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You're probably right--no one ever lost money betting on being disappointed by people's ability to not live up to expectations--but there's also always *some* progress or improvement mixed in. I mean, that's why we're all here. Fundamentally, it's a localized issue: The constitution of each town's council and mayor, and even their county governments, determine what direction development takes. I don't want to sound like a total elitist (we're all from somewhere less than perfect, including me), but a basic impediment to progress is that too many leaders of small towns have never lived anywhere other than that specific small town, or ones like it. They SO often aren't aware of, or interested in, better development ideas, and of course when coupled with a "business-friendly" ethos (i.e. bend over backwards to let them all have their ways entirely), you get the Southport effect. Again, not to sound too elitist, but the change I'm hoping I may see is some movement back to small towns by--dare I say it?--PLUs, who have lived other places, especially larger ones, and have chosen to move to a small town for its benefits, and not principally due to lack of other options (i.e. financially). I think a significant percentage of people who live in those mundane subdivisions you described would gladly live in a better designed place, even more centrally located, if not for budget constraints. (And I'm in a similar position, so I'm not judging; when I bought my apartment I ended up in a neighborhood I'd never even heard of.) But if even a small number of people who understand the difference that preservation and better planning can make find their ways back to some of these towns, they could influence the future of (some of) those towns. It won't be a majority, but maybe enough to start to shift the paradigm of small towns in the greater area. In the public health field, "South to South" (weirdly apropos here) learning is the construct by which you implement an innovative project in one region or country, with the (intended) effect that neighboring locales take notice (or are made to) of its results, and then learn from that initial (successful) effort. Nothing motivates people as much as jealousy, and if even a few towns in the Metrolina area get it right in the next decade or so, perhaps due to new influences and ideas that have moved in, they could end up mimicking them, despite their baser inclinations. But yes, I'll probably be disappointed.

I have long hoped--*maybe* believed--that the next generation of us--those not in positions requiring location-specific, manual or in person customer service work--who would have far greater choice in remote working options would complete a reverse migration to small towns, buying those good old houses for a fraction of what they'd pay in cities, and fully reviving the culture of so many small towns that have become all too often stagnant. I still hope it's going to happen, and if anything COVID won't DEcelerate it.

I'm going to offer a *very* unpopular opinion--so no need to let me know that everyone disagrees!--but I don't really care for the style of the old train station, so it's one lost historic structure I can live with with (which is saying A LOT, for me). I most hate the tower, which is more prominent in the other views I've seen taken from the other vantage on Trade. Minus the tower, I don't dislike it so much. I admit it's a personal prejudice, but I just don't really care for specific, regional architecture outside its native region, as a rule. I know the Mission style evolved and was hugely popular in the Midwest, but especially this iteration, I just think, "belongs in California or Colorado." IMHO--and would accede to the majority and advocate for it to be saved if it were still here! But SAVE HALL HOUSE!

Is it too much to dream that enough people could be made aware of this so that a future new development in the area--park or housing--could be given the name Wearn Field?? After a while all the Apexes, Pinnacles, Summits and the like start to numb the mind.

This is a view that will never, ever be seen again, in a few months' time.

The developers and their planners, I would hope, recognize the *future* importance of incorporating space for potential light rail expansion, even if it's decades ahead, and in the intervening years it can just be a greenway through the area; and if light rail never comes to River District, the greenway could one day be further developed. More importantly, I hope they're genuinely collaborating with transit officials to include road-based transit elements like bike lanes and dedicated bus lanes on the major artery in and out of the area.

I know everyone here has the same complaint about Charlotte's above ground power lines, so I won't beat a dead horse, but it does flummox me that Duke is *headquartered* in Charlotte, and as one of the nation's biggest energy companies, trying to position itself as a leader in the field, one would think that it would want to present, at least to some degree, a cleaner, more 21st image of itself and services in its home city. SMH. They're probably worried about setting a precedent for other cities, in acceding to desires for buried lines (from their clientele!), but there are at least a few arterial streets they could work on burying lines that wouldn't excite too much outside interest, I would think.

