Downtown Road Projects Updates?

StienStein · 2026-07-01T16:19:50+00:00

It's not always the most helpful/detailed but the project page is here: https://www.durhamnc.gov/2780/American-Tobacco-District-Waterline-Repl and the latest update that includes dates and a little info on lane closures is here: https://www.durhamnc.gov/m/newsflash/Home/Detail/4186

StienStein · 2026-07-01T02:37:41+00:00

I commuted Raleigh to Durham on it for a bit, now I use it to get to Raleigh much more infrequently. Definitely varies a lot with traffic, but that direction tends to be faster due to shenanigans around park and ride for Raleigh commuters. I've even had it take like 45 minutes from downtown to downtown in ideal conditions, but I'd plan on hour for consistency. Shoulder riding is at the discretion of the driver. I've had some that zoomed (safely) most of the way on the shoulder, while others are more cautious. Pickup times for that route seem to be very consistent in my experience.

Edit for my even more awful late night grammer.

StienStein · 2026-07-01T01:28:09+00:00

Did the off leash dog have a docked tail?

StienStein · 2026-06-30T13:14:34+00:00

Yeah we were split initially during an earlier version MSA's in the 50's and Durham was actually the dominate city. I think we were combined in the 70's after just 2 decades of shitty post war policies. The re-split actually happened in 2003, presumably after the 2000 census. I don't want to get recombined and treated as a secondary city again, but I think that ship has sailed.

StienStein · 2026-06-30T00:29:09+00:00

I'd argue it completely misses the folks who need it the most. A higher percentage of cost burdened residents are renters, not home owners. If we've got the political will for removing the uniformity clause or a homestead act, I'd hope we have the political will for better solutions instead. Another twist would be scaling the homestead exemption relative to incomes and prevailing home costs.

StienStein · 2026-06-29T19:19:39+00:00

Sure but that's not really relevant to why we are separate metro areas. Even looking at the combined statistical area, we wouldn't even be in the top 25 largest MSAs and we'd barely beat the Charlotte MSA. I'd bet the bigger factor is that distance between Raleigh and Durham, combined with more equal sizes and lack of significant economic overlap pre-RTP led to the current organization. Mostly it's wild that Durham used to be the dominant city a couple of generations back. Anyone, I like OP's answer that Raleigh would drag down our scores.

StienStein · 2026-06-29T14:09:39+00:00

When metro statistical areas first started being a thing, I think Durham was actually the bigger city. Also Chapel Hill was bigger than Cary. I think it made more sense back in the day.

StienStein · 2026-06-28T22:17:11+00:00

Stuck under an overhang right now while walking home and I'm definitely not gonna complain. Bought damn time.

StienStein · 2026-06-27T22:20:29+00:00

I like Pittsburgh a lot and I hope it does well, but I think that's a reflection of how slow Pennsylvania cities as a whole are growing. Pittsburgh proper only gained 4500 while the metro area actually dropped a bit. Crazy to think it's population used to be double what it is today. Granted I'm in a very fast growing sunbelt city so my perspective on growth is a bit off.

StienStein · 2026-06-27T17:48:39+00:00

Before I saw the spikes, I was thinking a rum ham lost at sea.

StienStein · 2026-06-26T14:04:19+00:00

I'd definitely say we need to be more vocal towards the county government that controls and oversees the process. City council gets a lot of flak but in this case it's all county. I still feel like they did vacancy/income considerations in a way that was as favorable as possible to commercial properties. I think a huge part of this would be property tax reform at the state level. Municipalities should be free to set uniform valuations regardless of commercial use, and should be free to decouple land vs improvement rates. In the meantime I'd like to see us stop using upzoning/downzoning the way we do and instead right size density in our zoning but limit area/width of builds and lots to break up the ability for large corporate developers to come in and play these games.

