alternatives are not mutually exclusive, and could be compatible with any of the three conceptual Carolina North plans.

Both options preclude FRA-compliant DMUs (they don't do so great on-street) so we will probably see either BRT, diesel LRT (NJT's RiverLINE), or electric LRT instead.

Using the old railroad right-of-way parallel to Cameron & McCauley is pretty much not likely. First, there would be a huge amount of neighborhood opposition (this is a historic neighborhood - nevermind that historically, there used to be a railroad there!). Second, UNC spent quite a bit of money several years ago to locate some steam pipes from their co-generation plant in that right of way. Finding another right-of-way, and relocating the pipes to it would be prohibitively expensive.

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orulz City

orulz

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The centers plan has the potential to be well-done. However, the devil is in the details, and the public seems to be praising exactly the WORST aspects of the plan, and knocking the BEST aspects of the other plans.

Having the campus as a pedestrian-friendly island in a sea of parking (lots or decks) around the perimiter would be terrible. The most wonderful thing about the UNC main campus is, in my mind, not the bell tower, the architecture, the Pit, or even its tree-filled quads. It's how well the campus relates to the town. If you surround Carolina North with parking, it becomes no better than Centennial Campus, Meadowmont, Southern Village, or even Southpoint. Nice environment inside, but completely unintegrated with its context.

The comment that some members of the public are worried about a grid causing congestion are ridiculous. Do they think "Grid = New York = Congestion"? Uh-huh, Riight.

I say that the densest part of the campus needs to be located along both existing roadways AND the future transit line. I still say everything should be clustered around the intersection of Estes & MLK, and build inwards from there. The "grid" plan most closely fits that description.

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DanRNC Burg

DanRNC

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The UNC Hospitals are in the process of a $350 million expansion. I know a new tower (in addition to the NC Cancer Hospital) will be built in front of the original building but there is talk that additional facilities will be placed at CN.

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