I know this isn't the Coronavirus thread, but I feel there's an important point that needs to be made here, since it strayed to the topic. Everyone seems to forget that the primary reason for the lockdowns was not to keep people from getting COVID, per se, and thus make people's decisions for them (i.e. take away their rights to self-determination), but was signally to stop its rapid spread, all at once. Our largely private health care system was not designed nor built to withstand a mass public health event such as a pandemic. The private sector operates--understandably--on a profit margin basis, and our hospitals do not have empty wards or large numbers of beds--and more importantly, high priced technical equipment--waiting around unused most of the time just in case of a once in a lifetime event. Again, understandably, because that would be a huge waste of valuable resources in a field that's supposed to be saving real lives, not theoretical ones. When you have a "novel" virus, which in real person speak means something no human being has ever encountered before (that we know of), no one has any immunity to it, period, which means if you're exposed, you're gonna get it. If social distancing and lockdowns hadn't been put in place, and everyone had been left to determine how and when they'd conduct themselves*, the rate of transmission would've been exponentially higher than it was, and what we saw in New York would've occurred in Charlotte and every other major city. I'm not particularly for or against socialized medicine--I truly don't have a fixed opinion one way or another--but the last few months are the consequence of a (basically) fully privatized health care system of independent components (i.e. hospitals) designed to operate on maximal efficiency, without consideration, mandate or official responsibility for the public health writ large. So when you have a system that's incapable of handling the exigencies of the moment, extraordinary measures have to be taken, like it or not. *I think many municipalities and states at first *tried* to let people make their own decisions about where they went, and how, but I'm convinced it was the fiasco of St. Patrick's Day weekend that led to the lockdowns. People were given the choice to socially distance, with the hope that most people would choose the rational path, and then come March 15th everyone's screens were inundated with visuals of bars packed and people partying as if nothing was amiss. That, I believe, is what triggered the official responses we've now had to live with. We were at first allowed to chose, and like too often, an unruly segment of the population made it tougher for everyone.

More often than not I think the color schemes on large residential buildings aren't terrific, but I think this yellow, in conjunction with the 'industrial' and lighter grey, is just right. A.

I don't think the federal government will spring for it, but the new tower definitely *should* be lighted from below in the evenings, to emphasize its contrast from the old building.

QCXpt posted on Saturday: Today 2:12 p.m. - Major General Nathaniel Greene, Commander of the American forces at the Battle of Guilford Courthouse & namesake of Greensboro, NC It seems to me, with the significance of this event, that it should be commemorated with more than a marker. I think a grand, imposing statue of Greene (or dramatizing the transfer, if they met in person), like the ones being placed along the Sugar Creek Greenway, with perhaps even supporting figures, but certainly explanatory carvings conveying the importance of the event, would be great. I'm all for modern, abstract or interpretive art, but I think art should reflect what it's conveying, and in this case IMO traditional is preferable. But I would personally prefer it not be lumped in with all the others, but actually placed as near to where Greene would've been based as could be determined.

That's a really nice angle of uptown that you rarely see pictured.

If that were the case, then it's *theoretically* possible that the parking deck base of the Honeywell building could one day be fronted and even partially wrapped (on the north side) with more office space, if either Honeywell wanted more or Lincoln Harris still maintains the rights to build around the deck...

To me, it's obvious: Build the stadium immediately east of the 77/277 interchange, as close to it as physically possible, where the fragment of West Palmer Street is now, and just bend Clarkson (like they did with Mint for the current stadium) farther east. Is there anything well-suited to being immediately adjacent to a busy highway interchange? Even if Tepper were interested (assuming he buys the property) in using different parcels for different purposes, it's a little distant and inconvenient from uptown for a Class A office building. Who wants to live immediately adjacent to a busy highway interchange? Only if you build a tall building do you escape the noise and glare of lights at night... To me, the best use of land immediately adjoining a busy freeway interchange is something like a stadium, where traffic noise and lights won't matter (and Tepper says he wants to build a domed stadium anyway). On the positive side, having a stadium nestled in the curve of the interchange would make an iconic setting--and it makes it closer to the Third Ward and within relatively easy walking distance of uptown.

