NC State athletic director Boo Corrigan knows the first thing that will spring to mind when Wolfpack football fans hear about plans to develop around PNC Arena.
"Oh, my God, I'm losing my parking," he said. "It's not, 'Oh, my God, I'm losing my parking.'"
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The Centennial Authority, which owns PNC Arena, voted Tuesday morning to approve two agreements with the Carolina Hurricanes, one that allows the NHL team to develop the area around the arena in 20-acre phases. The other agreement is for a 20-year lease extension and a $300-million renovation to the arena.
NC State chancellor Randy Woodson is one of 21 members on the authority board. He made the motion to approve the two agreements. Corrigan, too, was in attendance at the meeting. He was pleased with the decision.
"It's going to be great with the relationship that we have with the Centennial Authority as well as the Hurricanes, and we're excited about it," he said.
There is the issue of parking spaces.
NC State has about 14,000 parking spaces in the areas around Carter-Finley Stadium with about 4,100 of those on the PNC Arena side. Those are the only ones that would be impacted by the development.
Phase 1 of the development, to be completed within five years, includes retail space, office space, 200 units of multi-family housing and a 150-room hotel.
Ninety-five percent of any parking lost must be replaced, according to the agreements between the Centennial Authority and the Hurricanes' parent company, Gale Force Sports and Entertainment. And 50% of the parking replacement must be surface level.
"So all of a sudden, it's 2,000 (spots)," Corrigan said. "We're also looking at where else we can expand to create more parking. It really is the best and worst problem in the world. We love it. We appreciate the history of it and are all for it."
NC State's tailgate culture is well established, the result of ample surface-level parking that surrounds Carter-Finley Stadium and PNC Arena. Hurricanes fans, too, are fond of tailgating, particularly before playoff games in the warmer spring and summer months.
"We have unbelievable parking, as good a parking as there is in college football," Corrigan said. "We're going to lose some. It's going to re-purpose, but we still have an awful lot of parking. And we have time."
Raleigh Mayor Mary-Ann Baldwin, who worked for the Hurricanes in the early 2000s, said she remembers fans from Canada sitting in little swimming pools in the parking lot.
"It was such a different experience than any of them had had," she said. "That tailgating vibe is part of the culture, but also there's a lot of people now too who want a place to go. They don't want to tailgate."
Older fans or younger ones with small children, she said, sometimes don't want to or simply can't tailgate.
"It's all about providing choices for people and respecting traditions," she said.
Wake County Commissioner Vickie Adamson said Monday during a work session that she's heard from lots of NC State fans worried about tailgating spots. She tried to reassure them.
"NC State football fans who like to tailgate, we love you and we are not going to forget about you," she said before the agreement was public.
The term sheets voted on by the board Tuesday also call for a five-acre tailgate zone for NC State to use during football games that includes no vertical development. Corrigan said that zone has not yet been identified, underscoring the long-term nature of the project.
There won't be any disruption for this football season.
"We have plenty of time to communicate," he said. "We'll have plenty of time to move people around and adjust and do all that. Thee's no shovel going in the ground tomorrow."