What Does Cary Need to Do To Reach the Next Level as a City..er, Town?

[Jones_]

On 10/15/2019 at 10:04 PM, orulz said:

Kildaire Farm from here south to Cary Parkway would not be a bad spot for more high density mixed use like this.

In all, the town council has started to embrace the city that Cary has become and it's refreshing to see.

Hopefully Ya Liu's election (she was the most anti-development of the District D candidates) won't change the balance on council too much.

The Kildaire/Maynard intersection has an almost proper urban feel to it. I think its the Caribou. Regardless, this intersection seems like it could be tied into and up to Walnut with a few good builds in between the two. The food Lion shopping center is screaming redevelopment and the BB&T (94 Kildaire) has clearly shown how nicely it could be done. 

[DPK]

On 10/18/2019 at 8:28 PM, Jones_ said:

The food Lion shopping center is screaming redevelopment and the BB&T (94 Kildaire) has clearly shown how nicely it could be done. 

About half of that shopping center is getting torn down due to the Glenaire expansion.

[paytonc]

On 10/7/2019 at 12:34 PM, paytonc said:

One Walker will wrap the garage on the north, and One Walnut on the south. The park plan's map shows 5 buildings wrapping the garage, including the new library. One Walker is definitely the E-shaped one facing north, but I'm not sure yet which one One Walnut will be.

Some of the buildings have been combined, so One Walker is the one facing north and facing east (to Walker), including the corner of Walnut & Walker. One Walnut lines the garage on the south.

[KJHburg]

Here is a subscriber article from the Triangle Biz Journal about downtown Cary.

""Academy Park Cary -- a development team comprised of the Knier family, the Stephenson family and the Zahn family -- presented the project at a recent Town Council work session, with submitted plans calling for two mixed-use buildings abutting the recently opened Cary Regional Library and the adjoining parking deck.   The families have a history of development projects in the region, both individually and as a group.   This latest project would feature 153 multifamily units, approximately 34,000 square feet of ground-floor retail and a 102,000-square-foot Class A office building at the intersection of Walnut and Walker Streets. If approved, the town would sell the land around the library parking deck prior to development. ""

https://www.bizjournals.com/triangle/news/2019/11/04/latest-project-for-downtown-cary-calls-for-150.html

[orulz]

The town of Cary has done a great job of seeing the “larger picture” with the whole downtown park area, rather than just looking at it on a project-by-project basis or seeing it as an amenity for only the existing residents of the immediate neighborhood. It’s really coming together nicely, and I’m excited about what the “Academy Park” development can bring to the table. I hope the town can continue this encouraging trend.

On that note, I have sent the following suggested approach for the Old Library redevelopment to the Mayor and several staff at the Town of Cary for the old library:

1. Tear down the old library and, instead of issuing a RFP for that site, build a new community center in its place.
2. Close and demolish the Herbert C. Young community center at N. Academey St and Chapel Hill Road
3. Issue an RFP for redevelopment of the Herbert C. Young Community Center site, instead of the old library.

The Herbert C. Young community center is 30 years old – never renovated, small, and frankly tired. It’s 10 years newer than the old library, but like the old library near the end, one only has to step in the door to see that the Town has outgrown it – the facility is in need of a major renovation, expansion, or replacement pretty soon. The center also does not complement its downtown context well – it’s set way back from the street behind landscaping and berms, and faces its parking lot. That may have seemed like the right thing to do in 1989 – but in 2019, it just seems … off. Not representative of the Town’s vision for downtown.

Putting a large-scale mixed use development on the old library site on S Academy Street would also be difficult, in my estimation – perhaps entirely un feasible. There will probably be opposition to anything larger in scale to the Mayton Inn, and that’s a difficult scale to develop profitably, which will both restrict what can be done with the site and also the amount of revenue the town can realize from a transaction with a developer. Transportation is also an issue – the site is only accessible from South Academy street, which could easily become a bottleneck. It’s a quarter mile from the train station which is walking distance but it feels long-ish. The area is already becoming more active and popular and the Academy Park development will keep the momentum going, so doubling down with another commercial development on this site seems less necessary to me.

On the other hand, a new, larger, more modern community center would be a slam dunk on that site. It complements the cultural/recreational/arts district down by the park, and could be designed to blend in with its context easily. If retail is desired, a space for a cafe could be incorporated on the ground floor of the community center, like the BREW coffee bar attached to the Cary Theater.

