Town, UNC confront Carolina North housing

CHAPEL HILL -- Town and gown are still at odds over how much housing UNC-Chapel Hill should build at Carolina North.

Community members, led by Carrboro Mayor Mark Chilton, and university representatives, led by Carolina North Executive Director Jack Evans, agreed that the proposed research campus should not exacerbate the affordable housing problem in Chapel Hill and Carrboro.

They agreed also that the price range of homes at Carolina North should more or less mirror the income range of the employees who will work at the campus, though skewed toward lower-priced homes.

They could not agree on how many homes Carolina North will need. To keep additional traffic off local roads, Chilton proposed that the campus have as many dwelling units as there will be households to staff it, a number he pegs at about 10,000 by the time Carolina North is built out 50 years from now.

University representatives maintained their position that not every Carolina North worker will want to live there.

For example, chemistry Chairman Holden Thorp said only about 40 percent of his department's employees live in Chapel Hill or Carrboro, and many choose an area he called the Saxapahaw corridor.

"They can have a fairly large home on a large lot," Thorp said. "If you told them, 'We're going to give you a smaller home at Carolina North,' I don't think a lot of them would take it."

George Cianciolo, chairman of the Chapel Hill Planning Board, suggested that making parking difficult at Carolina North would force people to take a bus, which might in turn persuade them to live closer to work.

Town Council member Cam Hill added that building thousands of homes at Carolina North might stall rising sale prices and persuade more university employees to live in town.

"The reason there's not enough reasonably priced housing is because there's not enough housing to fulfill the demand," Hill said. "If we had more housing in Chapel Hill and Carrboro, the prices would go down."