Mecklenburg

In January 2019, the U.S. Department of Housing & Urban Development (HUD) released a Continuum of Care (CoC) Racial Equity Analysis Tool to help communities across the United States understand who is accessing local CoC systems and what outcomes are being achieved. Mecklenburg County Community Support Services, in partnership with UNC Charlotte Urban Institute, adapted […]

Common rush (Juncus effusus) is often used in riparian restoration projects. It provides cover for wildlife and helps stabilize soil and filter stormwater runoff, and it can be found throughout the Uwharries. Jim Matthews, professor emeritus at UNC Charlotte and founder of Habitat Assessment and Restoration Professionals, calls it the “Cadillac of wetland plants” because it can grow in standing water but also tolerate dry spells.

“How shall we grow?” That question was the dramatic title of a 1955 report examining the Charlotte region’s breakneck growth (Almost 200,000 residents and 75,000 cars in the county!) and looming challenges. Confronted with worsening traffic, inadequate transportation options, a lack of park space and the fear that growth was running away without a real, […]

Across Charlotte, developers are planning to add dense, mixed-use developments to parking lots at malls, shopping centers and office parks. See some of their plans, along with what’s there now.

It’s happening across Charlotte: Apartments, office buildings and restaurants are popping up in parking lots, as dense, mixed-use developments, connected by bicycle paths and walking trails, invade suburbia. Within the past month, major plans have been announced for densifying and transforming chunks of Ballantyne, SouthPark and University City – three of the biggest bastions of […]

Are youth who are disengaged from school more likely to enter the juvenile justice system – and does this vary for youth of different races and ethnicities? That was the question UNC Charlotte professor Dr. Susan McCarter set out to answer. Using data from the Institute for Social Capital, an integrated data system that’s part […]

A long-range game plan to dramatically reduce Charlotte’s greenhouse gas footprint has been an on-again, off-again priority since 2007. That’s when Charlotte City Council adopted its first greenhouse gas emission reduction resolution. And now, after a lapse of 11 years, it’s on again. In one of his first initiatives as newly elected mayor in 2009, […]

While Charlotte’s light rail line runs through the city’s glittering uptown – a tunnel of office towers and parking decks – at the farther reaches, the landscape tells different stories. Along the route of the Blue Line, from the edge of Pineville on the south to the UNC Charlotte campus at the north, you find […]

As the Charlotte region urbanizes, what changes will take place over time in the Catawba River basin near the smaller creeks and watersheds? Two UNC Charlotte researchers hope questions like that can be answered with information they’ll start gathering, thanks to a Duke Energy Foundation grant. The $76,521 grant from the Duke Energy Water Resources […]

Population growth in Charlotte and Raleigh continues apace, driving rapid growth into areas nearby. Example: The historic city of Hickory is now smaller than the former hamlet of Huntersville.