Hillsborough Street losing some familiar haunts
Some veritable Hillsborough Street institutions are falling victim to progress as NC State and Raleigh leaders seek to bring new life to the recently spruced up thoroughfare.
A 125-room hotel will fill the block across from the Memorial Bell Tower, displacing longtime tenant Sadlack’s Heroes. Earlier this month, bulldozers took down The Brewery, a music venue that hosted many a rising star over the years. Its former spot west of campus will house a drug store and apartments.
The 1.3-acre hotel site is owned by the University Endowment Fund. NC State chose local developers Bell View Partners and The Bernstein Companies to complete the project, which will include street-level retail. “This is a big step forward in the continuing effort to make Hillsborough Street a destination for the greater community,” Ralph Recchie, NC State’s director of real estate, said in a statement earlier this month.
But the plans are bittersweet for patrons of Sadlock’s, which has served sandwiches and beer to generations of NC State students and locals.
“It’s like Cheers, where you come in and everyone knows your name, and you recognize everyone in the place,” says Jeff Burton, who eats lunch and drinks happy-hour beers there several times a week.
The Brewery was demolished earlier this month.
The changes come a year after the city completed a $10-million project to improve Hillsborough Street, adding roundabouts to calm traffic and improving parking and sidewalks.
Sadlock’s owner, Rose Schwetz, isn’t sure when the demolition will take place, or if her shop might find a home in the new building.
”It’s kind of sad,” says Schwetz, who took over the shop from Frank Sadlack in 1984. “But that’s just what progress is.”
– Marti Anne Maguire
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This is wrong….what’s next….Mitch’s and Players Retreat? They are taking away the charm of NCSU. NCSU Alumni will not recognize Hillsborough Street once all of the hotels and high-rises are constructed. Are alumni donations funding these atrocities? If so, you can forget my check.
I don’t quite understand the demand for a hotel across from the Belltower when the Holiday Inn Brownstone (recently renovated) is less than a mile towards downtown and the Velvet Cloak is a stone’s throw from that. I’ll be sad to see Sadlack’s go. I still go by every now and then.
I hope sadlacks finds a new home in the new retail component. Its a NC State staple that future students must experience
Awful, awful idea. Why is the university destroying the establishments that are uniquely NC State? The redevelopment is going too far now.This makes no sense to me, we don’t need or want another (failed) hotel here, or chain retail stores for that matter. You can rest assured NCSU will never see another dollar of support from me. Shame on you NC State!!
Thank God they are doing this. Hillsborough St. has been a dump for far too long. NCSU will get much more financial support from me with this totally needed sprucing up.
Sadlacks was a relic. Students no longer went there, and same for Player’s Retreat. Sad for older alum, but true. Hillsborough Street is not what it once was as has not been for a long, long time. How many of you 70’s / 80’s alum have been back to Hillsborough in the last 10 years?
I find it interesting that the one person posting in favor of this plan doesn’t even live in Raleigh, or NC for that matter. With all due respect, I think the opinions of the people that actually reside in the NC State area and have to live with these changes hold more merit.