This is a(nother) story about parking. However, parking stories are about growth and how Downtown Cary is adjusting to the increasing interest in the park, festivals, and new businesses.
The Cedar Street Parking Deck’s opening is the next significant moment in supporting that growth.
With 296 spaces for public use spanning six levels, including 22 electric vehicle spots and eight handicapped or ADA spaces, the new deck adds needed parking near the center of the Downtown Cary business district between Walker and Academy streets, sandwiched between Cedar and Chatham streets.
Town staff, including Jimmy Simpson, public works director, and Bruce Clark, construction manager, recently walked me through the new deck. They pointed out intentional details of the parking deck, first conceived of in 2022, which began construction in February of 2024.
To drive in, there’s one entrance and exit, on less-busy Cedar Street. This is the road adjacent to the train tracks.
Those familiar with the Walnut Street Parking Deck, next to the Cary Regional Library and the Downtown Cary Park, will notice smaller expansion joints between the concrete. These structural gaps are engineered to accommodate changes in temperature and other factors.
Remember the crane that flew over downtown? That was to pour concrete on site, with the result being smaller expansion joints. That differs from the prefabricated expansion joints of Downtown Cary’s last parking deck, completed in 2019.
Drive up to the fifth and sixth uncovered levels and you may spot where the deck is “preset” for a solar canopy–but it’s not there at this point.
To exit the parking deck, there are two stairwells on either end–with great views of Downtown Cary on each landing–and one elevator, closest to the Chatham Street side.
The exteriors fit a town with a community appearance manual. Above the street-level business on one side and the deck entrance on the other, an artistic screen wall serves aesthetic purposes while buffering the wind. Terra cotta panels on suspension cables protect the stairwell from the rain while maintaining ventilation.
Another part of the deck’s completion includes access to“Rogers Alley.” The street-level space between the deck and the Rogers building is a future outdoor dining area, with string lights above.
A new K38 Baja Grill is slated to open this summer, the second Triangle location for the restaurant group that started in Wilmington.
The Raleigh location at Seaboard Station offers an extensive menu of coastal Mexican cuisine and beverages. A release from the parent company, Live.Eat.Surf., touts their “fresh tacos, house-made salsas, and hand-squeezed margaritas.”
Rogers Alley is named after the former restaurant and motel that was on site, Rebecca Pearce, Cary 311 Communications Specialist shared.
“It was originally owned by the Lemuel Rogers family. It was a popular spot for tourists and truckers when Chatham Street was a highway. Bill Rogers and his wife, Barbara, purchased the business in 1966. Once the highway moved, the restaurant remained a popular eatery for locals.”
What’s next: The new deck will support, in part, attendees to large Downtown Cary events, including the 20,000 expected for the Pimento Cheese Festival, according to Simpson.
Simpson said he expects the Academy Street Parking deck to open in April.
