elvigy

Turns out you are correct. And infuriatingly, Democrats have shot themselves in the foot on this one. They selected Mackey by a large margin. He's the one who resigned the police dept so he wouldn't be fired for falsifying time records, and later declared bankruptcy. Now he's running a huge operation with many many millions of dollars in its budget. I don't understand why they'd pick this guy, even if he did have a great shmoozefest going on with the Democratic leaders.

I've been wondering the same exact thing. Not that I could ever be accused of being sympathetic to Republicans , but this does seem, on the surface, just a tad unfair.

Yeah, I've seen stores with signs written only in Spanish. No biggie to me though I imagine someone is going to get their undergarments all in a wad over it. But on the subject of gays, where they live and where they socialize, I'd like to point out that the two issues are different. I also live in the suburbs and haven't had any problems at all with it, despite the fact that I'm sure some (or all) of my neighbors have put 2 and 2 together with only me and my partner coming and going all the time. But going out, we prefer gay or gay-oriented bars/clubs. Socially, I think people tend to self-segregate. With exceptions, and there are always exceptions, blacks will mostly socialize with other blacks, gays with other gays, etc. That's why you end up with mostly black clubs or mostly gay clubs, and mostly black churches and mostly white churches. It's a comfort zone. Whether that's a good or bad thing I'm not qualified to say. Obviously this self-segregation doesn't apply to work related outings or such. But that doesn't mean I would want my life to be 24 hour gayness non-stop. So even though I go to gay clubs more than mixed or straight clubs, I would not be willing to move to a gayborhood. On a personal level, I just have a need to feel like being gay is not the defining characteristic of my life. All of which is my long way around of saying that it's great that people can live and work together with relative ease, but I still think gay-oriented bars and clubs are beneficial and will never go away, just as there are still black clubs decades after civil rights laws were enacted.

Totally agree. It's very, very important. I don't even go out that much anymore, but it's nice to go to a place that I have absolutely no qualms about holding my partner's hand without having to endure the gawking that goes on even in relatively "mixed" clubs.

This is something I've been wondering about as well. It seems that an office tower wouldn't face nearly the problems that (yet another) condo tower might. The bulk of the credit problems are associated with subprime lending and the banks and other financial institutions that are involved with that. I wouldn't think a developer would have trouble getting a loan for a speculative tower in the lowest vacancy rate area in the nation. I don't know what experience Trump has with office towers though. My admittedly limited knowledge of his "empire" is that it focuses on high end residences and resorts. So even if he considered switching to an all office or mostly office tower, he might actually face a little more scrutiny from lenders that developers with a proven track record in office towers.

I totally agree. There is nothing, absolutely nothing, that is 100% safe. And we continually accept a certain amount of risk/return ratio in everything we do. Driving is way more dangerous than flying, and flying is more dangerous than living in a skyscraper. Shortly after 9/11 almost everyone was declaring the age of the skyscraper over and that from now on, people would build low to the ground and blah blah blah. I knew that was BS. It simply is not human nature. We like grand things. I have doubts about the future of the Signature Tower, despite wanting severely to see it built because I think it's an awesome building. But if it doesn't get built it won't be because people were worried about living in a skyscraper out of some nebulous fear of terrorism (which, btw, means they have accomplished exactly what they set out to do, i.e. instill fear) or fire hazards, it will be due to financing and credit issues.

I don't mean to detract from the anxiety involved in the Fleischmann case, but in general attractive white women get top billing when they go missing, followed by attractive young white guys, with missing old white people in a distant third (usually because they have some form of dementia and have wandered off). Missing middle aged white people and black, Hispanic or other varieties of brown get only a passing mention or none at all. Nancy Grace in particular seems to specialize in the Cute Young Missing White Woman news category.

I wasn't speaking in international terms. If that's the standard, less than a handful of US cities could be considered financial centers.

What is the difference? Even Forbes magazine refers to Charlotte as a financial center. I think it would be hard to say that, with 2 of the biggest banks in the nation headquartered here, that Charlotte doesn't offer a pretty broad range of financial services. Obviously not on par with NYC or what have you, but pretty significant nonetheless. And I'd venture to say that we're ahead of significantly larger areas, such as Atlanta, when it comes down to it.

Very nice indeed. And at the beginning, it looks like the Wachovia building is taller than the BOA building, which was pretty cool. But it was just the angle (and the fact that it is, um, not real, lol). At the end, BOA is tallest again. The whole thing is beautiful though. It makes Charlotte look like pretty impressive.

About those contracts, I'm wondering if anyone knows the wording of them? Is it specified that you're buying into a specific size tower (i.e. 1000+ feet) or does it say just something along the lines of Nashville's tallest? Or maybe there's no specification at all beyond the obvious "This contract is for a 1 bedroom 1 bath, 700 sq. foot condo in whatever building we slap up and call the Signature Tower"? Basically, my question is how much wiggle room is there in the contracts? With everyone speculating that people who currently have contracts would bail out due to changes in the building, I'd love to know if that would even be possible.

Pretty bad actually, so I really have no cause to throw stones at other cities. But there is room for hope. Charlotte seems on one hand to be committed to developing density in its core (residential, office and retail) as well as trying to encourage density along the new light rail lines. And it does seem to be working to a degree. The downtown area has really made a 180 degree turn from where it was in the 80s, though of course there's always room for improvement. We'll have to see what happens with the light rail. That subject is done to death in another thread. But then on the other hand you have the city approving ridiculously sprawl-inducing development plans on the outer edges of the city. It's almost schizophrenic to me.

