Carrboro has a new downtown destination. Find books, take classes and more.
UPDATE: The Drakeford Library Complex grand opening scheduled for Friday, Feb. 21, 2025, has been canceled due to winter weather. A new date will be announced at a later time.
In 1978, Carrboro Mayor Robert “Bob” Drakeford challenged Police Chief John Blackwood to a race — his bike vs. the chief’s car, from Carrboro Town Hall to Chapel Hill’s University Mall.
Drakeford won by five minutes, scoring a free lunch on the chief’s dime.
“The whole spirit was to bring the community together,” Drakeford said in 2018, recalling the race was an effort to raise awareness about bikes as a viable form of transportation.
A grand opening event to honor the late mayor’s legacy and celebrate a downtown library that the community has worked toward for 40 years was canceled Thursday because of inclement weather. It will be rescheduled at a later date, town officials said.
Check the town’s Facebook page for updated information.
The $42 million Drakeford Library Complex, named for the town’s first Black mayor, has been unofficially open for a few weeks, with more people stopping by as word spread to get a library card and check out what the building has to offer. Cards are free to residents of Orange County and some neighboring counties.
As a branch of the Orange County Public Library in Hillsborough, the library, in addition to its in-house collection, has access to more materials through the main branch and services like Libby and Hoopla.
The building, which is jointly owned and occupied by Orange County and Carrboro, also houses WCOM community radio and space for Durham Technical Community College.
It is also a key piece of Carrboro’s evolving downtown, located within walking distance of historically African American and refugee communities, The ArtsCenter, El Centro Hispano, Club Nova, the Inter-Faith Council for Social Service and the Orange County Literacy Council.
The Drakeford complex could bring economic benefit to downtown businesses, Economic Development Director Jon Hartman-Brown has said. The Orange County Southern Branch Library is expected to serve 30,000 to 40,000 people a year, with another 2,800 people visiting the government offices in the building and roughly 8,300 visiting the recreation and cultural facilities there, he said.
Who was Bob Drakeford?
Drakeford was a New York City native who came to Carrboro by way of UNC-Chapel Hill, where he earned a master’s degree in city and regional planning.
In 1975, he was elected to Carrboro’s Board of Aldermen. Two years later, he became mayor, with support from UNC students and the Carrboro Community Coalition, a group that was overturning the town’s white political structure.
Drakeford served as mayor until 1983, working to bring transit, cycling, and economic and community development to a blue-collar “sunset town,” where it was once unsafe for Black people to be outside after dark.
One of Carrboro’s key places is the former Durham Hosiery Mill, which faced demolition in 1974. Drakeford was on the council when the mill got a second chance, and it reopened in 1977 as Carr Mill Mall, home to Weaver Street Market.
Drakeford collaborated with other progressive Black mayors in the South, once resulting in a deal that delivered used buses for the town’s new bus routes, he said in 2018. He pushed for the town to be part of the new Chapel Hill-Carrboro bus system, which today, as Chapel Hill Transit, provides roughly 3 million rides a year.
Under Drakeford, the town hired its first Black manager, Richard Knight, and its first professional town planner, who also was Black. It got state funding to build a shelter for the Carrboro Farmer’s Market, created a small business loan program, renovated the fire station, and built two parks, including the future Hank Anderson Community Park.
His efforts had their critics, making Drakeford the subject of political cartoons at the time.
“I was an object of ridicule, I guess you could say, because we did a lot of controversial things that really needed to be done,” he said in 2018. “The town people there before our board got in there wanted to leave it the way it was in 1890, and we changed that.”
About the Drakeford Library Complex
▪ Cost: $42 million. Carrboro had the land and paid about 45% of the shared costs. Each government is paying for its fixtures, furniture and equipment, plus operating costs for its space.
▪ Project details: The town and Orange County replaced an 88-space parking lot with a three-story, 52,000-square-foot building, a 171-space parking deck, and 70 bike spaces.
▪ What’s inside: Orange County Southern Branch Library; Carrboro Recreation, Parks and Cultural Resources Department; Teen Center; Orange County Skills Development Center and NCWorks Career Center; WCOM radio; Orange County Guardian ad Litem Program; and flex spaces, meeting rooms, classrooms and a public performance space.
▪ Sustainability: Green-building features include energy-efficient lighting, rain gardens designed to hold significant water, an underground collection system that feeds a tree in the courtyard, and a state-of-the-art heating, air and ventilation system.
▪ Library hours: Monday-Thursday, 10 a.m.-7 p.m.; Friday, 9 a.m.-6 p.m.
▪ Is the library card free? Yes, for residents of Orange, Alamance, Caswell, Chatham, Durham and Person counties. Also, for people who work in Orange County, and local students and employees.
▪ Special touches: There’s a seed exchange library on the first floor and a terrace on the third floor overlooking Open Eye Cafe with a great view of downtown Carrboro. A sedum garden covers the roof around the terrace.
More about Bob Drakeford
▪ Military service: U.S. Army, 1966-68
▪ Education: Bachelor’s degree, Quinnipiac University; master’s degree, UNC-Chapel Hill; Doctorate of Philosophy, UNC-Greensboro
▪ Career: Political science professor at Auburn University, serving the U.S. Department of Agriculture and 4-H Development
▪ Affordable housing: Drakeford and his wife, Sharon, operated the Oasis of North Carolina near Laurinburg from 2007 to 2022. The RV campground expanded over time to add tiny homes, cabins and yurts, offering affordable options to residents and travelers.
▪ Community: Basketball coach at Richmond Technical College and a member of Sigma Beta Tau, the Democratic Black Caucus and the National RV Park Association.
▪ He was proud of what Carrboro has become, Drakeford said in 2018. “I’ve lived a long time. I’ve lived all over the world. This is the most unique town I’ve ever been in, and (you should) keep this unique. It’s a good thing,” he said.
▪ He was 77 when he died on May 16, 2022.
This story was originally published February 20, 2025 at 9:53 AM with the headline "Carrboro has a new downtown destination. Find books, take classes and more.."
