A vote for density in Durham’s Bragtown a ‘breath of fresh air,’ says council member

Vannessa Evans spoke for her neighborhood this week to support the Durham City Council’s annexing a development site near Carver Street into the city limits.

Evans, the chair of the Bragtown Community Association, and others knew the rezoning meant 800 new dwelling units would be coming to the 134-acre Carver Street Assemblage at Cub Creek and Old Oxford roads in northern Durham.

But the project also includes 198 affordable housing units among the 90 single-family homes, 180 town homes and 530 apartments.

“We are in hopes that this work will serve as a blueprint for other affordable housing developments in Durham,” Evans said.

In 2020, initial plans for adjacent projects proposed by the Joven Group and TMTLA Associates included just 20 affordable units targeting people at 80% of the area median income (AMI), out of 675 total units.

After major opposition to that plan from the Bragtown community, Kelley Development LLC stepped in.

According to Patrick Byker, the new developer’s attorney, the revised project is “the largest rezoning for a mixed-income affordable housing neighborhood in the history of Durham.”

The City Council voted unanimously Monday night to annex the development site north of Interstate 85 into the city limits and approve the site plan for construction.

Donna Frederick has lived on East Club Boulevard in Bragtown for more than 30 years and praised the communication between community residents and city planners.

“I’m in support of this Carver Assemblage because we worked really hard in town to have this communication,” Frederick said. “Communication is a really valuable point when trying to bring neighborhoods together, and it’s really important when talking about housing.”

“I have lost so many friends in this neighborhood that cannot afford to stay in Durham anymore. ... It’s gotten too expensive for them,” she added.

Neighbors wanted the affordable housing priced at 60% AMI or below. Kelley Development CEO Ted Heilbron committed 5% of the units to be priced at 40% AMI, equivalent to a $24,000 income for a single-person household in Durham County.

But residents like Matthew Council, who lives across from the development site, want traffic concerns to be addressed: roads repaved, sidewalks, bike lanes and storm water drains added. At the end of the intersection, drivers cannot connect to Carver street.

“We believe that access and improvement to Cub Creek Road should be mandatory for this development, and not optional,” said Council, a 30-year resident who spoke for 18 households.

He asked that the council only approve the rezoning if the developer agreed to construct all the traffic impact analysis improvements,.

Assistant Transportation Director Bill Judge explained that only parts are being annexed into the city and the most southern part, where Council lives, is not.

“The existing portion of Cub Creek Road, south of the Carver street extension, is actually still currently in the county,” said Judge. “Portions of it are being annexed, but the very southern portion closest to Old Oxford is not — it’s currently maintained by North Carolina Department of Transportation.”

When the city of Durham extended Carver Street, NCDOT did not connect that portion of the street due to the need for widening improvements.

According to Judge, if Kelley Development were to choose to connect an access point to Carver Street they would be responsible for improving “the substructure, resurfacing and pavement width.”

Before voting, council members acknowledged how meaningful the Bragtown community’s engagement was in tailoring the project to fit the needs of its residents.

“Mostly, we see middle-class homeowners who are rallying to support less density, fewer town homes, fewer apartments, less affordability and overall less building of new housing, which we know our community needs — and honestly it’s been kind of demoralizing,” said Council member Jillian Johnson.

“So this is a little bit of a breath of fresh air for me [to see] a community be really excited about more affordability, more density, and working with a developer to make that happen,” she said.

This story was originally published March 24, 2022 at 4:23 PM with the headline "A vote for density in Durham’s Bragtown a ‘breath of fresh air,’ says council member."