Category / New Construction

by Leo Suarez

A Cranetastic Year for Downtown Raleigh

An easy thing to notice from following developments, not being in the industry by the way, is that a lot of planning goes into all these things. It’s probably an underappreciated aspect of building larger structures but of course it is; there’s a lot going on behind the scenes. When it all starts to come together and construction starts, that’s when it feels real.

In just a few short weeks, new tower cranes have popped up in downtown. We’re still building stuff and that’s great for downtown’s vitality and future. Investments continue and that’s a sign for optimism for downtown Raleigh. Let’s recap the things we can actually see being built right now.

Hilton Garden Inn/Homewood Suites

Shown in the foreground of the above photo, a new hotel is coming to the corner of McDowell and Davie Streets. The building will have two brands which include a Hilton Garden Inn and Homewood Suites. That’s 259 additional rooms within walking distance to Fayetteville Street, the Raleigh Convention Center, and the Warehouse District.

The Hampton Inn on Glenwood is Hilton’s first presence into downtown Raleigh so this would make it their second offering. I imagine a variety of brands is great to see. Plus, another rooftop bar option isn’t bad either.

400 Hillsborough

400H for short, the tower crane at 400 Hillsborough was met with lots of excitement on the Community when it went up around Thanksgiving 2021. 400H is a true, mixed-use project with office, retail, and 242 apartments in a 20-story building.

For new office space to be built, I just can’t emphasize enough the optimism for downtown Raleigh here. Not everyone is working from home all the time and I believe innovation and creativity takes place more easily in-person.

The residential portion makes sense to me as downtown Raleigh is near capacity as far as residents go. We should be seeing the building open up in late 2023.

Platform

A crane is up on East Cabarrus to build Platform, a new residential building for over 430 units. That’s downtown’s largest complex yet!

Playing off the proximity to Raleigh Union Station, the building will have an excellent view of the rail lines going through the Boylan Wye including the station itself. Train-themed designs will probably be used to give it that modern warehouse feel.

Raleigh Magazine has an excellent writeup on what’s to come here so I’ll bounce you over to them.

Seaboard Station Block B

Already well into construction, Seaboard Station‘s first new building in a long time will be Block B, a 298-unit apartment building. In addition to ground-floor retail, this building starts a multi-project overhaul of Seaboard Station itself. There are plans for more residents and hotel units for Seaboard in the future so what once was a district of shopping may grow into a much more active district on downtown’s northern end.

You can check out what’s planned at Seaboard Station here.

Coming Soon

Not quite crane-worthy, or at least not yet, but dirt, concrete, and wood is being moved at a few other spots in downtown. We’re keeping our eyes on a few other spots as well.

  1. Dukes at Cityview – townhomes are being built on South West Street
  2. 615 Peace – Condos are almost sold out along West Peace Street
  3. Person Street Apartments – A construction site is being prepped for about 100 apartments on Person Street

Seems like the name of the game is all about residents. In this post, I’ve mentioned projects that will deliver over 1,000 homes that are currently being built in downtown Raleigh. My long-time hope is that retail truly follows rooftops and downtowners can then support a thriving shopping scene.

Cheers to 2022!

by Leo Suarez

Pic of the Week

The building and playground at 554 East Hargett Street has been demolished. Most recently the home of Treasuring Christ church but before that, it was a YWCA. The Y closed in 2012 due to financial troubles and efforts to reopen it didn’t come through.

Before the sale, rezoning plans were tossed around and neighborhood meetings were held in 2019 to explore options for more residential units than the current R-10 zoning allows. No requests have been submitted since then however.

The site is pretty large, coming in at around two acres, so it’ll be interesting to see what is next.

by Leo Suarez

Dukes at Cityview Coming to South West Street

The land at 600 South West Street, formerly a grassy lot with a few trees, has been cleared away. Work will start soon on a set of eight luxury townhomes, the Dukes at Cityview, that come with a laundry list of amenities. The estimated starting price will be in the $900,000s.

The townhomes are located on the southwest corner of West and Lenoir Street, within smelling distance of Sam Jones BBQ. Dukes Properties & Construction LLC are building the homes and Cline Design are the architects. The eight units will be split between two buildings with a driveway along West Street.

