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a view from above Sheena Johnson Cooper graduated in 2005 with a B.A. in mass communication and went right to work for the Greater Durham Chamber of Commerce, where she is now director of communications and marketing. The Chamber’s office is on the 14th floor of the Durham Centre, the blue-paned tower that overlooks downtown on Morgan Street. “When I was in college,” she says, “I only came downtown to go to the Book Exchange or pay a parking ticket. Durham had a bad reputation – you stayed away. And now, here we are,” she says, waving at the view from the balcony. “Sitting up here, we’ve been able to watch it happen.” So what, precisely, has happened? A quick recap: Durham’s industrial and commercial core underwent a slow-motion collapse through much of the 1970s and ’80s as cigarette production dwindled and moved out of town and suburban malls killed the downtown stores. Abandoned by the exodus was a remarkable assortment of sturdy old buildings. Meanwhile, though, the surrounding region boomed. The universities and the businesses of Research Triangle generated thousands of jobs, attracting new residents from all over the country and the world. Over time, the realization grew among some discerning investors that the muscular old red brick industrial buildings had hidden potential.
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The renaissance didn’t simply happen on its own. It got some strategic help, a mix of government action, business leadership and grassroots activism. One key source has been Downtown Durham Inc. (DDI), a nonprofit established in 1993 to promote the heart of the city and encourage private investment. DDI’s chief operating officer, Matthew Coppedge, holds an MBA from NCCU, and office manager maria davis dorsey has a B.A. in English. “It’s been wonderful to see the explosion,” says Davis Dorsey, who has worked for the nonprofit from its beginning. A Durham native, she came downtown often as a child. “I remember when it was thriving,” she says. “Lots of people working downtown and lots of fancy stores, like Belk and Thalhimers. Around the time I started at DDI, downtown was dead. There was nothing here. One article about the city described downtown as ‘moribund and decaying.’ You sure can’t say that now.” “Before 1993,” Coppedge says, “there was no unifying vision for downtown. Now we are an everyday advocate. We work as the middleman to get many deals done. We pull the players together and create an environment that encourages private investment.” The private investment is taking many forms, from small startups to big projects — including two new hotel projects now in the works. “For small business,” Coppedge says, “we walk them through the whole process — getting permits, lining up architects, finding space, making introductions.”
If you’ve been away from Durham for a while, you’ll find the biggest surprise across the railroad tracks from the city center at the American Tobacco complex. Nine years after it reopened, the huge former cigarette factory is a model mixed-use urban redevelopment — restaurants, offices, shops, bars, and a business incubator. The driving force behind American Tobacco was Jim Goodmon, president and CEO of Capitol Broadcasting, the Raleigh-based company that owns WRAL-TV, WRAZ-TV and other broadcast properties, as well as the Durham Bulls baseball team and the American Tobacco property. Paul Pope, a 1975 NCCU graduate, recalls how the transformation unfolded. He remembers that the sprawling old tobacco factory had been empty for more than a decade, and it was a mess. Pigeon-droppings covered the floors. Trees grew within the walls in a few places. Now a member of the NCCU Board of Trustees, Pope retired from Capitol Broadcasting in 2010 after more than 40 years with the company — working his way up from cameraman, to station manager, to vice president of community relations and, from 2005 until his retirement, vice president and general manager of the American Tobacco Campus. “American Tobacco was Jim Goodmon’s vision from the start,” Pope says. “Capitol had bought the Bulls in 1991, when they still played at the old Durham Athletic Park. During negotiations with the city about a new stadium, Goodmon promised that if the city would build the new park next to the empty factory, he would find someone to rebuild American Tobacco.” The new stadium, Durham Bulls Athletic Park, known locally as “the D-BAP,” opened for the 1995 season. After trying for a while to find a developer, Goodmon decided to do it himself. Pope remembers being skeptical. “While it was taking shape, I thought, ‘He’s going to bankrupt the company — all that asbestos, all that lead paint.’ And there was nothing worth going to in that part of town before the ballpark was built.” Goodmon worked with DDI leaders to persuade the city and county to build the parking decks to support American Tobacco, the ballpark and additional growth. “When it was up and running,” Pope says, “I was brought over to keep it on track. Our challenge was to make it a destination.” He and his colleagues recruited restaurants and some big important initial tenants, including McKinney + Silver, the big advertising agency; Compuware, a software company run by Peter Karmanos, owner of the Carolina Hurricanes; and Duke University. They started an outdoor concert series. They turned the lighting of Christmas lights on the Lucky Strike water tower into a festive annual event. “It’s been a great experience,” Pope says, as well as a big financial success. Now Capitol is nearing completion around the stadium of the third of three “Diamond View” office buildings.
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