New Durham Transportation Station will improve bus service for Bull City
4 Feb
A lot has changed in downtown Durham since 2004. The nearly-complete Durham Station Transportation Center is just another gleaming example of the transformation happening downtown.
Back in 2004, the glass-encased building had not even been sketched by an architect. The site the new bus station now occupies on Chapel Hill Street used to be the home to the dilapidated Heart of Durham motel. The motel, built in the late 1960s, was once a cool place to stay. But after it turned seedy after it changed ownership, reports Endangered Durham. The motel sat empty for about 12 years before it was condemned by the city and seized through eminent domain. The city later bought the property to house a new bus station.
On Sept. 30, 2004, the city staged a cheesy demolition ceremony. Here’s the lead I wrote for the event (which had the theme “Jump Start the Heart”) when I worked for the Herald-Sun:
Three firefighters armed with a heart defibrillator dashed through the parking lot of a dilapidated downtown motel Thursday, but they weren’t there to rescue anyone. Instead, they used the device to jump start changes at the Heart of Durham motel, releasing a large, heart-shaped balloon into the sky. The scene was part of a city demolition ceremony that was more symbolic than destructive.
By February 2005, the site was cleared and designs for Durham Station were complete. At the time, the transportation hub was expected to cost $15.3 million, but that price has since climbed to $17.6 million, the N&O reports.
But the new building is probably worth the wait for DATA bus riders. Here’s how N&O transportation guru Bruce Siceloff recently described the current bus station:
The transfer center is crowded, littered and chaotic. Its unisex toilet is filthy and seatless. … The buses are packed headlight-to-taillight at the curb, so they cannot come and go according to their timetables. Ready or not, each driver begins a new circuit through town when the bus at the head of the line starts rolling.
Here’s a sneak peak of the lobby of the new center:
And, as you can see, there are plenty of terminals where the buses can line up:
It’s a shame that the planned February opening has been pushed back to March so the city can tackle some nearby street improvements required by the NCDOT. But when it opens, we can all look back on the Heart of Durham days and realize just how far downtown has come (even if it took more than four years).
I drove by this at night last month on the way to DPAC and didn’t realize what I was looking at. I’m so happy to see how far Durham has come in just a few years.
I miss helping you write leads…
That was fun to help you write leads back in the day
Todd,
)
You were a great help. Now I just write whatever crap comes to mind. You were my own personal crap filter. I miss that (I bet my readers do too).
The new transportation center looks so great and will serve a real need. My big question is: Why is it ACROSS THE STREET from the train tracks? Maybe there are future plans that I’m unaware of. If anyone knows, I’d really appreciate an answer.