Raleigh area after 11 months

An old friend emailed this morning asking how we’re liking the Raleigh area. This seemed like a good opportunity to share my thoughts with both you and him. Some of this expands on my thoughts from last August.

Due to COVID we haven't spent much time getting to know the greater Raleigh area. Sherri and I spent a night in Chapel Hill when we were thinking of moving to the area, and the whole family flew in to RDU airport from California, but beyond that we haven't explored.

Holly Springs itself is experiencing massive growth. It has a few things going for it, which factored into our decision to move here specifically once we'd decided on the RDU area.

1 - Lots of new housing. Apartments, townhomes, small and large houses. Some developments (like ours) nearing completion, some like Trinity Creek are mid-way, and others like Carolina Springs are just getting started. So a variety of options and price points.

2 - Close to new toll road. I mentioned this one last time, too. Today one end of the 540 toll road dumps out in Holly Springs. This road leads to RDU airport and on to Durham. I can go from my driveway to RDU economy parking lot in 25 minutes. And it's about the same to get to Research Triangle Park, where Apple just announced a new $1B campus. Plans are underway to continue to loop this road up to Raleigh, but that will take awhile. 

3 - Ting Internet. A fair bit of the town is wired for 1000 Mbit internet. We pay $89/mo to get wired speeds that average 800 Mbit down AND up.

4 - Futures. The town seems serious about fostering and supporting future growth. There's an industrial park carved out in the land next to our development, with a variety of small and large companies there already. Fujifilm announced plans to build a $2B cell culture manufacturing facility in this park. 

5 - The town itself. We don't know much about the town itself yet. It's large enough for every big box store you can imagine to be here, though Publix is the next town over. Wegman's is under construction. There's a Main Street, but right now it's only like 2 blocks. They do have a plan to make it more of an attraction and are laying down the infrastructure (like parking garage) to support it. There's a well-regarded Farmers Market every Saturday during warmer months, and off-weeks rest of the year. There are some family-owned stores and restaurants around but overall the area is dominated by chains. We like Bass Lake Park (town park) and Harris Lake County Park nearby is awesome.

For downsides: this isn’t Holly Springs’ fault, of course, but I’d like to be closer to the mountains. And I wish Lennar had spared some of the trees that used to be on our property instead of clear-cutting everything.

One last note for the California people reading this: there’s actual weather here. For example, it’s the month of May and it’s raining here today. I know that sounds weird. You get used to it.