Edge City

Independent Weekly, The; Durham, N.C. › August 20, 2009

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Summary

The Golden Belt Manufacturing Company's textile factory on East Main Street on the east side of Durham's downtown has been shut down since 1996, leaving the historic five-building complex boarded up and effectively abandoned for a decade. Now a Durham develop ment company, Scientific Properties, is moving forward with plans to restore and revitalize the site for mixed-use development with a focus on artists' studios and live/work apartments. "The hope is that Golden Belt becomes a new artistic center for the Triangle," Audra Ladd tells me during a visit to the development, currently in what she laughingly calls "the demolition phase." "We want it to be a place where artists who want to be inspired, and work alongside other artists, will go."

Gary Kueber, a research associate at North Carolina State University's College of Design who blogs about Durham development at endanjereddurham.blojspot.com, agrees with Ladd's assessment of Golden Belt's potential, describing it as "the kind of development East needs," providing the surrounding neighborhood with desired amenities. However, his optimism is cautious, fearing that the city government's actions in East Durham will continue to move in the wrong direction: "I think this kind of development can be the seed for neighborhood revitalization - and with HOPE VI, Habitat, UDI [Urban Development Institute], etc., houses in abundance, there is little risk of displacement with rising housing values. But the revitalization will be chopped off at the knees if various entities (NIS and the county) continue to demolish houses/ buildings and build nothing but shelters, social services, low-income housing and parking lots.

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Edge City

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