Hotel, new homes, traffic shift: Development bookends Raleigh's Oberlin Village
Construction cranes are rising at both ends of Oberlin Road in Raleigh.
The Village District is getting its first hotel along with hundreds of new apartments next door.
To the north, a new neighborhood known as Budleigh East is going up next to Oberlin Magnet Middle school where Country Club Homes used to be.
Village District General Manager Brooke Conn oversees a shopping center which is becoming a destination from daybreak to late at night.
"Our 75th anniversary is next year," she said. "We really want to have the 6 a.m. to midnight vibe."
What was the K&W Cafeteria will soon see the Village District's first hotel.
The 7-story Oberlin Hotel will bring 153 rooms with a rooftop restaurant and bar.
"We needed additional overnight accommodations – not just for the proximity to NC State, but also for the business class we have surrounding this area," Conn said.
The hotel's name to honors the neighborhood's past. Oberlin Village was established as a community of African-Americans freed from slavery, built on a former plantation.
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At the corner of Fairview Road, the new Budleigh East neighborhood will include dozens of new homes, condos and a 214-unit independent senior living community.
Oberlin Road is getting a streetscape makeover, too. The project will reduce traffic from two lanes to one in each direction to add new bike lanes, sidewalks and crosswalks.
Sylvester Percival, division manager of Raleigh Roadway Design & Construction, says, limiting vehicle traffic will decrease congestion without taking away from the properties that exist along the road.
The city expects the road project to take about a year to complete, with work on the streetscape set to begin in November 2023.