Not being an expert in transit issues, I'm just making a layman's argument here, but it seems to me, with all of the caveats offered in earlier posts, that the rubric for determining BRT routes should be less where planners would *want* them to go and where they *can* successfully go--if in fact in other cities they devolve due to issues with signaling, lane infringement, etc. One of the sacred cows I think cities like Charlotte needs to sacrifice for the greater *environmental* good are medians (with or without trees, although realizing iconic streets like Queens Road and The Plaza will keep theirs). But if the city strategically eliminates medians on much of its city streets--good, big trees planted on either side, shading the sidewalks will still offer beauty as well as their environmental benefits--you can almost "magically" provide lateral space for bike lanes in both directions on smaller neighborhood streets and width for at least one BRT lane on boulevards. The loss of the city's median trees will be far outweighed by the increased use of bikes and BRT routes and their reductions in carbon emissions. In terms of BRT routes, it looks to me like an obvious place to start is on the city's expressways with the fewest or no stop lights--Independence, Billy Graham, and the Beltway--because these can all have dedicated lanes added and/or use existing or planned Express lanes. 485 BRT routes can get suburbanites from lots along the Beltway lots to transfer stations, either Lynx, other BRT or conventional bus routes; Billy Graham can serve the airport but also start from the West Tuckaseegee area, transfer from the Silver Line, and terminate at the Blue Line on South; and Independence would still be important because the Silver Line leaves Independence at Village Lake and then follows Monroe farther south, so an Independence BRT route can service folks who live north of Independence. For boulevards with stop lights, ideally you would retrofit them with bi-directional BRT lanes, but realistically eliminating their medians will only provide enough width for one BRT lane--but I think a single central lane can be made to work, at least in a first generation. New flat, paved medians would be marked as BRT only, like central turning lanes on some streets are, with cameras installed to automatically ticket any cars using them to pass or travel. It would be fairly easy to determine what directions have greater rider volume during rush hours, and those get the BRT lane rights of way during those hours of traffic, and other buses would have to share standard traffic lanes. W.T. Harris, as an example, especially on its northern portions, has medians that could be transformed into BRT lane(s). Harris can link Northlake all the way down to Independence, and allow transfers from the Blue Line at McCullough/Clay to the Silver Line Village Lake Dr. station. 51 through southern Charlotte has a similar median that could be eliminated. This same model could allow a BRT spur from Billy Graham down Tyvola and all the way to South Park (I think the city would just have to buy the several blocks of houses on the south side of Tyvola between the old school and the wastewater treatment land to allow a central lane through that portion). But just realizing that central medians, although they may be attractive, are massively wasted and can be transformed into utilitarian spaces (either BRT lanes or bike lanes) that can do far greater environmental good, to me, is pragmatic and relatively simple solution hiding in plain sight. Just a layman's conception of how a BRT system could be implemented without sacrificing existing car travel lanes, and utilizing space within DoT rights of way.

Maybe the deck isn't being screened on the SW side, facing 277, but the SE College Street side will be...??? I personally don't care as much about what decks look like from interstates, but I do think they should be screened on walkable city streets.

I have long thought Mint has the potential to be South Tryon's equal, in being a premier street through the South End (or Gold District). It has just enough good old buildings sporadically throughout its commercial stretch, not the least of which is the Boone Oakley building at the corner of Summit, that if preserved and complemented with good new development will make a streetscape and neighborhood worthy of any city. I just hope those extant pieces aren't ruined or beotchized. (It was my secret hope the city would've extended Mint across its current terminus at Woodcrest and incorporated an extension with the redevelopment of the Tremont Music Hall property, at least extending it to Tremont, or even crossing it and tying its terminus to South Tryon, so it could've become a more significant city street. I know Wilmore residents wouldn't have liked it, but I think it would've contributed to the Gold District's rise and parity with surrounding areas... but it was just a fantasy.) Regardless, I have big hopes for the Mint corridor.

