From under bridges, roadside camps, park benches, church basements, junked cars and the other makeshift places where the homeless sleep, hundreds came Thursday morning to three Triangle events aimed at getting them off the street.

As a steady rain fell in Raleigh's Moore Square, student barbers gave free haircuts, dentists pulled blackened teeth and volunteers served hot cream of broccoli soup while the representatives of social service agencies and local charities helped those in need negotiate the paperwork for long-term help.

In downtown Durham, bedraggled men and women, some with children in tow, waited inside Urban Ministries for blood pressure screenings and flu shots while getting information about services. Dozens more trickled into Chapel Hill's Hargraves Community Center to apply for rental subsidies, get tested for HIV and speak with mental health providers.

The three simultaneous events, the first of their kind in the Triangle, were all part of Project Homeless Connect, a national effort to provide one-stop assistance to the scattered and often anonymous people who lack permanent shelter.

Thursday's event was part of a larger strategy targeted at ending homelessness in the Triangle within the next decade.

"If it's just today, it's not going to be worth a whole lot," said Stephen Raburn, executive director of the Volunteer Center of Durham.

More than 500 people attended the event in Moore Square, a park known as a haven for the homeless. The turnout was higher than expected, but organizers acknowledged that the crowd was a fraction of Raleigh's total homeless population.

Estimating the true numbers of local residents without stable housing is difficult. They are often largely invisible and ignored by the more well-to-do who pass by while avoiding eye contact.

More than 3,000 people are thought to be homeless in Wake County at any time, though as many as five times that number are considered at risk -- doubled up with family or sleeping on the couches of friends. Another 2,500 homeless are estimated to live in Durham.

In Raleigh on Thursday, the tents offering the most sought-after services were quickly swamped. The event had been under way only a half hour before an announcement went out that all the appointments to see two dentists working out of a nearby bus had been taken.

"That was my whole reason for coming," said a disappointed Jimmy McCalop, who complained of a sore molar as he waited for a haircut.

McCalop, who said he served 12 years in the Army, has been homeless about three years. He said he receives treatment from the Veterans Administration for mental illness and has had trouble holding a job. He spent Wednesday night at a shelter on South Wilmington Street.

Roberto and Deanna Thomas, a married couple from Sampson County, said they had been in Raleigh for a week. Their caseworker with Coordinated Health Services drove them up and dropped them off in front of the Raleigh Rescue Mission, they said. The Thomases soon learned that local shelters don't typically admit couples, giving them the tough choice of whether to split up.

"We slept here [in the park] last night," Roberto said.

Tammy Reeves, a mother of four living temporarily in an apartment provided by Pan Lutheran Ministries, waited in line to see whether she could get public housing through the Raleigh Housing Authority.

"They told me there was a two-year waiting list because they tore down everything," Reeves said. "I've got until January, then we'll have to find someplace else."

Two of Raleigh's largest public housing complexes were bulldozed in recent years as part of the federal Hope VI program, which provided $53 million in grants to replace them with new townhouses and apartments intended to mix market-rate renters and homeowners with those on public assistance.

Finding a decent home in Raleigh is difficult even for those with steady but low-paying jobs. The average two-bedroom apartment goes for $800 a month.

Ramona Love of Durham brought her two sons, Vontrey, 1, and Shyheimin, 2, for free flu vaccine, hepatitis shots and lead tests. An unemployed single mother, she worries about what might happen to her boys if they were to get seriously ill.

Without insurance, she relies on emergency rooms for routine heath care -- often an all-day affair that ends with Love trying to calm her fussing boys for hours in a cramped waiting room.

"I have to carry them both, and I have to get on three buses to get where I'm going," said Love, who lives in an apartment now but has been homeless in the past. "It's just a big mess."

In Chapel Hill, Mike Atherton needed to see a dentist and complained of foot pain. Atherton isn't homeless, but said he's about to be. He had been renting a house in Chatham County, he said, but the property was sold. He was supposed to be out a while ago. "It won't be long before I have the sheriff or whatever knocking on my door," he said.

He's not sure where he'll go.

"Live in my truck. Find a place to put a tent up somewhere," said Atherton, who works for a tree service. "I don't have a whole lot of choice."

Though all the dental appointments were taken, Atherton did get to see podiatrist Jane Andersen.

He thanked her as he pulled on his socks to leave. "I feel better already," Atherton said.