Apr

Downtown Parking Fees On the Way?

Earlier this week news outlets reported that the City of Raleigh is going to seek more parking revenues as a way to cover a larger than anticipated revenue shortfall for The City. Not only will Raleigh go after unpaid parking fines, but will also consider selling ad space in parking decks and ending the practice of free parking during nights and weekends.

"The city’s not making enough off parking and it’s obvious people don’t like paying for tickets. That’s the issue," said City Council member Mary Ann Baldwin.

During the last decade and a half downtown Raleigh has undergone an enormous resurgence that went along with a $2 billion investment from the private and public sectors. In the late 90’s we started to see Raleigh most interesting new restaurants appearing in downtown instead of in the suburbs. Popular bars in the suburbs began to fade as a bustling nightlife emerged in downtown Raleigh. In fact, almost every single interesting restaurant to open in the last 10 years has been in downtown Raleigh.

Apparently the City of Raleigh wants to ignore the role of free parking in that renaissance. The introduction of nighttime parking fees is a huge deterrent for restaurant patrons who have an alternative. If this becomes the city’s policy, expect a renaissance of its own in North Raleigh. Downtown parking fees would be a huge boon to restaurateurs in the suburbs.

Increased parking revenues from downtown lots also would be a big boon to McLaurin Parking Company , the company that operates these parking structures. You may also know that company as…the inlaws of Mayor, Charles Meeker.

Nothing lasts forever. Hillsborough Street’s nightlife scene in the 70’s rivaled Chapel Hill’s Franklin Street. North Raleigh saw a ton of great restaurants open in the 80’s. The popularity of downtown in the last 15 years is a delicate thing. If the City of Raleigh wants that momentum to continue, it must proceed with extreme caution. As it is, downtown is not perceived as convenient to where people chose to live, it isn’t perceived as an easy place to park, and it’s wave is nearing the point where we’ve typically seen nightlife/entertainment cycles end in Raleigh’s history.

Mar

Subscribe to Gogo’s Google Calendar for Complete NCAA Tournament Action

It’s NCAA tourney time and you guessed it! Gogoraleigh is your source for importing calendar events for all of the games. It is a Google Calendar which contains all 36 First Round games. Keep following it, though, as the next round games will be added as soon as they are determined. Subscribe in Google Calendar , on your Android Phone, iPhone , iPad other capable device!

The two area teams playing include:

UNC vs. Long Island – Friday at 7:15 pm (CBS)
Duke vs. Hampton – Friday at 3:10 pm (truTV)

This year’s tournament will be broadcasted on four different networks for the first time. The games will appear in Raleigh on these Time Warner Cable Channels:

SD

CBS – 3 and 105
TBS – 34 and 302
TNT – 26 and 301
truTV – 44 and 313

HD

CBS – 1105 and 5.1
TBS – 1302
TNT – 1301
truTV – 1313

Posted by Dana on March 14, 2011 | Tags: Exclusives , Sports . | ( 0 ) Comments

Feb

Chipotle Coming to Hillsborough St.

Fast-Mex outlet Chipotle is coming to Hillsborough St. The site will be near Jimmy John’s and Duncan Donuts, either in the free-standing building that was home to Sylvia’s Pizza or on the corner where GoPaks Bazaar was. At this point construction has not begun, but in all likelihood the store will open in the summer.

This is a major blessing for Hillsborough Street. A strip that has been dotted by junk food and forgettable local food is showing signs of life to a Denver-based company that takes site selection very seriously. Hopefully it is the sign of more good things for the area. The company is also expanding into Fayetteville, showing another positive sign about the economy.

If you haven’t had Chipotle’s carnitas on crunchy tacos, then you are really missing out. Try the trio with a different salsa on each, plus cheese and lettuce. It makes one fantastic lunch.

map it

Posted by Dana on February 15, 2011 | Tags: Exclusives , Food . | ( 7 ) Comments

Feb

ACC Football Schedules Posted for Easy Download

Today the ACC released the complete schedule for the upcoming football season. In typical fashion, gogoraleigh has compiled the schedules into a formats that are easy to import into almost all calendar applications. Included are not only downloadable files for the UNC and NCSU schedules, but also files for the entire ACC conference schedule.

Google Calendar users will find that the existing feed for each of these schedules has been updated, so there is no need change anything if you are already subscribed.

TV has not had a chance to affect the schedule, so the dates are not final and times are not set.

Posted by Dana on February 14, 2011 | Tags: Exclusives , Other . | ( 0 ) Comments

Jan

Late Night Eats

If you have been to a “Starve Dana” party or the equivalent, no doubt you know what it is like to seek food toward the end of the night in Raleigh. Here are some of the best options for late night eating on a Friday or Saturday night. They fall into two main districts: