Moore Square is closed until 2019. But look for new art in the meantime.

Moore Square is closed for construction for the next 14 months, and the popular downtown public space is obscured by an 8-foot fence.

Raleigh invited local artists to submit ideas to use the fence as a canvas, and the first of four installations has appeared – a looping script made out of pool noodles that reads, “Logic will take you from A to B, but imagination will take you anywhere.”

The other three projects will pop up through the beginning of 2018. They were chosen in June by arts stakeholders and were among 25 submissions. The art will cover the four sides of Moore Square, bounded by Hargett, Blount, Person and Martin streets.

“It’s a great opportunity to use what is an otherwise unattractive moment for the square and use it as an opportunity to present some attractive art,” said Bob Hagh, communications director for the nonprofit Downtown Raleigh Alliance, which has pushed for the Moore Square redevelopment on behalf of downtown business owners.

The $12.6 million project is finally underway after it was first proposed eight years ago. The square closed this month and will reopen sometime in early 2019.

Moore Square is one of the city’s oldest public spaces. Downtown workers stroll the square’s paths and eat lunch on benches, and homeless people often hang out there during the day.

After renovations, the square will be less dense and more open, and it will have a café, space for food vendors, a central water feature and larger lawns and spaces for events.

The goal is to turn the 4-acre site into a key downtown attraction that will drive pedestrians to nearby business, including those in City Market, and make the eastern edge of downtown a more appealing place to visit.

But Stephen Bentley, the Moore Square project manager for Raleigh, said the closure could temporarily slow pedestrian traffic in the area.

The streets that encircle the square will remain open.

“The other good thing about this construction is it’s not closing down roads,” Hagh said. “People can still travel around Moore Square, and that’s definitely a plus for our businesses.”

Lots of delays

It’s taken longer than many people hoped to to get started on the renovations. Plans were tabled at first as the city climbed out of The Great Recession nearly a decade ago. Then the project was plagued by disputes about the qualifications of the city’s preferred designer. In 2014, the council approved funding for the renovations and awarded a contract to Massachusetts-based landscape architects Sasaki Associates.

As recently as September 2016, the city hoped to finish renovations and reopen Moore Square by the end of this year. But construction was pushed back while the city waited for approval from the state, which owns the square. Design adjustments were also needed to keep the project within budget.

Gentrification, displacing the homeless

Moore Square’s renewal has also figured in conversations about gentrification, particularly because of the area’s history as a commercial center for Raleigh’s African-American communities.

In the weeks leading up to the mayoral election this fall, candidate Charles Francis said Moore Square’s revamp would favor the interests of affluent newcomers while excluding the homeless and other longtime residents “who just want a nice park to sit in and look at the birds.”

Francis lost the election to incumbent Mayor Nancy McFarlane.

In recent years, Moore Square has been frequented by Raleigh residents with few other places to go during the day. Bill King, the economic and planning director at the Downtown Raleigh Alliance, said he hoped the new Moore Square would emerge as a more inclusive space.

“We want downtown to be a place where everyone feels comfortable,” King said. “We don’t want this to be a project where we close Moore Square down, renovate it, and the people who are down and out are pushed aside and can’t return.”

But officials say displacement is unavoidable during construction.

“Moore Square elevated a humanity issue in Raleigh,” Bentley said. “We’ve worked with the Raleigh Rescue Mission and other organizations to talk to those individuals and get them resources that they may need.”

This story was originally published November 27, 2017 at 4:53 PM with the headline "Moore Square is closed until 2019. But look for new art in the meantime.."