I guess there is still some fall season time left before officially declaring it winter, no? Anyway, a cold walk around downtown this weekend led me to visit some new places to add to my long list of eats to try.
Dickey’s Barbecue Pit has now opened on Davie Street in the Progress Energy building. Immediately, some want to turn this into a rivalry with Cooper’s right down the street but calm down, and at least give them a try.
Dickey’s is open until 9pm each weekday, giving downtown residents a dinner option, and they are open on Sundays. I can definitely support those kind of hours. (before scaling back in the future but hopefully not) I’ll try them once but fully expect Dickey’s to be different then other NC barbecue joints.
ZPizza is now open in the space facing City Plaza in the Bank of America building.
The Depot has two new tenants that kind of came in under the radar. Blue Tuscan Cuisine, an Italian restaurant is now open down from Jibarra and initial internet chatter is positive.
Also, at the end of The Depot near Cabarrus Street is The Union, a beer bar infused with a club. The chalkboard with the beer list was solid but I have heard nothing about them. Has anyone been down to The Union?
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Leo, there’s also a new Italian restaurant at The Depot called “Blue” that just opened. My wife and I had lunch their today and met the Owner, Maurizio and his wife Patricia. Maurizio was the former long time chef at Cafe Luna, and has now struck out on his own. We tried their Lasagna, his mother’s recipe, and it was fabulous. I highly recommend your readers give it a try.
I dragged Nick and Andrew out to The Union on Friday night for no other reason than I liked their twitter bio/description (We aren’t Miami, we aren’t New York. We’re Raleigh Mother F’n NC). There was nothing really uniquely Raleigh about it, but the bartender was friendly and the three of us enjoyed our round of drinks. It was Friday night around 11/12 and there were only a handful of other folks there. I think it might serve better as a true bar/tavern rather than having so much space for dance floor, etc., but it is in The Depot, and I guess they’re trying to appeal to a booty-shakin’ consumer…. which is just fine.
Is “Blue” in the old Ess Lounge space?
[…] Blue Tuscan is open in the Depot – along with the Union […]
Hackles, Blue is tucked in between Jibarra and The Union. Nothing is in the Ess space yet. I believe I saw a real estate sign out front on Friday night.
Anyone know what is going on with the property/development across the street from the Marriott?
This developer needs to go, have not heard one update in years (sorry, do not want to hear about the economy, travel across the country, I see downtown development in a number of cities).
Empire and this developer need to go, bring in new blood for downtown Raleigh
Thomas –
You want to bring in some new blood and do away with the local developers who have brought businesses and residents to downtown Raleigh? The only developments going on right now are being built by large national/international conglomerates who won’t give a damn about contributing to downtown Raleigh, only about their own bottom line. Downtown Raleigh is the place it is today because Empire, White Oak Properties, etc. took a huge risk and an assessment of what works and brought it to downtown on their own backs. You should be thankful that we are a grassroots downtown. That’s what gives Raleigh it’s character. What is needed to get these projects off the ground are large office tenants? Can you bring one of those to downtown Raleigh? If so, please do. If not, sorry, but you’re going to have to keep hearing about the economy.
Thomas says just about the same things in his posts. He seems to forget how lucky we are to have the development we have right now.
Oh, and try using personal pronouns more too.
Dickey’s BBQ wasn’t exactly a let-down for me, but I would rather go to The Pit. The latter has better prices for what you get, IMO.
Thomas, I understand where you are coming from, and I am equally upset that several nice projects have been stalled. I am not sure I will contribute much, but there is one thing both city and county governments can do to help these projects take off: Relocations. Get medium and large companies to relocate to DT Raleigh and you will see how quickly some of these projects will take off.
As others pointed, we should be happy for what we get right now: NC SECU Bldg, new Justice Center and Green Square. These three projects can do a lot for our downtown. If we are lucky and Red Hat executives see the light, we may even be able to convince them to bring their additional 300,000sf of space and even relocate their current HQ to downtown. Incentives will be an important factor, IMO.
As for Charter Square (the project envisioned for the parcel across from Marriott Hotel), it will be tough to get off the ground these days. To me, it is an underwhelming project and I wish it was a much bigger proposal, but even so it is going to contribute to our downtown’s revitalization effort in many ways. Sure, it is amazing that 3-4 developers working together cannot get this project off the ground, but the economy is bad and the market just isn’t there yet. I’d rather wait another year than looking at an empty building for the years to come.
@Thomas:
If the economy supported it, there would be a building there.
Well,
A developer BETTER step up and build a REAL tower downtown or Red Hat will be gone. So what is the excuse of this developer with the potential for a major tenant (again, don’t talk to me about economy, I just got back from three cities this week, cranes in each downtown)
Thomas, have you not seen the cranes for the Justice Center? Or Green Square? We have cranes in our downtown as well. Get off it. Are you really this oblivious? Both to the state of our economy and the development we still have managed to keep?
The economy the economy the economy.
Anyway, whether Red Hat stays or goes probably depends more on government incentives than a local developer’s ability to deliver a building.
A developer would gladly build a building if Red Hat (or any other major tenant) agreed to a lease. That’s the main issue with stalled projects like the Edison and Charter Square. No one can afford to build (much less design from scratch) a large building downtown until they have buyers/lease holders lined up. Build it and they will come doesn’t work right now.
Red Hat’s case involves more factors than the average “relocation”. State and local government incentives, as well as a developer who can offer a decent lease, as great, but the board of advisors and other stakeholders keep pushing for Silicon Valley, or so we heard. Here is the problem for Red Hat: salaries will have to increase up to 50% in order to maintain a Silicon Valley presence and perform well as a company. Besides, we haven’t heard of any incentives to Red Hat offered from Silicon Valley. Atlanta and Austin have done so, along with Boston, but the first two are the biggest competitor when it comes to cost of living adjustments, as they are close to our numbers.
Regarding speculative space, only NC SECU’s building offers such, mainly because they can afford it. Who knows, in the future they may consolidate their services in that building. However, I think that Red Hat can wait for a building to be built, if it helps their bottom line. The developer that has the best chances is the one that can offer temporary space and then move Red Hat to a new tower, but until we hear something solid we should consider Red Hat as a possibility for relocation to another area. Personally, I advocate The Edison, or One Glenwood as the best choices for Red Hat.