Richland Creek Tract Transferred to Umstead Park

State Property Office Records Deed

by Kate Dixon, TLC Executive Director
(from TLC News, March 1997)

On January 23, 1997, the State Property Office recorded the deed for a tract of land that TLC donated to Umstead Park more than 20 months earlier. This land donation was tied up in the controversy over whether the State should build the Duraleigh Connector. Although the Governor and statewide elected officials voted to accept the property, and TLC delivered the deed, the State Property Office refused to take action on the property after the NC Department of Transportation decided in May 1995 that it might want to build the Duraleigh Connector across the property. The impasse was finally resolved when Governor Hunt expressed his opposition to the road in early December 1996.

The land that TLC donated to Umstead Park was originally given to us by Dr. and Mrs. Edgar Baker of Raleigh. Dr. Baker, who owned the tract for many years, wanted to see it become a part of Umstead Park and asked TLC to help make that happen. For tax and other reasons, the Bakers wanted to donate the land in 1991, but state government could not move that quickly to accept the land. TLC was able to take the property on the Baker's time frame and then hold it until the state would accept it.

The 13-acre Baker property on Ebenezer Church Road is a site that Umstead Park has been interested in acquiring for many years because it establishes a natural boundary for the Park at Richland Creek. Richland Creek has also been an area of special interest to TLC because it is the most important wildlife corridor remaining within the city limits of Raleigh.