Old West Durham Neighborhood Association

Just the FAQs

What is Duke planning to do with Central Campus?

Duke is planning a large-scale revitalization of its Central Campus to build a "university village" of retail shops and other amenities to keep students on campus, and out of Durham.

Why is Duke planning changes to Central Campus?

The apartments have outlived their useful life and Duke has a wonderful opportunity to use the fruit of its recent capital campaign, about $2 billion in tax-advantaged dollars, to push the envelope of investing this tax-free money to turn a profit, under the rubric of providing for future educational needs.

Where is Central Campus and how big is it?

Central Campus consists of about 200 acres bounded by Medical Center and West Campus on three sides and the neighborhood of Old West Durham to the north.

Before the student apartments were built in the 1970s, the area was home to 450 mill houses for the nearby Erwin Mills (at the time, Duke officials asked the City to condemn all the mill houses). The Duke School for Children has been asked to move.

The area also includes Erwin Soccer Field -- which Duke recently tried to buy in a quiet back-room deal. The scheme failed after Duke officials were exposed by two soccer dads.

What is the current zoning?

Thanks to the strong support of partnership neighborhood representatives speaking to Durham City Council -- East, West and the Medical Center were re-zoned "University College" in 2004. (Before that, Duke's campus was non-conforming.)

Central Campus is now mostly zoned as single-family and multi-family residential. This area was not rezoned University-College, along with the rest of the campus in 2004, because Duke had wanted to build on-campus retail (beyond the academic mission of the university).

What's the timeline?

The timeline on Duke's website starts in March 2004. It ignores the February 2003 meeting (initiated by Duke) with 18 representatives of 12 partnership neighborhoods -- where the community discussed campus land use plans and first raised concerns about Central Campus retail.

See... http://www.owdna.org/Duke-NhoodTimeline.htm

What initiatives might Phase I include?

In addition to the general aim of addressing ‘the need for beds and food services’ described by Duke, testing and preparing the local political landscape is clearly an objective of Phase I. The Duke administration has engaged in a long series of newspaper columns that raise more questions than they answer, meetings yielding promises later threatened or broken, rude posts to community bulletin boards and then followed by patronizing attempts to calm the unrest caused by these actions. Duke has exhibited a general policy of ‘trust what we say and don’t pay attention to what we do,’ so as to take the local political temperature and assess what they can get away with.

How will decisions be made?

Tallman Trask will determine priorities. Every once in a while, carefully chosen items will be shared with the public and feedback will be accepted.

Who is involved in the planning process and how were they selected?

This is an internal planning process involving mostly Tallman Trask III. (The community asked to participate on the planning committees but Duke refused.)

How can citizens contribute input to the planning process?

Basically, Duke is saying they will accept no formal input from anyone outside of their internal planning process. The previous attempts at having input i.e. the list of retail uses for Central Campus agreed upon by the Partnership Neighborhoods, are exactly what Duke is fudging on now, by not committing to University/College zoning. People can keep up with what Duke decides through an elaborate public relations process which even includes a full time community relations officer. But there is no indication that Duke will do anything other than what is best for Duke, as their sense of 'fiduciary responsiblity' (read: 'invest money to make money') dictates.

How much retail space will be included in the development?

Duke has announced they have a 'fiduciary responsibility' to make money whenever and wherever they can, purportedly in support of the educational mission that provides them with tax-exempt status for soliciting contributions. In other words, Duke will try to build as much retail as it can get away with.

I've heard that Duke is proposing building stores on campus that will keep students away from Ninth Street businesses. Is that true?

Yes, along with Brightleaf Square, locally-owned Northgate Mall and other nearby business districts.

Are there any best practices for campus development that Duke can look to as a model?

Nope. No other university has tried to build this much non-academic retail on campus. No other university has tried to avoid paying this much in property taxes -- keeping more money on campus and out of their host towns.

These questions and responses are modified from www.duke.edu/web/centralcampus/faqs.html

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