RaleighForward Roundup

Sunday, July 2nd

Hello, and Happy Fourth.

This week the City Council has a light agenda. We have more details on our first in-person event (RSVP now!) and a new blog post that examines CBS17’s fact check of Raleigh’s Missing Middle Reforms.

RaleighForward is hosting its first in-person events this summer! Details below:

The first is scheduled for the evening of Wednesday, July 26, called Transportation, Traffic Impact Analysis and Safety: Keeping it all in Perspective featuring Eric Lamb, former City of Raleigh Transportation Planning Manager. The event will be from 6:30 - 8pm and is located at Trophy Brewing & Taproom on Maywood.
The second program features Ben Stevens, author of Birth of a Building. This program is scheduled for the morning of Saturday, August 19, at the John Chavis Community Center.

Please mark your calendars and be on the lookout for more details.

As always, please reach out with any comments or suggestions, and consider making a donation to support our continued efforts to inform policymakers and the public.

Eric Braun, Founder

Sun, Jul 02

Fact Checking CBS17’s ‘Fact Check’ of Raleigh’s Missing Middle Reforms

On June 19, CBS17’s Joedy McCreary interviewed the authors of an essay published recently in an NCSU Poole School of Management newsletter.

According to this article from Business Insider, the national housing crisis is likely to continue for the foreseeable future because of continuing supply constraints dating to the Great Recession.
Renters might finally experience the beneficial effects of falling rents (or at least slower rent inflation) according to this WRAL story.
Pending regulatory changes by the Federal Housing Administration may make financing ADU’s easier. Read more from ShelterForce.
ShelterForce is running a series on the obstacles facing people with disabilities when searching for housing. Also from ShelterForce.
Only Zoning Reform Can Solve America’s Housing Problem, from the Wall Street Journal.
As superstar cities struggle to fill vacant offices and pandemic boomtowns try to contain rising costs, both must double down on density, argues Bruce Schaller in Bloomberg.
Southern Urbanism has an interesting article critiquing the “Town Center” concept with references to Cary’s Fenton Development, as well as Chapel Hill’s Southern Village.
This New York Times article discusses a recent study of homelessness in California and the “Doom Loop” that follows a person that loses housing for the first time.
While most experts argue that part of the ongoing housing crisis is due to low inventory, here’s an opinion piece from Barron’s suggesting low inventory is not actually a problem in the US.
American Cities Have a Conversion Problem, and It’s Not Just Offices. Read it in the New York Times.

Long Reads: If you have a little more time, you might consider these:

Zoning change: Upzonings, downzonings, and their impacts on residential construction, housing costs, and neighborhood demographics.
If you’ve wondered about those “We buy ugly houses” signs around Raleigh, consider reading this ProPublica investigation.

Be sure to check out these new additions to the RaleighForward data page:

This Housing Affordability Dashboard from the Atlanta Fed is a great resource for tracking national and regional housing trends since the Great Recession.

Upcoming meetings to keep track of:

Due to the 4th of July holiday, City Council will hold its regular meeting on July 5, 2023. The agenda is unusually light, but there is a rezoning case worth keeping an eye on. Z-88-22 involves approximately 6.7 acres located at 130 Kindley St. near the intersection of S McDowell and Martin Luther King Blvd. The applicant is requesting a zoning change from Downtown Mixed Use 20-stories to Downtown Mixed Use 40-stories with Conditions. The conditions relate to bike and pedestrian access, along with on-street parking limitations. The case was deemed consistent with the Comprehensive Plan and Planning Commission recommended approval of the case with a 7-0 vote.
The Board of Adjustment met on June 29th and 30th to continue hearing the Hayes Barton Neighbors’ appeal of the recently approved preliminary subdivision for 18 townhomes. After 2 full days of hearings, the appealing neighbors completed putting on their evidence and the City and developer’s team completed examining 1 witness. The case will likely be heard again sometime in July and possibly again in August. This lengthy hearing process is typical of appeals where the goal of the opposition is to delay the project for as long as possible, hoping to saddle the developer with so much additional costs that they are forced to walk away or capitulate to the neighbors’ demands. For background, click here.
The Planning Commission’s Committee of the Whole discussed the pending New Bern Avenue BRT Transit Overlay District Comprehensive Plan Amendments and proposed TOD Rezoning on June 29. The COW will continue its review of these issues at its next few meetings before voting them out to the full Planning Commission in the Fall. Click here and here for background.

Fact Checking CBS17’s ‘Fact Check’ of Raleigh’s Missing Middle Reforms

Articles we found interesting this week:

Upcoming meetings to keep track of:

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