Built in 1998, the vacant office building located at 7001 Weston Parkway in Cary isn’t that old.
But as work patterns shift, and Cary’s population continues to grow, developers, town leaders, and residents broadly agree that the 57-foot-tall, 80,000 square-foot brick-and-glass structure located on 8.7 acres at the intersection with Norwell Boulevard has reached the end of its useful life.
Last week, the Cary Town Council approved a proposal from Highwoods Properties and Kane Realty to transform the obsolete office building campus into a site offering mixed-use multifamily housing and retail fronting Weston Parkway, one of Cary’s busiest corridors.
The new five-story, 275-unit apartment building will offer a mix of studios and one- and two-bedroom apartments, 5% of which will be affordable for at least 30 years for tenants earning at or below 80% of the area median income (AMI). And, to ensure that the added density isn’t disruptive to longtime homeowners nearby, the plan maintains the site’s existing tree canopy along its southern and western edges.
“Designed to align with Cary’s vision for thoughtful, connected growth, the project would create long-term benefits for residents and the surrounding community,” Kane Realty’s team wrote in a statement to The Line. “We were delighted to hear resident support … for new walkable amenities, and we are excited to deliver that to this important corridor.”
With plans for the site in the pipeline starting in 2024, the developers worked with the town’s planning staff and nearby residents to come up with their final design.
Deemed consistent with Cary’s comprehensive planning document, the Imagine Cary Community Plan, the project evolved from a proposed mix of townhomes and a multi-family building to mixed-use apartments.
By right, the developers could build commercial structures up to 75 feet tall virtually anywhere on the site, but they needed a rezoning from the town to convert it to residential use.
Following conversations with the community, the developers in April submitted a refined plan that replaced the townhomes with a single mixed-use multifamily structure to be situated in a corner of the site roughly in the footprint of the existing office building.
The revised plan includes generous setbacks and buffers between the new apartments and existing homes, slightly less density than originally envisioned, and an “evergreen screen” along the southern property line.
The project will include 3,000 square feet of community space, up to 5,000 square feet of retail space for businesses such as coffee shops and restaurants, wide sidepaths, and the affordable housing component. The development will also connect to the town’s greenway system.
Cary town council members approved the rezoning in a 6-1 vote during Thursday’s regular meeting, with some members seeming to make up their minds to support the rezoning proposal during the discussion at the council table.
Last fall, following a September public hearing, residents circulated a petition with 500 signatories opposing the project. But council members said they only heard positive feedback from residents after the new design was submitted this spring, indicating to them that the residents worked with the developer successfully on a compromise.
“The residents were extraordinarily engaged,” said Councilmember Brittany Richards. “They did literally invite us to their homes, and I, like many of you, stood in their backyards and really visualized what this property was going to look like. In equal measure, the applicant was also extraordinarily responsive, and so we encouraged, in the earlier discussion, to have the two parties continue to dialogue, and this is an example of how something is really shaped for the better when that happens and works how it’s intended.”
Councilmember Michelle Craig, whose District B is home to the site, said residents had differing visions for the property, but the one thing most everyone agreed on is that it had to be redeveloped.
“You can’t side with the applicant or the residents when residents didn’t seem to want all the same things,” Craig said. “And I don’t believe keeping it like it is is a viable option—which was the only thing the residents agreed on, is we couldn’t just keep it like it is.”
Mayor pro tem Lori Bush, who initially said she was leaning toward opposing the rezoning, ended up voting in favor. Only the mayor voted against the rezoning, citing concerns about affordability; 80% of the AMI, Mayor Harold Weinbrecht noted, means a potential tenant could make up to $108,000 a year.
“That’s not workforce [housing] to me,” Weinbrecht said. “I’d rather see 2% [affordable units] at 40% AMI than 5% at 80% AMI. That’s just me. So, to me, that’s a negative. … You’re really not providing workforce housing for future uses.”
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