CLT2014

It has been open for a few weeks now.

People are looking for retail literally in the middle of Uptown and in the 277 loop as opposed to the broader definition of Center City that includes South End et... That portion of Center City is really a financial district though. Financial districts are tough to stimulate with retail after 5pm in many cities nationwide, even in NY where downtown / Wall Street is relatively quiet at night compared to more residential neighborhoods where the trendy shopping is located.

Most transplants to Texas are coming from areas of California away from the coast (Riverside, San Bernardino, inland Los Angeles, inland SF Bay Area, et....) that are also brown and concrete jungle metros. Dallas can seem relatively "green" compared to those areas even, especially in summer, for a fraction of the cost of living. Compared to the East Coast though, Dallas definitely feels brown/treeless.

The Riverfront in Omaha is a public-private partnership so 2/3rds of the cost was by private donors and a 1/3 by the city. Has Charlotte had any parks funded this way?

The other shop the men get their clothing at at Birkdale. Even to work Uptown, things have increasingly shifted away from suits to dressing like this mannequin if you work in technology, marketing, digital, et. People came back from the pandemic and brought casual style with them + as technology has a greater role in the headcount at the banks, the fashion is shifting more casual as engineers, product owners, marketers, et. are like "nah, I'm wearing a t-shirt." It is a shocking contrast from prior to the pandemic where it was rare to not see a man without a collared shirt in a lunch line Uptown.

Macy's may get taken over by private equity soon and the outside investors want the company for its real estate. Macy's owns their SouthPark store and I wouldn't be surprised to see it sold in the transition to private equity. https://www.axios.com/2023/12/11/macys-takeover-offer https://www.wsj.com/business/deals/investor-group-launches-5-8-billion-buyout-bid-for-macys-441ca24a https://www.cnbc.com/2023/12/11/macys-receives-5point8-billion-buyout-offer-sources-say.html

Amtrak needs to work on partnerships with the airlines to boost the amount of people that take their service to the airport to sell connecting tickets under one reservation number. They lost their partnership with United at EWR back in 2021 which was great for knowing your ticket was protected (i.e. if Amtrak was late, United would have to rebook you on the next available flight and vice versa as it was one reservation just like a plane-plane connection). I don't think many people are confident enough in Amtrak's on-time percentage to risk getting to the airport on time for an expensive flight. In addition, the frequency of service outside the northeast is still too low. How much time do you budget for your connection to the train if there are only 3 round trips per day and how long do you need to wait for the next train if your flight is late, et. The current service for Detroit, the Wolverine route between Detroit and Chicago, is only on-time 59% of the time. Too risky for making a flight connection.

Wells Fargo is ending its sponsorship of the Quail Hollow stop on the PGA tour. Unsurprising given WFC's cost cutting moves. They join Bank of America who is not continuing naming rights of the NFL/MLS stadium. https://www.nbcsports.com/golf/news/wells-fargo-ending-sponsorship-deal-with-pga-tour-event-in-charlotte-n-c

The Charlotte National Bank Building is an office condo association so for it to convert uses from privately owned offices to retail lease, the individual owners would have to vote to sell or decide it makes more financial sense to move their business out and become landlords to a retail tenant. I def like the premise though! I think the retail will come to Uptown eventually as it becomes more of a neighborhood. The pace of residential construction needs to accelerate though against offices. I work Uptown and don't live there. When I'm at work.... I'm working. I'm not shopping for clothes, running errands, or getting dinner. I do those things close to home and I think most others do too. Uptown needs to become more of a residential neighborhood as well or it will continue to be a transient place people visit for a specific thing (work, soccer game, et.. ) and then leave ASAP.

I forgot something else from Thanksgiving... why are the crosswalks across the private vehicle lanes still open from the Hourly Deck to the terminal now that they have built a tunnel that goes under the traffic lanes? The traffic directors stopping cars so people could cross was slowing things down a lot and all of those pedestrians should have been directed to the new underground tunnel... the whole point of building that was to stop people crossing up top.

When the digital rendering that always makes things look brighter / less harsh is ugly..... it means real life is going to be hideous. The Metropolitan as a whole is not the most beautiful thing though.

Interesting podcast with Daniel Levine from 2018.... but you can hear his thoughts directly on why he is so slow around the 3:30 mark: https://www.onlifeandmeaning.com/podcast-episodes/daniel-levine The guy basically says "The city was changing faster than I could keep up because I analyze everything too long, and I want to build something that is amazing but I can't decide what is the right thing because by the time trends come and go, I couldn't make a decision." He also explains why they stopped the parking garage and apartments... "we realized we were underutilizing the site. So we just stopped. We are now focused on a 420 unit apartment that is superior architecture." He's just not the right person to be in development because he gets paralyzed by ideas versus execution. He's famous for his quote "I'd rather do nothing than not do it well." He's in his 60's now... average life expectancy for a US male is 73... so maybe we are getting close to the end?

