Our big week of presidential traffic jams, milkshakes and Triangle Places to Watch
The happening was President Joe Biden & Entourage’s visit to the Triangle. It’s an election year and maybe North Carolina is in play, but the coverage that caught your interest wasn’t about policy issues. It was about:
A. How the presidential motorcade could affect Triangle traffic, especially during rush hour; and
B. Korie Dean’s report on what the president ordered at Cook Out.
A pool reporter described Cook Out as a “small eatery known for its shakes.” That’s like describing the UNC-Duke basketball rivalry as a “boutique indoor activity matching friendly neighbors in a vigorous board game involving crafts such as hoops and nets.”
Korie covers higher education for The News & Observer and also doubles — insert tongue firmly in cheek — as our Chief Cook Out Correspondent. Korie wasn’t on the president’s tour but got recruited into The N&O’s coverage because she has reported on the iconic chain’s 40-something milkshakes and 54,000 combos.
Let her provide context that an obvious out-of-towner reporter couldn’t: Biden told reporters that he ordered a “black and white” milkshake that was “triple thick,” according to the pool reporter. “Black and white” isn’t a flavor on Cook Out’s extensive menu of 40 milkshake flavors, but he told reporters that it was a vanilla shake with chocolate syrup. Biden also appears to have ordered food at the restaurant, walking away from the window with a bag in hand, though it’s unclear if he went with the famed, holy grail Cook Out Tray. (We’d understand if he didn’t order a Tray. It can be a complicated process for newcomers.)
Causing traffic to snarl AND not ordering from the Cook Out menu are two ways for a politician venturing into the Triangle to lose bipartisan support AND independent voters who prefer their regular tray with a Cheerwine float.
Besides, the president isn’t a Cook Out newbie. He’s been here before. So let me — in a nonpartisan, all-shakes-are-better-when-blended-with-crunchy-candy kind of way — spin this mix of tangled retail politics, traffic angst and food-to-go debate into a new reality.
Five Places to Watch
The Triangle no longer is a collection of quaint towns, college campuses and a state capital weaved together by multi-lane highways and windy two-laners.
We’ve become an urban region. A syncretic city of cities. Where we grouse about traffic. Where we fuss about protecting our uniqueness — even as newcomers rush in and state-born businesses like Cook Out, Bojangles and Krispy Kreme spread beyond our borders.
Oh, it doesn’t mean our quaint towns and small cities have lost their charm. Try shifting lanes along the Chapel Hill-Durham stretch of I-40 and dare to tell me your BPM is under 100.
This is why it’s worth spending time with The N&O’s Five Places to Watch, our annual microscopic gaze on growth in the Triangle.
N&O editor Dave Hendrickson led this project that features stellar reporting from Brian Gordon, Tammy Grubb, Mary Helen Moore, Richard Stradling and Chantal Allam; and stunning visuals from Kaitlin McKeown, Travis Long, Scott Sharpe and Kevin Keister. It’s a veritable census block of journalists stretched across counties. And it’s a logistical challenge.
“One of the problems is that there are so many areas where things are happening that it’s hard to whittle down the list. At the same time, there are so many large, ongoing projects that it’s a challenge to avoid being repetitive,” Dave says.
The ‘Lars Look’
We launched The N&O’s Five Places to Watch in 2022 and continue to track these areas. An early favorite among readers was our profile of Moncure, an unincorporated area of Chatham County with 780 residents poised to become a megasite of statewide economic development.
(We’re also fond of the Moncure story because it launched the “Lars Look.” There he was, The N&O’s Lars Dolder, in a video reporting while wearing a hoodie under a blazer. Lars always dresses impeccably, but it gets cold in January. Lars, a beloved reporter and editor, recently took his suit-plus-vest style and talents to what a pool reporter might call an “urban-based publication near a bus terminal and an Applebee’s.” Of course, we’re proud of Lars as his career moves on to The New York Times.)
The 2024 Five Places will take you to areas familiar and intriguing. The changes coming to Raleigh’s east side, Durham’s American Tobacco campus and a Chapel Hill mall should interest longtime residents. In Pittsboro., you’ll witness how farmlands are turning into suburbs, including a project with a Disney touch.
Sometimes, the Triangle feels like a circle. We’re back in Moncure, reporting on how VinFast already is changing Chatham County, the Triangle and our state.
So many ribbon-cuttings to come. So many new roads to connect with crowded roads.
We’re growing, and that means grousing about the urbanity of it all.
Stay calm.
Or cast your vote for the Big Double burger served cheddar style + a corn dog + onion rings + a chocolate malt shake + Cook Out sauce.
Bill Church is executive editor of The News & Observer.
This story was originally published January 20, 2024 at 10:00 AM with the headline "Our big week of presidential traffic jams, milkshakes and Triangle Places to Watch."
