Articles

Dr. Lori Thomas Our community’s challenges extend past any one silo, organization or jurisdictional line. Public education systems address hunger, health, homelessness, and other impacts of poverty. Our jails and prisons are mental health and substance use treatment facilities. Our workforce development efforts must circumvent fragmented transportation, distant and still unaffordable housing before people can […]

One of Charlotte’s quintessential suburban communities has big plans to transform itself into a dense, walkable, mixed-use center. Greenways, sidewalks, protected bike lanes and transit would replace the car-choked expressways and huge parking lots that dominate the auto-centric area now. We’re not talking about Ballantyne or SouthPark. Leaders in University City — Charlotte’s second-largest employment […]

You’ve surely seen them, but you might not have noticed them—roadside signs with a big “Z,” indicating an upcoming public hearing on zoning at an interminable City Council meeting. Most of us know that zoning exists. Perhaps we even know it involves planning and land use. But for many of us, the specific details are […]

CATS chief John Lewis on Wednesday shed new light on the reasons that his transit agency’s buses increasingly are late or don’t show up, saying that drivers using their allotted paid sick days are leaving the agency without enough workers to operate routes and contributing to unreliable service. At a meeting of elected officials from […]

A far-reaching new plan could shape Charlotte’s transportation infrastructure for decades to come, reorienting a car-dependent, sprawling Southern city towards a denser, transit-oriented, bike- and pedestrian-friendly future. Charlotte City Council approved the Strategic Mobility Plan on Monday in a 9-2 vote, with council members Tariq Bokhari and Ed Driggs voting no. The plan was developed […]

Plant obsessions can run in different directions. Some plant lovers amass a deep collection of a single species – say, iris, roses or hostas. Others go wide — they want one of everything. I’m definitely on the wide end of that spectrum, but I’m moving toward the center. I’ve come to appreciate how a mass […]

Brookings Institution Press (February 22, 2022) From $24.99 (paperback) Length: 210 pages Who should read it? Fixer-Upper is a great book for policymakers and people interested in understanding the nitty-gritty of how some housing policies have distorted the market and driven up prices. The data and anecdotes agree: people in the Charlotte region are struggling […]

For three years, transit advocates have lobbied for the proposed Silver Line to bring passengers closer to uptown — instead of the planned route that would follow Interstate 277. The Charlotte Area Transit System refused, saying the I-277 route north of uptown would spur more development. The transit system also said bringing the train into […]

As COVID-19 fades from the front pages but normalcy still hovers out of reach, Charlotte’s two biggest employment centers want to resemble each other a bit more in the decades to come. On the surface, University City (a sprawling, suburban landscape dominated by cul-de-sacs, strip shopping centers, the university campus and office parks) doesn’t seem […]

This might surprise some people who think bicycling in Charlotte is serious, or scary: Riding is fun! If you come and ride your bicycle with me, you’ll most likely have a good experience. I’ve been leading bike rides since 2013, sometimes three per week. I also teach CyclingSavvy, a skills course that equips riders to […]

This story originally appeared in the Charlotte Ledger business newsletter, and is reproduced here with permission. The start of summer beckons in the region’s extensive greenways, but Mecklenburg County’s publicly owned green spaces are under attack from a half-inch-long insect that’s turning whole areas of our urban forest into tree graveyards. The emerald ash borer, […]

Update: On June 13, Charlotte City Council approved changes to eliminate the petition process for traffic-calming requests) Where you live in Charlotte has a big effect on whether neighborhood safety measures like speed humps, stop signs and lower speed limits are installed nearby. Charlotte’s traffic-calming policy has been in place since 1997, and remains “very […]