The Raleigh City Council will vote on the train station rezoning case this Tuesday, September 20, at the 1:00 session. Feel free to join us at Council Chambers on Tuesday! Our Save the Train Station taskforce will not oppose the final conditions. Read more about this decision in our public statement:

707 Semart Drive was sold by the Logan family to Turnbridge Equities in December 2021, and in the months since then several groups of community members, preservationists, architects, and concerned citizens have joined together to advocate for the preservation of this historic train station. By right and in accordance with current zoning, Turnbridge could demolish the building and build up to seven stories, similar to what Hoffman has done with other parcels in the Seaboard Station area. Despite being approached by preservation groups, the Logan family refused to place the station on the historic register as a Landmarked Property and sold it with no protections.

During the past ten months, Turnbridge has met with members of several preservation groups many times. At the beginning of these discussions the entire train station was going to be demolished.  Through negotiations and lengthy conversations, the final set of zoning conditions evolved. The zoning conditions that City Council will vote on on September 20, 2022 represent a great deal of compromise on the part of both the developer and the Save the Train Station citizen groups.  As with any compromise, no one is 100% happy. However we feel that we have accomplished our original goals which were: 1) Convince the developer to save the train station or preserve portions of it. 2) Raise awareness of the importance of this historic building to our community.

After careful negotiations, review of the revised conditions, and verbal assurance from the developers, a majority of our final nine-member taskforce agreed to the final conditions. On Tuesday, September 13, we emailed City Council to inform them that we would not oppose the final conditions. View the final conditions and learn more about the 707 Semart rezoning case here: http://go.boarddocs.com/nc/raleigh/Board.nsf/goto?open&id=CJ2HB44788AD

Will the entire train station be saved in its original location? No, but a minimum of 50% of the main part of the building, including the eastern facade, will be saved either in place or on their parcel, or Turnbridge or another group can move it to an adjacent property. If not, Turnbridge will not be able to build more than seven stories. Do we feel that this is “meaningful preservation”?  Yes.  

Jason Davis from Turnbridge, along with attorney Jamie Schwedler, agree that they will work to save more than 50% percent of the building. While an “assurance” clause cannot be legally placed in the conditions, our group as well as the Mayor and Council are assured that Turnbridge in good faith and in accordance with their aspirational language will work to preserve more than the minimum which is outlined in the conditions. 

We sincerely appreciate all of the over 3800 people who signed this petition to help Save Seaboard Train Station! We will continue to advocate for the preservation of the station in a meaningful way and would appreciate your support. 

We hope that Raleigh citizens will be reminded of our efforts every time they visit the Seaboard area and learn about our local history. And we hope that future preservation efforts can be more successful at convincing property owners to place buildings on the historic registry and/or Landmark list, so more of our historic buildings are not lost.

Feel free to email us at savethestation@mordecaicac.org.