by Leo Suarez

Site Plans Show 10-Story Building for Gateway Center

The end of Kindley Street, 3D view from Google.

The end of Kindley Street, 3D view from Google. Click to see on Google Maps.

Back in the summer of 2016, we took a look at the Gateway Center, the area along Salisbury Street near the performing arts center and Raleigh Convention Center.

I’m guessing few of us have had any real interactions with this property as it used to be a fenced in building owned by Duke Energy. The property has since been sold to Exploris and now submitted site plans show us of what could come to the area.

SR-099-16, called Gateway Southeast AKA Exploris School, shows a 10-story building consisting of parking, office space, and the consolidated K-8 charter school. The property doesn’t consist of the entire Gateway Center, just the portion across the Norfolk-Southern railroad tracks. (highlighted in orange in the map below)

Here is the site plan. The first is a screenshot from the plan, the second is the same thing but turned so that North points up. (approximately anyway)

Site plan for Exploris Charter School

Site plan for Exploris Charter School

As you can see from the plan, all the parking, offices, and school are contained inside the building. There will be a large courtyard and sidewalks around the building. The northern end of the “campus” will also retain some of the existing field as well as turn the old Duke Energy building into a lawn, perhaps for outdoor activities.

Development fans may find hope that in the future, there is room for more buildings here. Exploris has a track record of supporting innovative ideas and initiatives and their expansion to grades K-8 now may not be the end so you never know what long-term plans might come at the Gateway Center.

This is a good 2017 project to watch rise up and hopefully it applies a little pressure for the suburban-style campuses on the other side of the tracks to go urban in the coming years.

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20 Comments

  1. This makes considerably more sense than trying to wedge a sports arena on the property (as shown in one version of the Downtown Plan).

  2. I’m disappointed that this isn’t going to be the proposed site for the downtown stadium, as suggested by the downtown plan. A 10-story school seems underwhelming, to say the least.

  4. In my dream of dreams, it would have been perfect to have combined both the north and south gateway into one property. At that point, you could have soccer and other entertainment venues, parking as well as office space & hotels. You could even do a train track with two levels, one for going directly under the property and the second allowing for access into the property itself… but only in my wildest dreams of course…lol

    Great job as always Leo! Thank you!

  5. @Robert. It’s good, I think, to have dreams larger than reality because dreams serve to expand our reality. Perhaps one day soon an MLS stadium in downtown Raleigh will be realized.

  6. Just a bit of FYI I want to share. I was reading a article in the North Raleigh times paper, about John Kane looking to build a 30 story tower in North Hills. As well as expanding as far as wake forest road. pretty interesting. it seems that North Hills as well as North Raleigh in general is set to be a destination for Raleigh as a whole. Now just bring abit of that momentum Downtown and we got it made. Hey Charlotte, keep an eye out for Raleigh, we’re catching up.

  7. Some day in the way future I could see North Hills and downtown “connected” with taller buildings going from Wake Forest road, to Atlantic Avenue and then Capital Blvd.

  8. We’re already seeing and have seen a lot of development on the Beltline from Lake Boone over to Capital. With the exception of North Hills, these developments are not very tall.

  9. Big fan of thinking “big” and impossible. I do it all the time as a way to cope with all the things that let me down. Keep doing it ya’ll….I enjoy seeing other folks imaginations can come up with. Having said that, William, your idea I think was toast when the Capital Blvd bridge projects were reduced back to the same freeway style bridges they are now. Capital/Wake Forest or Capital/Six Forks(extended to Capital) are the only realistic options for a continuous high density urban fabric. Those rich folks on their large lots in the NW ITB are not giving up their homes for a good 500 years. Anyway…
    I head someone lament (on here I think) that Raleigh will end up with or currently has “multiple downtowns”. I’d like to just say, that since our downtown is physically very small, that getting a couple more “downtowns” is our next best option. But rather, I like to call them “neighborhoods”. A good city has lots of neighborhood nodes. Downtown is just one of those. If they don’t connect with dense strands between them, thats not a huge problem, as long as transit keeps up and allows free movement back and forth between them. Anyway, if MLS ends up in another neighborhood (if we get a franchise), I think all will be well. Downtown Raleigh is growing fast without big time sports being located there…we shouldn’t lose sight of that…

  10. Sounds like a fantastic plan for an inventive organization – MUCH better than a taxpayer-losing stadium or sports arena.

  11. Why does everyone want to build a sports stadium downtown, when the Triangle already has plenty!?!? There are much better uses for downtown land than a stadium that will sit empty most of the year.

  12. I would like to point out that the proposed MLS stadium will be PRIVATELY funded by the owner Steve Malik. Let’s stop saying this will be taxpayer funded and a waste of public money. Please and thank you ?

  13. He says it will be privately funded now, but that doesn’t mean he won’t ask and they city won’t give him money. He has also said he wants the city to pay for infrastructure upgrades surrounding the stadium, so taxpayer money will be going to help a multimillionaire build his soccer stadium instead of towards the homeless.

  14. Brad, Steve Malik is submitting the official bid for the MLS in January. In the bid, he has to explain how the stadium will be funded. He has stated that he will fund the $150 million stadium. So, while you may speculate that Malik will go back on his word, there will be official documentation that will say otherwise.

    I, like most people on this blog, support public funds to improve our city’s infrastructure. Some people just like to complain…

  16. Because they are Homeless,they need resources and support so that they don’t become homeless again. AKA compassion and care. That is where my tax dollars goes not to posh north hills.

  18. Please, the homeless, I lived in Seattle for 8 years, volunteered at shelter, paid out the rear for everything and we spent a gazzilion dollars on the “The Homeless”, all we did was increase homelessness because it was a pretty good deal. It is out of control with urine, crap, dope and crime.

    There is true homeless (families in hard times, mental issues and such and all for helping them to get back on feet).

    In Seattle we found that 99 percent are professional homeless, its just what they do and its not what you want to promote. I speak from first hand experience of being involved, we could never get a grip on it, I ended up leaving after 8 years of efforts.

    Wish I would have spent it on teaching disadvantaged kids how to code instead.

    Anyway, such is life.

  19. Al, I think “Homeless” was just being used as a crude analogy concerning supporting professional sports franchises…
    Not a good analogy at all….among other things, homeless sports teams don’t commit crimes…don’t cost even more in jail than to simply address [most] of the root causes of being homeless, etc.

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