I'll tell you why: It's precisely *because* of the presence of the theatre building, and the necessity of designing around it, that made this project surpass the usual concept of a glass rectangle and a mediocre adornment at the top. If the city had allowed the developer to simply demolish the theatre building, they would've been able to design a much less challenging, simpler, easier (and yes, cheaper), but less interesting structure--and they abso-f---ing-lutely would've done it. There's surely a strong overlap between folks who don't care about historic preservation, or even the rights of small property owners, and those who don't have strong aesthetic sensibilities, so people who care about those things must always challenge at every turn possible their attempts to clear cut entire blocks or large parcels of land--if you want interesting, unique architecture. If you keep as much of the existing structural environment of a city that's truly worth keeping, you not only preserve a variety of architecture, which alone helps preserve a city's unique character, you force the architects and engineers to design less from templates or stock plans or their own preconceived ideas, but create specific and unique designs for each place at hand. IMO

One factor in all of this, that I haven't heard any commentary on, that helped sow doubt and disbelief early on is that this outbreak was initially concentrated among the affluent, or relatively affluent. In general, you either had been traveling internationally, or were in contact with someone who had been, if you were an early case. One of my best friends (an American) lives in Madrid but is married to an Italian who lives in Milan--before all this, they commuted between the two cities--and I had firsthand accounts of how it was spreading in Europe, when a lot of people in the States were only seeing accounts on t.v. Another friend's brother who lives in the U.K. somehow managed to have pancreatitis concurrent with covid 19 and was put into a medically-induced coma the week before last; miraculously, he seems to be stabilizing. I had atypical connections to it, and was concerned early on; but it doesn't make me prescient, just with early direct (virtual) contact. The fact that the first epicenters of outbreak here were in coastal cities, i.e. urban 'blue' areas, was a manifestation of this socio-economic differentiation and was, weirdly, emblematic of our times: These socio-economic and geographic differences in early experience really affected people's appraisal of the situation. Historically, though, most outbreaks of this sort start not at the 'top' but somewhere in the general populace--tuberculosis, typhoid, the 1918 flu--and then work their ways in all directions, so the fear and agitation were more immediate, even if it meant certain people or groups were still scapegoated. I think that historical prejudice worked in weird ways this time around. Too many people, myself included, have to have a direct experience of something like this to really take it as seriously as one should, and I really do think the initial stratification of this outbreak had measurable effects on its spread and containment. Then, of course, with Donald Trump as president, whether you're a supporter or not it's objective fact his politics are explicitly "us versus them" in principle, the pre-existing social and political climate exacerbated normal human tendencies. But it's no longer limited to the coasts and the upper socio-economic strata, because of course viruses don't adhere to those distinctions. I'm perversely thankful that the first person known to be positive in my hometown is someone who, in a 'micro' way, mirrors the general U.S. spread--someone my parents and family all know and respect--and so they've all immediately begun to take it more seriously than they had been, when it was more of an abstract notion or possibility. In terms of the economic fallout, I vacillate from despairing to gong into deliberate denial, but the one factor that keeps me from permanent despair is that this is a global pandemic, and so we're all going to be affected equally, which at least means the U.S. won't be at a disproportionate disadvantage during the recovery, when it begins. It's not like it began and was concentrated here and other countries are going to be able to profit from our misfortune. For lots and lots of obvious reasons, we're at a huge advantage . I hate to talk in Malthusian terms, but if this does what it is very likely is capable of to India, with its hundreds of millions of people living in slums, it could set them back a generation economically. Business and finance friends of mine have been saying for a decade that China's economic expansion has plateaued and that India was the next Asian tiger , with an equally large potential workforce and potential...but this is very likely to upend all of that. And then of course there's what could happen in Africa, where its major cities (Lagos, Nairobi et al.) have huge percentages of the populations living in slum areas. I just hope that, unlike after 9/11 (IMO), we can manage to have rational, scientific, evidence-based discussions about what our response to this has to be, and that we make policy--political and economic--changes that genuinely are designed to combat a future outbreak like this, because the same epidemiologists who predicted this also say that this isn't going to be an isolated event. More are coming. And of course I read just this morning that China's 'wet markets' are opening back up (another conversation entirely). Of course, 2001 pre-dated the internet and the extraordinary role it plays in misinformation, so I'm not too optimistic. But we have to try to get everyone to understand that the impulse to try and make things as much like they were before isn't going to be the correct one. That would be the worst outcome from this. One specific area I've thought about--and this isn't meant to ignite a controversy, but just an example of how we're going to have to reconsider everything, so no one has to agree, I'm just thinking out loud--is education. We can't endure periodic cessations of our school systems like this, once or twice each generation. Most immediately, if there's a second wave of this in the fall, like they're predicting, we're looking at schools being shut down again for several months, which will cumulatively mean nearly an entire school year lost. The way things stand now, most public schools can't mandate e-learning, even if they're prepared to do it (which most obviously weren't and aren't), because internet access isn't universal, and equity is (understandably) a mantra of the public system. That's one issue that the technocrats will be all over, but I think the bigger (mid-term) issue here is the need for a coordinated, nationwide ability to respond to this, so that all districts and schoolchildren are 'on the same page' and can provide children with some degree of decent learning during future events. I understand the advantages, desire and need for local control of schools, but there's got to be a reformulation, even if it's only for 'emergency declarations', for some kind of central coordination of lessons, and more importantly platforms for their dissemination, so each and every district and school in the country aren't desperately working concurrently and redundantly on the exact same issue, when a centralized, coordinated response could provide well-conceived lessons designed and delivered from the top teachers in the country to each and every child. If lessons and their delivery are handled (dare I say it) at the federal level, that would have the added benefit of freeing local districts to then deal with their own local problems, of children who have specific issues, even if they're just about connectivity. But something like that will take (IMO) the courage to make serious adjustments to our public education system, because of course all the objections people will raise to what I've just posited are the products of the current way of doing things. The health care system, with absolute certainty, is going to face intense reassessment in the coming years. It's weirdly coincidental that the 1918 flu pandemic--which actually originated in isolated farming areas in western Kansas, in a (now) ghost town called Santa Fe (it's fascinating, look it up)--not only hastened World War I's end but also is directly responsible for socialized medicine in the U.K. and elsewhere. They too didn't see the need for state-run or centralized medicine until the flu ravaged their civilian populations in addition to their surviving soldiers on the heels of World War I, and their private and charity-based hospitals and clinics were overwhelmed. All of this current fracas about lack of bed space and equipment capacity and coordination is going to lead straight to the same debate if we end up with actual bed shortages, ventilator rationing and patient deaths directly due to patient prioritization. Our '20s are going to be an interesting decade, just like the 1920s were.

