DT Raleigh Chatter for February First Friday 2012
Filling Empty Spaces The BEST Way Possible
The Hue storefront on January 29th
A fun scavenger-hunt style post series I have are a few that talk about empty storefronts in downtown that should be filled with businesses. The latest was written back in May 2011 and I don’t think it’s been long enough for an update. Click on the link to visit that conversation and previous years:
- 2011 Top Places of Empty Spaces, Filling Retail Space In Downtown (May 25th, 2011)
There’s a new twist on the space filling front in downtown Raleigh and it’ll be unveiled during February’s First Friday, coming up on the 3rd. Beautifying Emerging Spaces Together, or BEST, has been meeting up for the past few months and they are ready to show off their first installment.
But before I get into that, I need explain what BEST is exactly. From a post on the Raleigh DLA blog, Donna Belt writes:
Two months later, I’m ready to introduce BEST, a team of Downtown Raleigh residents, business leaders and artists who have come together with the mission of BEAUTIFYING EMERGING SPACES TOGETHER. Our vision has morphed and grown according to the imagination and individual skills of each person who has joined our table, often over coffee at the Wilmoore Cafe.
With these empty spaces creating gaps around our downtown the question arises about what can be done while we wait for the businesses to invest in them?
In my mind, an empty space adds nothing to the sidewalk experience. It’s not interactive. There’s no reason to stop and stay awhile. People just pass on by and ignore it. Rather than wait for a shop or restaurant to come, why not activate the spaces until that business sets up one day?
The BEST team is putting that together and property owners are at the table with artists, residents, and business leaders. The idea is for the team to work within the current bounds, be it financial, legal, etc., and try to do something, anything that is allowed in the space. Art installations may be first but down the road, who knows.
The main point, and one of the big reasons why I’m into this project, is that it is a community driven project. Some readers may be aware of last year’s Mordecai Barbershop Art Gallery installation, a collaboration project between citizens of the Mordecai neighborhood and the property owner. A face lift was given to an empty space on Person Street made possible entirely on volunteers from the community. This is a grassroots example of taking pride in where we live and doing something to enhance the places we go by all the time.
I wish the BEST of luck to the team and look forward to the growth of the project.
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Read about BEST on the project website, RaleighEmergingSpaces.com
Follow BEST Raleigh on Facebook. |
Patting Myself On The Back Day, 5 Years of RalCon
Five years and going strong.
Looking Back at 2011 Article in the Raleigh Downtowner
I contributed to the latest edition of the Raleigh Downtowner Magazine with an article that looks back at our city’s progress in 2011. Many of the items that I go through are happening in downtown and have been mentioned on this blog before.
Pick up a copy and check it out or read it online.
Looking Back at 2011 – via Raleigh Downtowner
DT Raleigh Chatter for January 27th, 2012
Pic of the Week
The Walk Raleigh project is brought to you by the good folks at CityFabric. Their latest tweet is interesting, with an equivalent Facebook post mentioning more permanent signs.
New Talks of Salisbury Street Hotel, Wants Inn On The Convention Center Action
Hotel space seems to be a lacking resource for downtown Raleigh but reading through the city’s Budget and Economic Development (BED) Committee agenda yesterday shows more rooms may be on the horizon. Longtime readers will remember The Lafayette project proposed for what is called “Site 4″, the parcel of land along Salisbury Street that butts up against the Performing Arts Deck. That project is officially out the door and the city is ready for new blood to come into town.
Looking through the agenda, City Manager Russell Allen sent a letter to the BED committee to suggest they consider Request For Proposals (RFP) of the site. He mentions multiple requests have come in from interested parties. He includes a copy of one such letter of interest, copied again by me and pasted below:
October 27, 2011
Mr. J Russell Allen
City Manager
City of Raleigh
P.O. Box 590
Raleigh, NC 27602Dear Mr Allen:
Summit Hospitality Group, Ltd. would like to engage with the City of Raleigh in the appropriate process to acquire the three parcels of city property on South Salisbury Street at its intersection with Lenoir and South Streets. I believe this is generally referred to by the city as their “Site 4″.
The intent for the property would be the development of an upscale mixed use property, the largest tenant being a MArriott extended stay hotel. The hotel would be similar in scope and scale to a similar property located on Mint Street in Charlotte, NC. For purposes of illustration, I have enclosed photos simulating the hotel situation on the Raleigh site as well as photos of the Charlotte hotel.
We have a verbal approval for a Residence Inn by Marriott franchise and tentative financing from local conventional sources contingent on the strength of a market study by a nationally recognized form. As soon as we could enter into a Letter of Intent or Memorandum of Understanding with the city, we are poised to immediately contract for the market study and begin the design phase for the presentation to the city.
Regards,
R. Doyle Parrish
President
The attached pictures are shown in this blog post. Here’s a Google Streetview link to the hotel in Charlotte. I’ll emphasize that the pictures here are not final and no designs exist at all. This is just a model, made up for visualization.
The Raleigh Convention Center needs more of this in order to host some of the much larger conventions that it can handle but are not getting because of lack of hotel rooms. Skyline fans may be disappointed as a building of this scale is nothing to cheer about.
For me, it’s a great project really. The building should make a great compliment to the Performing Arts deck, helping make use of the extreme oversupply of parking that we have in downtown Raleigh. Also, while not unique in character, the urban form is a fine addition to the sidewalks of Salisbury Street. If you take our Marriott hotel on Fayetteville Street for example, the street trees, tables, and chairs are inviting. I see people sitting and relaxing there on many occasions.
The location of this hotel is also primo. It’s easy to get in and out of downtown by car and visitors can experience the Fayetteville Street/City Plaza area with much ease.
We’ll stay tuned for updates.
Participate In The EV Station Mapping Project, Make Volts and Leafs Happy
Electric vehicles (EV) are SO hot right now and believe it or not, Raleigh is making room for what could be the future technology of personal automobiles. While I do not own an EV, not yet anyway, I’ve taken a great interest in this alternative form of “car fuel” and have been watching the city and private businesses cater to these new cars. If you’ve been reading the blog for a bit, you may remember my attempts at mapping all the charging stations. Today, I want to introduce the next step of this project and this time, readers can participate.
The EV mapping project gets it’s own page. (ev.dtraleigh.com) This new site attempts to be the one stop for gathering information about places to charge up in and around Raleigh. You can use this site to do a couple of things:
- See a map of all known public charging stations.
- Seen a station around town? Contribute the information to the ongoing discussion.
- Download an up-to-date inventory of the stations that have been found.
The point of this project is to open it up to the community. I’ve started it with a core list of stations and for it to be really complete, I need readers to participate by adding information. If you’ve spotted a way for EV’s to charge up in Raleigh, add it to the thread and that information will work its way to the map and spreadsheet.
To keep the added information correct, you can also up-vote and down-vote others’ contributions. Accurate information should be up-voted in order to show that you agree with it. This is a crowdsourcing tool so any little bit of information helps.
Slowly throughout the year, the EV Mapping page will change and be upgraded, hopefully looking better and consist of much more data. I also have a very beta Android app built that I’m not ready to release with this information in it. The idea is to help EV drivers find stations and plan their days around them.
Enjoy!
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