Yep, fair enough. At the very least during peak holiday periods they could just put some basic signage up in the hourly deck like a Target drive up with space numbers for Uber drivers. Have one of the exit lanes from the deck be for Uber only and have a staff member wave them through and you don't even need to upgrade the parking lot QR code system. They wouldn't need to even making any structural changes to the garage or re-stripe it. During non-peak periods, the curbside works fine for Uber and is probably faster / preferred by customers versus a longer walk, elevator ride to a parking garage floor, and exit from the Hourly deck. They could just flex which location ride-pick up is at based on projected crowds.

Yep, Delta Connection had a CRJ-900 go mechanical at gate A7 and Delta uses all their gates for their morning departure bank, so they needed an extra gate compared to normal to accommodate their normal schedule + the extra CRJ-900 that was stuck on A7 and didn't leave for Atlanta until this morning (looks like it was ferried back for repairs). The airport likely asked Air Canada to move over to D so Delta could use additional gates on A.

The Hourly Parking garage was completed in 2014 (and thus in planning before that). Uber didn't even enter the Charlotte market until late 2013 when the garage was well on its way to completion. Suburban markets in the Charlotte metro didn't have Uber access until 2015 or later (Concord, Davidson, Huntersville, et.). The airport will need to remodel the garage or they could just implement a parking stall model with numbered signs and a partnership with Uber to update their app for CLT.

That's great for Citadel, but not as accurate for Bank of America where leaders are spread throughout the bank's hubs and no city hosts more than 1/3 of the leadership team. I'd say BofA's defacto headquarters is "Zoom". The leadership team has a lot of experience working in different cities from each other. Really Bank of America is like many large multi-national companies where senior leaders sit in multiple cities and it is tough to say decisions really come out of one place. Charlotte has absolutely lost some influence though, in particular on the Consumer-side where Athanasia (President Regional Banking) has concentrated some key talent in his inner circle in Boston rather than Charlotte, despite that historically being Charlotte's strength in the BofA network. Boston: CEO, President Regional Banking (2nd highest paid position in company), President of Retail Banking, Global General Counsel New York: CFO, CHRO, CRO, President Merrill, Presidents Markets, President Investment Bank Charlotte: CTO, COO, CAO, Chief Audit Atlanta: President Commercial Banking, President Preferred Banking London: President of International Los Angeles: President Business Banking

What I observed with the Thanksgiving traffic in the arrivals area: 1.) The taxi lanes that are temporarily on the arrivals area for passenger cars are taking up WAAY too much space. Most of the taxis were just sitting empty on the first stretch of curb space. When the upper deck is finished, taxis are supposed to move up there and will add additional curb space for private passenger cars that is needed. 2.) People were not using the outer lanes to travel to the further end of the terminal. Cars were stopping / clustering to pull to the first 100 - 200 feet of curb and thus blocking cars behind them. There was 300 feet of unused curb at the end of the arrivals area. Better traffic control and directing people where to go would help. CLT has a similar set up as Dulles for example, but the Arrivals level is not covered at Dulles which allows people to see further down to see there is space. At CLT, the tunnel creates a panic with drivers who can't see further down / how long the curb is, so the try to pull over as soon as possible. 3.) Due to construction on the east end of the terminal, the flow of walking directs people to exit baggage claim right now from the west end of the terminal. People exiting were thus concentrated on the western half of the terminal and stand on the first curb they reach once leaving the terminal. People also tend to walk towards the direction of on going traffic, thinking it will bring them closer to the car picking them up / be faster. This concentrated most passengers on the first stretch of curb and didn't spread out passengers to the eastern end where the curb was empty. 4.) Loading cars was going VERY slow due to holiday crowds that are inexperienced travelers (might be the only time they fly all year). There were also a large numbers of families. I watched 4 cars that were in a row and took up the curb for 10 minutes as parents tried to install car seats in the vehicles picking them up. They were "active" loading, but took up space for a long time. The Hourly Deck needs to have a free window of parking so families with large amounts of stuff load from the parking garage rather than try to use the curb and install car seats, buckle up babies and toddlers, et. at the curb. Perhaps branding it as "Free Family Loading / Parking" on one of the levels and give 30 minutes free.