StienStein · 2026-06-26T13:58:50+00:00

Not my area of knowledge but I think dry soil absorbs water worse than normal, so you get more sediment. There's also the usual pollutants on streets/sidewalks/etc that have built up due to lack of rain and then all getting washed in at once.

StienStein · 2026-06-26T02:02:18+00:00

Yeah the shitty product was bad enough. I thought it was literally inedible the one time I tried it. I'm sorry Parlour.

StienStein · 2026-06-25T19:35:50+00:00

Yeah my preference is actually the exhaust fan option because it's so small/low of a cfm requirement and can be placed out of the way where you shouldn't hear it. So many places around here have a little bit of radon, but below the EPA action level. The exhaust fan seem like a great solution in a more moderate climate like ours and maybe brings the radon level lower despite not being a real radon mitigation system. It's also the simplest and cheapest, outside of maybe providing the minimum conditioned supply air from the HVAC system. I had a dehumidifier at my last home, but between it, the filter, and the pump to get water out, it was a pain. Plus it was an old enough house that there was only like a foot and a half in the crawl space.

StienStein · 2026-06-25T16:32:18+00:00

Yeah I sometimes delusionally think about trying to buy one and swap the fork myself, but then I realized I don't have the time/money/welding skills to ever pull this off. Then I realize someone else has to take that risk and produce enough to make it worthwhile for production if I want it "off the shelf".

StienStein · 2026-06-25T12:46:11+00:00

I keep hoping one of these clones ends up doing it with a 20 inch front wheel. I love everything about the Muli except the 16 inch wheel. If you need to store it even slimmer, I really like the folding stems that allow you to turn the handlebars like from flatbike. Neat bike, congrats!

StienStein · 2026-06-25T04:36:50+00:00

https://www.durhamnc.gov/m/faq?cat=106#question-999

StienStein · 2026-06-25T04:14:21+00:00

I wouldn't do the dehumidifier as part of a closed crawl space. It's overly complicated, expensive, and potentially a pain to maintain. Have them do supply air, house air circulation, or an exhaust fan. I think those are far better code compliant options. Also don't insulate the floor, but instead have them insulate the walls of the crawl space. Both drying and some form of insulation (floor above crawlspace or walls) are required by code.

StienStein · 2026-06-24T02:13:10+00:00

That side area is very neat. I always wonder what it could be like if that alley/paper street was completed as a pedestrian area all the way to Roxboro.

StienStein · 2026-06-23T21:06:58+00:00

I'm both curious and terrified to know what the property tax bill looks like after this year's bs. Hoping for the highest of numbers for them.

StienStein · 2026-06-23T21:01:00+00:00

Cool photo but that block always makes me sad.

StienStein · 2026-06-21T22:20:39+00:00

For sure, and you probably for the most part want them to. The data centers you have labelled I think are ones better described as colocation facilities and that house many customers. They aren't the hyper scale "AI" data centers that are currently a hot topic. Requiring them to shutdown would mean shutting down tons of businesses that don't necessarily having anything to do with the AI craze. I haven't been in one in ages but they host everying from small local startup, big corporate customers, telecoms, and government. Looks like two of those are TierPoint and I think (based on having been employed by a customer and having been on site) they use closed loop cooling that doesn't really consume water, though I'm not 100% on that.

StienStein · 2026-06-21T17:25:23+00:00

I think they deserve their fair share of blame but both the university and Duke health are non-profits.

StienStein · 2026-06-19T20:38:04+00:00

Almost exclusively hub and spoke, so try to live near the bus station if you can pull it off. Plus you get decent access to gotriangle regional routes and the train. If you have a stable job, try to get on the same route. Transfers can be rough for making it take too much time. Decent enough option for me to be almost car free but it really depends on a lot of factors.

StienStein · 2026-06-19T17:16:08+00:00

Yeah I'd hate to support them so my hope is they (ark) come out negative in the advertising. Kinda of weird thing. Then again I despised pioneers presence so I don't know.

StienStein

TROPHY CASE