Articles
Shredded paper Paper is a popular recycling item so it may seem a bit puzzling that shredded paper is on the do-not-toss list for your curbside recycling bin. It’s just too small for the sorting machines used at Mecklenburg’s recycling processing facility. It can be composted, put in the recycling container at your grocery store […]
As part of the 2009 youth needs assessment, the institute inventoried youth workforce development programs in Mecklenburg County. The resulting Youth Services Catalog includes all organizations that provide workforce development services for at-risk and disconnected youth in the Charlotte area. It contains a range of information on each program/organization, including basic contact information, whom it […]
When David Walters moved to Charlotte in 1990, you could pretty much fit all the people here who understood urbanism into one room. And when that happened – for instance, at the loosely organized Charlotte Urban Forum breakfast group – Walters was generally right in the thick of it. He’s been in the thick of […]
Back in 2012, Chef Barry Francois had an idea for a new business – a mobile farmers market that would take fresh fruits and vegetables to Charlotte neighborhoods without grocery stores. The idea, pitched as a way to encourage entrepreneurship while providing fresh produce to “food deserts” and other economically distressed areas, won him $12,500 […]
We asked UNC Charlotte professor David Walters, who is retiring, what three major planning breakthroughs would he want to see made in North Carolina? “I’d work my first miracle at home. For Charlotte we would have a funded transit system with the associated private development, the tens of thousands of homes and new jobs.” “I’d […]
“Much of the damage inflicted on land is quite invisible to laymen,” noted revered conservationist Aldo Leopold. The trained ecologist, on the other hand, “lives alone in world of wounds.” She takes no pleasure in evergreen thickets of Chinese privet on a dreary winter day. She cringes at patches of lush Japanese stilt grass. She […]
From Hyde Park to Sheffield Park to Madison Park, plenty of Charlotte-area neighborhoods are filled with people who love where they live. Now, they have an opportunity to show the world what’s remarkable about their neighborhoods. Learn more Want to lead a walk? Some tips Read about previous years’ walks: In Jane Jacobs’ footsteps, exploring […]
In honor of our second anniversary, PlanCharlotte.org is asking readers to nominate spots in the Charlotte region that need a design makeover. (See our first installment in this series here and our second installment here. Urban designers Keihly Moore and Alex Borisenko have launched a website, www.completeblocks.com, where they’re proposing a series of urban design […]
The LandTrust for Central North Carolina and staff from the North Carolina Museum of Sciences will host the second annual Uwharrie Naturalist Weekend on May 10 and 11, 2014. This naturalist weekend is the only one of its kind in the area and showcases the 1,300-acre Low Water Bridge Preserve on the Uwharrie River. The […]
As a planner, I’ve found most communities open to making concessions to pedestrians and cyclists in their transportation plans, a goal generally phrased as “providing transportation choices.” There’s an underlying assumption that transportation networks are for cars and trucks, and accommodating anything else is just for variety. For example, Charlotte’s Transportation Action Plan includes a […]
In honor of our second anniversary, PlanCharlotte.org is asking readers to nominate spots in the Charlotte region that need a design makeover. (See our first installment in this series here and our second installment here. Urban designers Keihly Moore and Alex Borisenko have launched a website, www.completeblocks.com, where they’re proposing a series of urban design […]
In the Uwharries, raptors make their presence known in late winter and early spring. A lone female northern harrier has spent the winter skimming our fields of native warm season grass. I’ve come to wonder if she’s the same one who shows up every fall, who chased away another pair of harriers who tried to […]