In contrast with the Library site, a larger-scale mixed use developent at the corner of N. Academy St and Chapel Hill Road (Herbert C Young Community Center site) would be very feasible. Transportation is less of an issue there, with nearby major roads (Chapel Hill Road and North Harrison) providing direct access to/from the whole region, and it is about half as far from the train station where buses connect (eventually, commuter rail and BRT too). It will serve to ‘wake up’ a forgotten/neglected corner of Downtown Cary and expand what has become a burgeoning district on the south side of downtown.

[orulz]

The Old Library site is 2.28 acres and the Herbert C. Young community center sits on about 3.2 acres. When you think of this as a downtown project, this is actually quite a lot of land.

For some perspective, the Old Library site is the same size as the land that the 301 Hillsborough Street development in downtown Raleigh occupies. This development is proposed to have three towers roughly 20 stories tall, and a total of about 1 million square feet.

The Community Center site is the same size as the Nexus development also downtown, which will have four towers, also around 20 stories each, and about 1.5 million? square feet of total floor area.

Now, as much as I would like to see it happen, I don't think that something that size is quite feasible in Cary, unfortunately. But I do think something as big as maybe 10 or 12 stories could *possibly* happen on the Community Center site: current zoning for that site already allows buildings 90 feet tall (which could be a 9 story apartment building) and that number seems pretty arbitrary; town council is fairly pro-development at the moment and it might be possible to get some extra height. On the other hand, I doubt anything more than 3 or 4 stories would ever see the light of day at the Old Library site.

[rolly]

Here's some renders from the Academy Park Cary project. 
Looks like we can see up to 6 stories here.  Cary keeps stepping up their density...
 

[orulz]

Rumor has it that the town is pursuing tourism development dollars for a huge (250,000 square foot) indoor athletic facility somewhere near Fenton and Wake Med Soccer Park. Wake county seems very interested. Up to 12 basketball courts. Yowza.

The town's gymnasiums at its community centers are all small and outdated, but this is taking it to quite an extreme.

[po-boy]

Last year Wake County commissioned a 10-year strategic tourism plan and one of the big recommendations was an indoor multi sport facility. Specifically mentioned a 6-court minimum, but preferably 12-16 court facility with ability to seat 4,000-5,000 people. Would be used for basketball, volleyball, and wrestling tournaments. 

[rancenc]

Cary has been selected for the relocated headquarters of a community college association

https://www.wraltechwire.com/2019/11/20/national-community-college-entrepreneur-group-moving-hq-to-cary/

[KJHburg]

Downtown Cary and its new library and parking garage.  Today.   general photos of "downtown" Cary including the Amtrak station. 

[KJHburg]

Big step in the Cary Town Center redevelopment approved by the town.  With Fenton across the street this could be a major focus of retail and office development for Wake County.  From a subscriber article in the TBJ
https://www.bizjournals.com/triangle/news/2019/12/13/major-development-in-cary-takes-big-step-forward.html

"""A proposed mixed-use development in Cary took a big leap forward Thursday night after the Town Council approved the developer's rezoning request to turn 87 acres into a new urban hub.  New York-based real estate firm Turnbridge Equities and its development partner, Denali Properties, requested the town rezone the site of the Cary Towne Center to allow for an extensive redevelopment of the property with plans to transform the struggling shopping center. The rezoning allows for up to 1.2 million square feet of office use, 360,0000 square feet of commercial use, 450 hotel rooms and 1,800 multi-family and townhouse dwelling units. 

The companies' preliminary development plan submitted to the city divvies up the property into 19 blocks with varying uses, with commercial blocks on the northwest side, nearest to the city, and residential blocks to the southeast, closer to residential neighborhoods.  Blocks in the middle would have flexible uses depending on tenant demand and would also feature public spaces and parks.  The commercial blocks would allow developers to build up to 12 stories. Residential blocks would allow for up to six.  Plans also call for the planting of 1,100 canopy trees and a reduction of the total impervious surfaces on the property — as the shopping mall currently features acres of surface parking or retail space."""

[nicholas]

On 6/30/2019 at 10:45 PM, nicholas said:

A few recent pics.  Think you're right about it being Chatham Walk, this'll be huge for downtown Cary.

Five and a half months later....

