Tag / Legends

by Leo Suarez

After Successful Rezoning, Legends to go up to 30 Stories for Residential

An administrative site review has hit the city with high-level plans for a new tower along Harrington Street. The Legends nightclub at 330 West Hargett Street (corner of Hargett and Harrington) would be demolished to make way for a new tower and parking deck, the site plans show.

The new tower would have 372 apartments, ground-floor retail space, and a parking deck. The plans show all these offerings in a 30-story tower. The building where Legends is located isn’t the only one getting the “demosh” as the tower actually goes along Harrington between Hargett and Morgan. Two buildings along Morgan, being used as office space today, will also be demolished for the new tower.

With a narrow lot, we’re getting a pretty thin tower compared to the current downtown Raleigh building stock. The parking entrance/exit will be along Morgan and the service/loading entrance is along Hargett. This shifts the ground-floor activity up and down Harrington Street. That seems necessary with a tower this size but is disappointing as Hargett was identified as a key pedestrian-retail street per the 2015 downtown plan.

Below is the view, from the site plan, staring at the tower from Harrington Street followed by the view from Hargett. (as if you’re looking at Legends’ front door)

That block will be pretty built up with over 600 homes, probably, when you include The Dawson and The Hue. Nearby, The Dillon has over 500 units and construction is starting on another residential tower over at the future Raleigh Union Station Bus Facility.

The latest news has construction starting at the Legends lot in early 2023.

by Leo Suarez

Warehouse District Potential Rises With a Pair of Approved Rezonings

I propose we rename the warehouse district to the rezoning district. I’m kidding of course but with a pair of approved rezonings earlier in July of this year plus plenty of cases in the recent past, you can’t deny the potential for multiple new projects adding a lot of new space to the area. It’ll be quite a change!

Approved recently were two cases around the intersection of Hargett and Harrington. Mentioned earlier this year, the “Legends block” was approved for a max-height of 40 stories. Across the street, now a parking lot owned by Highwoods Properties, is another piece of property with a similar 40 story max zoning.

There’s not much else to add about the Legends parcel in that it includes the entire building, front and back bar, and the small parking lot along Harrington. No details as to what is planned have been released. The owners of the property is CityPlat, a local commercial development company.

The owner of Legends was quoted in the News & Observer that the deal here was a positive thing for the business.

“The deal with CityPlat ensures the long-term survival of Legends as an on-going business and an opportunity to collaborate for future development,” said Tim Bivens, one of the club’s owners, in an email. “We are coming up on our 30 year anniversary and plan to be around for another 30.”

Downtown Raleigh LGBTQ club Legends sells property for $4.3 million – link

The Highwoods Property on the other corner was mostly surface parking. The surface parking expanded with some buildings being demolished in February 2020. It’s not even fully paved, a move Highwoods seems to be fond of like their property on the corner of Wilmington and Martin. Similar to Legends, no details on future plans have been announced.

What gets me excited about this potential is the possible future for a nice two-block street of retail and restaurants. 300 and 400 West Hargett could have retail facing each other on both sides of the street on their ground floors. That’s actually quite rare in downtown outside of the Fayetteville Street core and Glenwood South.

Long term, we have planned bus-rapid transit and an already running train station nearby with plans for commuter rail. Office, residential, or even hotel uses could be nicely served by these alternative transit options.

We’ll have to see what’s announced in the future.

by Leo Suarez

Pic of the Week

I wanted to get a photo up of the northeast corner of Hargett and Harrington as development plans are in the works here. The Legends “block” may see a rezoning request for up to 40-stories according to this TBJ article. That intersection looks to be pretty significant in the future if any kind of building takes place there.

When I look around, I see The Dillon apartments with Weaver Street on the ground floor. The apartments are on two corners actually with the third being a gravel parking lot, also in a holding state for future development.

The Warehouse district has got a lot of potential.