Would Revitalizing Carrboro’s Downtown Lead To Worse Floods?

GOVERNMENT

CARRBORO – Carrboro’s downtown development plan imagines the town with more affordable housing and more green space — but could it also lead to greater flooding problems and traffic congestion?

Those were among the questions Carrboro residents and council members brought up at the Oct. 21 public hearing on the plan. Several speakers also said the town’s outreach efforts to gather public feedback hadn’t gone far enough.

“There was not any community engagement in my neighborhood,” Fair Oaks resident Clara Zelasky told the council. Zelasky said she’d only just learned about the plan and had to struggle to digest the 171-page document before the meeting. In a town of 22,000, the 736 people — about 3 percent — who’d provided feedback “is a really low number to be engaged.”

Zelasky said the town should include all of Carrboro in future outreach. Even though Fair Oaks and other single-family subdivisions are outside the downtown area, “we contribute to the tax base and we contribute to local businesses.”

The downtown dream

Work on the plan began a year ago, based on the goals in the town’s 2022 comprehensive plan. Carrboro budgeted $200,000 to develop the strategy and solicit public feedback over the past year. Tuesday’s public hearing was a necessary step before a Nov. 18 vote on whether to adopt the plan.

Danny Wilson of the Freese and Nichols consulting firm told the council that the biggest priority for the downtown’s future was to add more affordable housing. Other goals listed in his presentation included climate resilience, green stormwater management, improved pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure, support for small businesses, and keeping development in line with Carrboro’s identity and distinctive charm. Balancing the goals could mean accepting higher buildings to provide a larger stock of affordable housing and commercial space.

Water flows downhill

Speaking for the town’s Climate and Environmental Advisory Committee (CEAC), Jeff Gannon agreed with Zelasky that there hadn’t been enough public engagement outside of the downtown area. In addition, the plan didn’t account for Carrboro’s topography. “The downtown sits at the highest elevation and water flows downhill.”

Gannon said the plan also didn’t consider how the downtown development it anticipated would affect congestion in the surrounding non-downtown areas.

“The only way in and out of our neighborhood is past the art center into downtown,” Carrboro resident Scott Muir said, so increased congestion would have a massive effect. Without going downtown, “we can’t pick up our kids, can’t go to the grocery store.”

CEAC’s Jane Danielewicz said the plan had blindsided the committee, and they only had a week to digest it. A project so big needed more time and engagement; even downtown, she said, there hadn’t been enough discussion. Danielewicz recommended a topographical overlay to the plan’s downtown maps, showing how water would flow out of the downtown into the rest of Carrboro.

Wilson said that might not be a helpful solution. A topographic map would show current water flows; if the plan succeeds in reducing impervious areas in future development, those flows would change. “The goal is in the future it will not be moving as much as today, and all we can show is today.”

How much engagement is enough?

Council Member Catherine Fray said the town could have done better in soliciting feedback from black neighborhoods, but “we’ve heard a lot from white homeowners who live outside the downtown area.” Some of the attendees to the city’s outreach events had been Chapel Hill homeowners rather than Carrboro residents, she added.

Council Member Randee Haven O’Donnell said the council should take the residents who hadn’t heard about the plan. “If we don’t listen to them and make it happen, then we’re complicit in marginalizing voices.”

Council Member Danny Nowell said getting feedback from 3 percent of Carrboro’s population was exceptional for this day and age. “We never have anyone say ‘you have come to me for feedback at the perfect time.’”

The council voted to keep the public hearing open until Nov. 18, giving more people the chance to speak up. You can watch the entire discussion streaming online.

Fraser Sherman has worked for newspapers, including the Destin Log, the Pensacola News-Journal and the Raleigh Public Record. Born in England, he’d still live in Florida if he hadn’t met the perfect woman and moved to Durham to marry her. He’s the author of several film reference books and has published one novel and several short story collections. This reporter can be reached at: Information@TheLocalReporter.press