UNC chancellor to ask trustees for $8M to start Carolina North campus planning
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Trustees may approve $8 million to fund planning and budgeting for Carolina North.
- Plan could add student and family housing and commercial space.
- Proposal links possible Smith Center relocation, new stadiums and transit planning.
UNC-Chapel Hill trustees could approve $8 million this week to kickstart Carolina North, a long-planned academic and research campus with housing and commercial space north of downtown Chapel Hill.
The 200- to 250-acre project, first approved by the town in 2009, languished without funding or support until new conversations among university officials last year. The future of the aging Dean E. Smith Center basketball arena on campus has also driven talks about a possible new stadium at Carolina North.
UNC Chancellor Lee Roberts has not announced what will happen to the Smith Center, which could also be rebuilt in its current location near UNC Hospitals. Another option is to renovate the existing arena, but officials have said that may not be worth the $80 million to $100 million cost just to replace the roof, renovate the bathrooms and upgrade the concessions area.
On Wednesday, a UNC Board of Trustees agenda shows Roberts will update committees on the Carolina North discussion. The trustees’ Budget, Finance and Infrastructure Committee is being asked to approve spending $8 million to hire consultants to draft a Carolina North campus plan and establish a project budget.
The full Board of Trustees could vote to approve the spending Thursday. The board’s agenda notes university trust funds will pay for the work.
Carolina North, at the corner of Estes Drive Extension and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard in Chapel Hill, “represents a unique opportunity for UNC to plan and construct a multi-use development to support both academic and research expansion as well as enrollment growth, including the development of undergraduate and graduate housing, intramural fields and related private investment to support the site user,” the Board of Trustees agenda states.
The meetings will begin at 9 a.m. Wednesday and Thursday at the Friday Center.
A big question will be whether the university seeks the Chapel Hill Town Council’s approval of any Carolina North plans. A change in state law last year exempts UNC System universities in Orange, Wake, Buncombe and Watauga counties from local zoning and development rules.
Any development at Carolina North would still have to meet state requirements.
Carolina North, two miles north of UNC’s main campus off Franklin Street, includes a total of 947 acres, most of which remains forested. The agenda notes there are roughly 250 acres at the former Horace Williams Airport that could be used to build a new campus focused on academics and research.
Future development also could add 2,200 new undergraduate beds, more graduate housing and housing for working families and professionals, it says, meeting a critical need in Chapel Hill, as well as commercial space and potential athletic venues.
University officials are already collaborating with the town to plan for transportation and increased traffic through the heavily traveled corridor, it says. The town also has applied for federal funding to build a North-South bus-rapid transit route from Interstate 40 to the UNC campus, UNC Hospitals and Southern Village, south of town. A BRT stop would be part of a future campus development.
Carolina North: A brief history
Roberts is the fourth UNC chancellor to push for development at Carolina North.
In 2008, then-Chancellor James Moeser negotiated a development agreement with the town to build an 8 million to 9 million square foot satellite campus over 50 years. The first phase — 3 million square feet on 133 acres — stalled without funding and in the face of shifting priorities.
Since that time, the university has identified a growing list of significant and severe deficiencies, especially in buildings constructed decades or centuries ago and residence halls that no longer attract students drawn to off-campus options.
This year, the university enrolled its largest ever first-year class, adding 500 more students in its first step toward a 10-year goal of having 5,000 more undergraduates on campus. Over 32,000 undergraduate, graduate and professional students now attend the 230-year-old institution.
Chapel Hill’s housing need
In the last decade, the town also has held ongoing conversations with UNC and UNC Health officials about the critical need for more housing.
In 2021, a town-gown study showed the need for 485 more homes a year for the next 20 years just to keep up with the current demand, including 45 student housing units each year. Chapel Hill Mayor Jess Anderson has said the town can’t fix the problem without the university’s help.
One of the other big concerns for town residents will be the fate of Carolina North Forest, which lies north and west of the Horace Williams tract.
In 2012, county and UNC records show 258 acres of the most sensitive land at Carolina North was placed into a conservation agreement with the nonprofit Triangle Land Conservancy. That was only a portion of the 311 acres identified for preservation in the 2009 agreement.
This story was originally published January 20, 2026 at 6:05 PM.
