Elon’s town council left nary a stone unturned this week as it dug into the latest offering from a Wake County developer that already has two sizeable projects in the works on the municipality’s northern frontier.
At the suggestion of the town’s planning director, the council took no vote on Tuesday after Raleigh-based GreenHawk Development unveiled its plans for this 50-acre mixed-use venture at the southwest corner of University Drive and North Williamson Avenue.
[Story continues below layout of the newest ‘Parc’ development, to be known as ‘Parc Village.’]
The council nevertheless spent the better part of two hours picking over GreenHawk’s proposal, which is meant to build on the company’s previously-approved plans for two other projects on the north side of this same road juncture.
Dubbed “Parc Village,” GreenHawk’s latest endeavor shares certain thematic elements with “Parc Northwest,” a mélange of residential and commercial development that the town’s leaders approved in 2022. The new project is also bathed in the afterglow of “Parc East,” which GreenHawk rolled out in 2023 as a cluster of family homes.
Yet, this newcomer to GreenHawk’s nest is no simple clone of the company’s previous projects – at least not according to Tony Tate, who has served as the developer’s point person on each of the three Parc developments.
“We feel that this third piece of the Parc projects is the crown jewel of what a real, mixed-use village is supposed to look like,” Tate declared when he appeared before Elon’s town council on Tuesday. “It’s going to be laid out in the way that villages and neighborhoods were built before the automobile took over…We’re very excited about the concept and the plan. We think it’s going to be a great place to live and to shop and to play.”
Triple Parc
A pedestrian-friendly design that harks back to yesteryear had also been one of the chief selling points of Parc Northwest, whose latest plans call for 385 residences and 54,500 square feet of retail development on the north side of University Drive. Accommodations for foot traffic were, likewise, a highlight of GreenHawk’s plans for Parc East, a mélange of 85 townhouses and 44 single family homes that’s slated to go on the other side of Shallowford Church Road from Parc Northwest’s 58-acre expanse.
[Story continues below photo of existing construction site for Parc Northwest, one of two previously approved subdivisions at the same intersection, and map, which shows the relative locations of the three Parc developments, and also the two phases planned for the new development.]
Even so, GreenHawk’s latest venture proposes to pack an even greater punch into its 50 acres than either of the company’s other two projects would muster between them.
During Tuesday’s council meeting, Elon’s planning director Lori Oakley presented the town’s leaders with a conditional rezoning request that set out the possibilities and limits of this village-style endeavor. According to Oakley, this customized designation would set aside more than 22 acres of Parc Village for mixed use development and another 9.7 acres or so for townhomes, apartments, and other multi-family dwellings.
Oakley went on to add that the project’s mixed component may include up to 92,500 square feet of office space, a grocery store with a maximum footprint of 45,000 square feet, as much as 43,000 square feet of additional retail, and a hotel or motel with no more than 110 rooms available to let. The town’s planning director added that the developer has deliberately excluded 15 commercial uses from this mixed-use district – with gas stations, convenient stores, telecom towers, and adult-oriented establishments among these self-imposed prohibitions.
Oakley added that the project’s residential component would contain up to 600 dwelling units. These residences may consist of townhomes, apartments, duplexes, quadraplexes, or some combination thereof – although it would explicitly exclude single-family homes as per another one of the developer’s self-imposed constraints.
Give ‘em the perks
During her presentation to the council, Oakley also touched on some of the amenities that GreenHawk has included in its plans for Parc Village. She was especially pleased with the developer for going above and beyond the town’s requirements for open space within the project’s proposed site.
“They have proposed 22 percent open space,” she conceded, which is more than the 15 percent required by the LDO [or Land Development Ordinance].”
Oakley pointed out that a portion of the development’s open space would be used for retention ponds and other runoff controls. Other areas would be set aside for recreation – with one spot reserved for a dog park and another for a so-called urban square where people can gather.
Oakley also alluded to a latticework of walking paths that would feed into a sidewalk along North Williamson Avenue and a multi-use path along University Drive. Meanwhile, a public road network would provide vehicular access through two points of entry along University Drive as well as a third entrance off of Williamson Avenue. Oakley added that GreenHawk has agreed to line up one of the University Drive outlets with one of the entrances for Parc Northwest so that the state’s transportation department can install a traffic signal between the two developments.
Oakley went on to note that GreenHawk has pledged to install a two-car charging station for electric vehicles at the behest of the town’s sustainability committee. In addition, the developer has penciled in a site for a bus stop to serve Burlington’s Link Transit bus system.
Oakley noted that, in order to accommodate these various features, GreenHawk has sought four waivers from rules in Elon’s Land Development Ordinance. She acknowledged that these proposed deviations, which concern things like landscaping, street widths, and pedestrian access, have all been cleared by a staff-level technical review committee. Oakley also emphasized that GreenHawk’s plans have received an endorsement from the town’s planning staff as well as a unanimous nod from its planning board in February.