Zooming out a bit, the area has seen a lot of change over the past few years, primarily on the residential side. The Fairweather condos anchor the area, joined by several new single-family and townhome builds lining Lenoir and West Street. As mentioned, Sam Jones BBQ and Hartwell opened in 2021 and Vault Craft Beer should be opening soon. That gives one of my few loves, Boulted Bread, some new neighbors.

There’s still a nice-sized hole at 600 West South Street, formerly The Lynde, a property that has gone through a few rezonings and can’t quite seem to get any construction going. A neighborhood meeting for yet another rezoning took place in December 2021 so another request may hit the city soon for that property. Maybe 2022 will be the year for that one.

by Leo Suarez

Pic of the Week

After demolition in September, construction is really humming along at 400 Hillsborough. As you can see above, I felt like the northwest corner has a nice view when looking southeast. I’m sure the ninth-floor terrace, or the Skyhub as the website calls it, will have a real nice view.

On the site for 400H, it looks like foundation work is taking place right now. Perhaps by the Spring, this project will start to go vertical.

by Leo Suarez

Local Developers Join Forces to Bring a Hotel and Apartments at The Acorn

Collaboration happens in all kinds of ways and in development, it’s great to see a sharing of space and resources. Two local developers, Williams Realty & Building Company Inc. and Summit Hospitality Group, are planning to build a seven-story apartment building and adjacent 138-room hotel. The site of the new development is at 415 South Blount which currently sits as a parking lot between Blount and Person Streets.

The property cuts the block in half with one side facing Blount and the other Person Street. On the Person Street side, the eastern side, will be the The Acorn apartments, shown in the rendering above. There will be 106 units on floors four through seven.

Facing Blount Street will be the hotel. A Marriott TownePlace Suites branded hotel will have rooms on all floors. The hotel and residents will share a 200-space parking deck on floors one through three below the apartments.

There’s not much to say about the property in it’s current state. It’s a surface parking lot surrounded by a chain-link fence. That’s it.

Construction is planned to start this December with the hotel portion coming later, planned Summer 2022.

by Leo Suarez

Bloc 83 Momentum Continues with New Mixed-Use Projects

The finishing touches were put on the Bloc 83 project earlier this year but the growth around Morgan and Boylan doesn’t seem to be over yet. Two projects worth following are planned along Boylan Avenue between Morgan and Hargett Streets. They both will be bringing more office space, more residential units, and probably just enough parking spaces that FINALLY, we can do away with the complaint that you can’t park in downtown.

First, let’s map it.

Shown in blue are the Bloc 83 projects that are already up and running. These include the office buildings, One Glenwood and Two Hillsborough, the Origin hotel, and two parking decks.

For the future, another office tower is trying to get built at the corner of Morgan and Boylan, shown in red on the map. The rendering at the top of this page is for this project and shows off the 11-story building. To provide even more parking for the building, the red portion on the map to the southeast would add structured parking to an existing surface lot. The building will also provide ground-floor retail space.

Next door, another developer has plans for Bloomsbury, a 135-unit apartment building. This will be at the corner of Hargett and Boylan. Studio, one, and two-bedroom units will be offered over ground-floor retail spaces. The building will be seven stories tall.

The 100 block of South Boylan will feel entirely different after this infusion of mixed-uses. Currently, the eastern side has a few one-story brick warehouses used for retail and two older homes that, to the best of my knowledge, are broken up into a few units. There are no definitive plans of moving the homes, which look great by the way, so let’s hope someone steps up to move them. They would fit in nicely in Boylan Heights.

Construction probably won’t start until 2022.

by Leo Suarez

Pic of the Week

Have you seen the First Citizens Bank building recently on the corner of Martin and Fayetteville? The building was undergoing a renovation for the last year and they really opened that building up. Significantly more windows have been added and the ground-floor lobby has a nice contemporary refresh.

Buildings along Fayetteville Street have been getting modern refreshes lately. This is probably a result of landlords attempting to lure higher paying office tenants as rents are much higher compared to decades ago when they were first built. Constructed in the 1980s One City Plaza was given a new facade and lobby in 2015. The lobby in the Wells Fargo tower, from the early 1990s, was given a refresh in 2019 and 333 Fayetteville from the 1960s is being renovated right now.

Back to First Citizens, here is a photo pre-renovation.