Strictly a personal opinion, but I don't know that I'd necessarily want to live in any of their top 10. Some of them are the worst examples of unchecked sprawl (Houston, Dallas and Atlanta) in the US. And Cincinnati is referred to as the Queen City? I didn't realize we had competition for that title.

All of this "big" talk is so very subjective, but for those who think it doesn't feel "big" I'm curious what would convey a feeling of bigness? I'm just wondering what makes the city seem small? Is it the lack of 20 lane highways running through downtown, a la Atlanta or LA? or something else? From my own point of view, I used to think of Charlotte as average or medium sized. In the past couple of years, though, I've started thinking of it as a big city, albeit not a supersized one such as NYC or London, obviously. It's hard to look at the population figures (city itself is almost 700,000 and the metro area is between 1.5 and 2.2 million, depending on how you want to define it), the growing skyline, the expanding variety of restaurants and other services, and come to any conclusion but that it is a big city. What clinched it for me on a personal level is the growing commute time. It used to be that I could get anywhere in the city from anywhere else in the city in about 20 minutes (that was back in the 80s, lol). Now it takes me about 40 minutes, on a good day, to go the 15 miles to work near downtown. The people who've posted examples of outsiders coming to the city for a visit seem to almost invariably get similar responses, along the lines of "wow, I had no idea Charlotte was such a big city". For me, the fact that I've lived here for so long makes it harder for me to see the true size of the city. Almost can't see the forest for the trees kind of thing. I know the city so well that, in my mind, it's a small, intimate place. But for newcomers I'd be willing to bet they are often lost or overwhelmed just trying to get around and I'd bet they all think of Charlotte as "big".

Haha, thanks. I stared and stared at the pictures trying to figure that out. I should have known.

Why? The Trump Organization is definitely interested in Charlotte. They've confirmed that to the press. Sure there's been a lot of speculation here with an occasional hint or two at the behind the scenes goings-on, but it's still waaaay early in the life cycle of such a huge project. It may never happen or it may happen in a scaled down fashion, but I'm not sure why it's so funny that Trump is interested in Charlotte.

The very odd thing about this though is that the biggest businesses in Charlotte have already come to this conclusion. Wachovia and BoA are way ahead of the city on this. Which puts Charlotte in the ironic position of making the stereotypical conservative banks look more progressive than the city as a whole.

Agree. And also love the Wachovia buildings with the colors. They are, to be honest, my least favorite of the skyscrapers uptown and yet in that photo they look vibrant.

Yes, The Alternative. That was the place. And I agree the concept was interesting but probably doomed to failure from the start. Gay or straight, I think people like the option of having some kind of alcoholic beverage available when they go out. Even if it's just a beer or glass of wine. And I also agree on positive feedback for our misguided Republican leaders . Just recently the conservative mayor of San Diego changed his stance on gay marriage. He now supports it whereas in the past he opposed it. Of course, it helps that his daughter is a lesbian and was probably pressuring him somewhat. But it does go to show that progress is possible, even in areas that are widely considered to be socially conservative such as San Diego (and Charlotte).

FWIW, I'll vote with the people wanting a new tallest. BOA tower will eventually be passed, there's no question in my mind that it will happen, so why not now? As for the skyline needing a dominant or signature tower, I'll be in the minority on this I think but I disagree with that as well. There are plenty of cities with great skylines without a dominant tower. Houston comes to mind. Even NYC itself is kind of a blur of buildings at this point, without the WTC towers. But I'd be surprised to hear anyone say those aren't two of the best skylines in the US.

Wow, impressive memory metro. I had totally forgotten about Stephens. I can't remember if I ever ate there or not (I think not) but did go to the bar upstairs a few times. And Scorpio was the first gay bar I ever went to waaaay back when I was still in high school. Can't remember if I only went in my senior year or if I started going in 11th grade. I graduated in 1981, so I was going to Scorpio in it's current location at least in 1980 and possibly in 1979. They were very lax about checking IDs back then, though the drinking age at the time was only 18. I do think that I used to go even when I was only 17 and never had a problem getting in, lol. There was another gay bar on Central at the time as well. Not a dance club. All I can remember is that it was a lounge kind of place with only a few customers, most of whom were regulars. I don't think it lasted long. I used to go there because it was the only place I knew that I could sit and talk without shouting to be heard over blaring music (not that there's anything wrong with blaring music ).

Or 300 S Tryon. That thread was started in 2004 and we still don't have any construction! Patience is a virtue, especially when it comes to building skyscrapers.

Not necessarily-if rumors of the possibility of height increases pan out on the Wachovia building, we could still have a new tallest. And depending on how much Trump scales back, we could even have 2 new tallests. Wouldn't that be something!

I can say for sure that I, for one, would not be able to step out on it if it were 1,000 sq ft of translucent glass at anything more than a couple feet off the ground. I'm not even sure the lizard part of my brain would let me walk on distorted glass that high up, lol.

I hope it gets built as I think it's a really beautiful building. But I have to point out that it's Tony's job to say it will get built. If he even hints that it won't, the whole thing will fall apart from a financing perspective. People will begin to back out of the reservations he has now and getting new reservations would be exceedingly difficult. Most people would rather put their money on "a sure thing" particularly in the current housing climate. With each delay, and subsequent explanation of the delay, I think the chances of this getting built edge further into "not gonna happen" territory. As of right now, I'd put a 70% chance that it's not getting built. This is all IMHO. Please don't take it as anything else.