406 West Chapel Hill / St. William's School

St. William's School, 1953

A view of the north side of the 400 block of West Chapel Hill St. shows several large houses.

Looking northwest from near the intersection of West Chapel Hill St. and Pettigrew, 1910s-1920s.
(Courtesy Duke Archives)

Notice that 'The Terrace', BN Duke's first house, is now on that side of the street, just beyond that is 406 West Chapel Hill. 

The eastern portion of the block had a small commercial structure, next to the railroad tracks - the Lashley Grocery.

Looking northeast towards the railroad tracks and the Walker Warehouse from West Chapel Hill St.

Commercial expansion and piecemeal replacement of these houses occurred between the 1930s and 1950s.


A&P grocery on the corner of West Chapel Hill St. and Duke St., looking northeast, 1950s.
(Courtesy Herald-Sun)

Post snowstorm view of the block, 1950s - the A&P and Esso station are visible near the end of the block on the right, while a few houses and a frame grocery - possibly still the B. Lashley grocery building (renamed "White's Lunch") remain in the right foreground. St. William's School remains in coexistence with the service station and A&P
(Courtesy Duke RBMC - Wyatt Dixon Collection)

 This side of the street was completely commercial by the late 1950s.

A&P grocery on the corner of West Chapel Hill St. and Duke St., looking northeast, 1963.

Esso station, north side of the 400 block of West Chapel Hill St., looking north-northeast, 1963.

The appearance of this block hasn't changed much since the 1960s, although the structures are now empty. In the 1990s, Amtrak moved their lovely train station to the eastern portion of this block, and 'The Amshack' (basically a single-wide) is Durham's grand depot.

400 block West Chapel Hill St., 2006, looking northwest.

Former location of the Lashley Grocery, now the Amshack, 2006.

Much of this land is owned by TTA, or in the pipeline for eminent domain proceedings for TTA. This was supposed to be a significant public-private development (with Cherokee Investment Partners as the Master Developer) surrounding the main TTA station. But with the train looking nigh impossible at this point, what happens to all of this property? I certainly hope that they proceed with development of the property as they would have, or sell it to someone who will. There is value in the assembled parcels, and I'd like to see productive use out of them - otherwise TTA becomes just-another-speculator.