(The construction crew only seems to consist of two men)

[rancenc]

Town Council approves 51 million development in downtown Cary

https://www.newsobserver.com/article238370258.html

 

[KJHburg]

CEO of Epic Games Tim Sweeney of Cary named Tar Heel of the Year by the News and Observer.  In the article he talks about how Epic Games ended up in this area.

https://www.newsobserver.com/news/business/article238221784.html

It wasn’t until 1999 that Epic made it to the Triangle, as a small group of game developers who had just finished working on a project in the suburbs of Toronto. First they moved to Raleigh, then to Cary in 2005, where they built their office off Crossroads Boulevard.

The team had looked around the country for a landing spot, before eventually settling on the Triangle because of its cost of living. You could buy a house here on a game developer’s salary, rather than be stuck in a one-bedroom apartment in California, Sweeney told the website Gamasutra in 2009. It was an added bonus that you could easily make a drive to either the mountains or ocean, an important factor for nature-loving Sweeney.

By choosing Cary — at that point a backwater in the gaming industry — Epic found another benefit. It allowed the company to escape what Sweeney described to The Wall Street Journal as a “groupthink” among gaming companies in California, where the vast majority of developers are located.

Read more here: https://www.newsobserver.com/news/business/article238221784.html#storylink=cpy

 

[nicholas]

[Brendan]

I'm very confused.  I've been following the redevelopment of Cary Towne Center for years.  Up until December 2019, everything was in place for the site to be redeveloped as a huge mixed use complex with an impressive mix of high rise office buildings, hotel, apartments,  and retail.  

https://www.townofcary.org/projects-initiatives/cary-community-plan/eastern-cary-gateway/cary-towne-center-redevelopment

Then oddly we see today that the site could be the site for a $193 million indoor sports complex.  What?!  

https://www.newsobserver.com/news/local/counties/wake-county/article240188142.html  (Wait.  Not starting construction in 4 years?  You've got to be kidding.)

https://www.wral.com/latest-proposal-could-be-huge-boost-for-cary-towne-center/18949728/  (This story completely skipped over the 2019 redevelopment plan, going from IKEA to this.)

What the hell happened to the mixed use complex?  Did the owners sell the property back to the town?  

I have always wanted to Cary to do something big here and a sports complex just ain't it.   This site is prime real estate for something much better.   Does Cary have any vision? 

Fenton is already clearing land for a large, mixed use development right next door.   I just don't see a majority of Cary residents ever using this venue.  

Giving up on Cary ever thinking big.

Edited February 13, 2020 by Brendan
typo

[KJHburg]

something like this sports center could be an anchor for the CTC site.  Fenton is going to be fantastic across the street and might attract the office tenants.  I think there is room for both a mixed use and this sports center on the mall site. 

[Brendan]

Maybe the sports complex is just part of the mixed-use plan, but it's never been mentioned before.  

[Brendan]

I heard back from Doug McRainey, the Director of Cary's P&R and he said that the indoor sports complex will be part of the redevelopment and NOT the entire redevelopment.   Local media really weren't clear at all.  What a surprise.

 

[po-boy]

Wake County Commissioners approved the sports complex. Raleigh City Council still has to approve it as well. That vote is tomorrow. 

https://abc11.com/community-events/funding-approved-for-$193m-cary-sports-complex-/5940148/

[KJHburg]

Here is the Business Journal article about the new sports complex.  I think this could jump start the redevelopment as this will attract people for games and events and generate demand for hotels and restaurants.   Fenton across the street is strong competition for this project and this mall site needs to be different but complementary in its draw.

https://www.bizjournals.com/triangle/news/2020/02/18/carys-193-million-sports-complex-wins-support-from.html

[KJHburg]

here is an article about the state of Cary from the mayor now the "town" is up 171,000 people with high incomes and very educated.  There is an update on major projects in the town.

https://carycitizen.com/2020/01/23/mayor-weinbrechts-13th-annual-state-of-cary-address/

[paytonc]

On 2/13/2020 at 1:39 PM, Brendan said:

What the hell happened to the mixed use complex?  Did the owners sell the property back to the town?  

Look closer at the background of the rendering. The building shown is on a five acre site, a bit bigger than the existing gas station/car wash (at Maynard & Walnut).

The other 80+ acres of Cary Towne Center are behind it. The 2-story building behind and to the left is the existing Belk, which may remain. Behind that are taller buildings on what are currently parking lots and the existing mall area.

[rancenc]

Cary continues to attract development.  This proposal is for a medical oriented campus.

https://www.bizjournals.com/triangle/news/2020/02/25/buyer-picks-cary-site-for-health-care-facility.html?iana=hpmvp_trig_news_headline