It will be very interesting to see if the service improvements help ridership bounce back more. Beyond frequency, in a recent town hall and survey with 10,000 metro riders, safety was the #1 hot topic with the huge homeless population in Los Angeles and drug usage onboard trains, residents don't feel safe and moved to private cars. That's been a big focus of metro with increased security on trains, frequent station cleaning to remove feces and waste, et... (and it is helping ridership). LA's system still peaked in 2013 and ridership was declining 3% - 5% each year through 2019 even prior to the pandemic (losing about 100,000 annual riders). A big factor was exiting the recession and then AB 60, which gave undocumented residents (about 951,000 people in the county) the ability to get a CA driver's license. As soon as many undocumented residents could drive, they ditched public transport they were previously forced to use.

BofA's senior leadership isn't as concentrated as Wells. It is largely split between Boston, NY, and Charlotte. The CEO and a few top leaders in his inner circle (Athanasia, O'Neill, Tyrie, et) live in Boston. The CEO largely stays in Boston but will fly to NY and CLT as needed.

IMO it isn't really good news for San Francisco. Each move the new leadership team makes distances the company more and more from SF. They are consolidating senior leaders in one time zone to make it easier to collaborate. Charlotte has been getting some improvements to its offices as well, but San Francisco remains ignored as the company gradually winds down their large presence as people exit or retire and they backfill the job elsewhere. Charlotte and NY have both come at the expense of San Francisco in center of power / gravity in the Wells Fargo system. SF is increasingly moving to a rung below Minneapolis even and more on par with Chandler, Dallas, and Des Moines. San Francisco: - No renovations to the aging and old "HQ" - No senior leaders on the Operating Committee are actually based in San Francisco (they are largely in New York, with a handful in Charlotte) - Sold several buildings / exited leases - Reduced headcount - Only 23 open job postings at more junior levels or branch positions (the company isn't backfilling leaders in SF) New York: - Majority of leadership team and new "defacto" HQ - World class office facilities and home to the C-Suite - Continued investment in offices - Growing headcount - 43 job openings, largely senior leadership roles and high paid positions

Union Square is still part of the Parks Department and is publicly owned. Charlotte is increasingly relying on private developers to build gathering spaces, but they are of course driven by profit. We really need to look to the county parks & rec department to start investing more in public spaces to bring people together, but we seem to add a lot of red tape that often gets in the way. South End for example is an area the city really needs to invest in some public gathering spaces rather than rely on Atherton Mill, the Design Center, et... to create all those spaces themselves. There are examples of non-profit privately owned public spaces, such as Bryant Park in NYC. That was funded by wealthy donors and a private board of directors manages the park as opposed to the city of New York. There are also public-private partnerships like Klyde Warren Park in Dallas, again requiring donors to help complete building the park which has its own board. The benefit of these parks is the extra funding and resources to put on programming to engage the community. Klyde Warren Park is 5 acres and has 20 leaders on staff with the CEO making $250,000+ (Meck's Parks & Rec Director makes $190k). https://www.klydewarrenpark.org/about-the-park/leadership.html Also.... unsurprisingly our Parks Commission that advises the county and makes recommendations is largely senior citizens since they are volunteers. I love our seniors, but they aren't representative of the youthful age of our city overall. Are they thinking about civic squares in the city center or are they focused on the typical suburban park for the grandkids and walking the golden retriever? A lot of this is on younger people (including myself) just being in the busy phase of life (kids, friends, full time jobs, et..) and not volunteering.

7 of the new gates under construction will be leased to Delta and 3 will be common use controlled by the airport for use by multiple airlines. Delta could flex up to 10 gates for example during a peak departure wave and then an airline like Spirit (before JetBlue guts their routes here in the merger) and Air Canada could use one of the three in the afternoon, et... The 3 common use gates might open a door for new carriers like Breeze or Avelo, but they are very focused on underserved markets (while CLT is overserved based on size).

Apple is already opening at Birkdale Village as the replacement to the closed Northlake Mall store. The new store is under construction. I also agree that some more casual and fun places in the southern portion of Uptown is VERY needed. Right now, there are few options for a happy hour or lingering after work unless you have a lot of money to spend at places like Caroline's or Dean's. If your group isn't expensing the happy hour and you are self-paying, there are very few places to go for a $7 beer. As such, folks get in their car and head home that work in that part of Uptown if they don't have time to walk over to the pubs at Latta.

Chop the trees down! Get ready for Gaston County to be covered in lithium mines. Has to come from somewhere and a lot of it will be in our backyard. I'm sad so much forested space will be lost, but we have some of the richest deposits in our area and it is inevitable they will heavily mine this region.

Pennsylvania (Pittsburgh and Philadelphia) and Ohio (Cleveland and Cincinnati) have destinations in Canada, Mexico, and Europe from each of their respective airports. Most states only have one major metro area, so it makes sense they have a single link to the world (like WA, GA, et.).