Neighborhood cool?
Both of GreenHawk’s earlier forays into Elon were bedeviled by persistent objections from neighboring homeowners. Yet, this same sort of opposition has failed to materialize against the developer’s current proposal for Parc Village.
During Tuesday’s proceedings, only one member of the public approached the town’s leaders when they opened a state-mandated public hearing on the plans for Parc Village. Yet, the remarks that the council heard from Jim Sykes, who identified himself as a resident of Elon’s extraterritorial jurisdiction, were less a critique of this particular project than a general recitation on the town’s accelerating growth.
“What we’re faced with is not going to go away,” Sykes told the council that evening, “and that is we’re getting development from every area you can dream of.”
Oakley informed the council that the plans for Parc Village also received a dribble of feedback during a community meeting that GreenHawk conducted in January. The town’s planning director added that most of the nine people who attended this hearing hailed from Henton Place – a senior-oriented subdivision that lies to the southeast of Parc Village’s proposed site.
Oakley recalled that some of these Henton Place residents were so keen on GreenHawk’s plans that they asked if the development could be age restricted to allow them to move in to the development. But the project received a far more skeptical hearing from councilman Randy Orwig, who is himself a resident of Henton Place, albeit not one of those who had been on hand for the community meeting in January.
Among other things, Orwig complained that word of the community meeting didn’t reach everyone in Henton Place or nearby Blakey Hall, another enclave for retirees that lies in the vicinity of University Drive. Oakley assured Orwig that proper notice had gone out about the meeting – to which, Orwig invoked a sci-fi classic that memorably ridicules the seemingly purposeful obscurity of bureaucratic notices about development projects.
“I’ve read Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy,” the councilman said. “So, I know how it happens.”
Council culture
Orwig went on to share some concerns about the potential impact that the project’s stormwater controls may have on his own subdivision. These misgivings were addressed by Lee Bryant of Evans Engineering, who explained how the project’s drainage infrastructure would collect and gradually release rainwater to prevent flooding.
Orwig, meanwhile, wasn’t the only member of the council who had something to say about GreenHawk’s plans for Parc Village.
The proposed development elicited some questions from councilman Michael Woods about the adequacy of the project’s provisions for dogwalkers and electric vehicles.
Meanwhile, councilmember Stephanie Bourland inquired about the proposed accommodations for parking as well as the potential for Village Parc’s dwelling units to serve as student housing. On the latter point, Tate insisted that the developer has no plans to market these residences to students from Elon University. His assurances were nevertheless contradicted by Jeremy Medlin, who serves as GreenHawk’s executive vice president for real estate.
“At Parc Village, we may have some student housing,” Medlin declared. “We’re going to seek that flexibility because it seems logical.”
Medlin was drawn back to the podium by some additional questions from Orwig, who challenged him to explain the inclusion of a 45,000-square-foot grocery store within the development. Orwig observed that a supermarket has always been something of a pipe dream for both Elon and the neighboring community of Gibsonville.
“You are claiming to be miracle workers in the sense that you’re claiming to bring a grocery store here,” the councilman added. “What kind of a grocery chain is going to go into that grocery store?”
Medlin replied that the three Parc developments will, on their own, make Elon much more attractive to a major grocery chain. He added that the town’s allure will only be amplified by other, future developments.
“You’ve got a lot of growth here,” he insisted. “Ultimately it will come, and we’re confident of that…I’m confident that by 2030 – we have a lot of momentum here, and you have a wonderful town.”
Medlin was also put through his paces by councilman Quinn Ray, who inquired about the long-term viability of the three Parc developments. Ray went on to ask the executive VP to speculate what he would do if the council opts not to approve the plans for Parc Village.
“The first thing I’d do is ask ‘why?’” Medlin replied before he reiterated his commitment to doing business in Elon. “We’re not leaving,” he added. “We’re planted a flag, and we want to be your neighbor.”
The GreenHawk executive went on to address some of the hiccups that his firm has recently encountered in its efforts to develop Parc Northwest. He admitted that this project is “about a year behind schedule” because of some engineering issues, although he assured the council that the worst of these troubles are well in the past.
“Our plan is pave Phase I [of Parc Northwest] in April,” he elaborated, “and we’re excited to have our first homes – hopefully – COed by the end of the year.”
In the end, Oakley advised the council to spend some time getting better acquainted with GreenHawk’s plans before rendering a final decision on the rezoning request.
“Unless you have further questions,” she added, “I would recommend closing the public hearing and taking the next two weeks to study the plan.”
At her behest, the council agreed to vote on the project when it reconvenes on the evening of March 24.
