Apex, NC, Mar. 25, 2026 — An approximately 83-acre tract in Apex’s New Hill area is moving through annexation and rezoning, marking another step in the town’s westward growth into areas that have historically remained rural in character.
The site, made up of three parcels totaling roughly 83.5 acres, sits east of New Hill Olive Chapel Road and spans areas both north and south of Old U.S. Highway 1, near the railroad corridor. Today, the property remains under Wake County’s Residential-40 Watershed zoning and includes a mix of existing single-family homes, streams that bisect portions of the land, and areas that were previously wooded but have since been cleared. Annexation would bring the property into the Apex town limits, allowing access to municipal services and enabling the requested rezoning to a Planned Unit Development with conditional zoning.
From a long-range planning perspective, the proposal aligns with Apex’s adopted land use map, which designates the area for medium-density residential uses, along with potential commercial services and park space near key intersections. While that designation allows for development intensity of up to 7 units per acre, the current proposal falls significantly short of that threshold.
What the Development Would Deliver
The Welch Homestead plan calls for a mix of housing types across the site, including up to 123 single-family homes and 152 townhomes. Despite that total unit count, the overall density is approximately 3.3 units per acre, reflecting a deliberate decision to build at less than half of what the land use plan would permit…