The fundamental issue here, that I don't think is being adequately conveyed by the media, is that no numbers that we're seeing right now have any real relevance, because they're not accurate, in any real way, because there aren't tests available. Without widespread testing, with test kits available to anyone who needs or wants a test, you have no actual idea or measure of who actually has it and who doesn't. Until we reach that point, which will be the first week of April, at a minimum, these numbers being reported are wildly inaccurate--and by that, I mean UNDERreported, by massive percentages. When you couple this lag--of well over a month--of no adequate testing with the fact that it takes five to six days for someone to exhibit symptoms, it means that cases are yes, definitely, going to explode in the next two weeks. A. Because merely the expansion of testing is going to count more and more and more people who've had it but weren't tested and B. This lag in testing and thus people's lack of knowledge if they have it means huge numbers of people are going to continue to get new infections in the interim. I also don't think the media are conveying with enough seriousness that this virus itself doesn't kill you, that's why younger people do better with it and largely recover. It's the PNEUMONIA that it causes that kills you. If anyone you know couldn't, shouldn't withstand a case of severe pneumonia, then they *cannot* be potentially exposed to covid 19.

If any of you haven't read The Mind of the South, you should, absolutely. It's one of the most interesting books I've ever read. It completely upends a lot of conventional wisdom and perceptions of what the South was like before the Civil War. Importantly, it's informed not only by scholarship and historical research, but much is informed by his direct contact with Civil War veterans and those from that era that her personally knew (when they were in their old age). His nearly direct knowledge of the region from before the war is something you don't get in most purely academic works about the antebellum period, and certainly not from people of later generations. Just to be clear, in case anyone might misinterpret my meaning, he paints a picture of a decidedly un-salubrious South, which is all the more remarkable because he was researching and writing when the New South mantra had taken hold, and there had already been a lot of revisionist history written about the causes and motivations for the war. Basically, if you think the South was markedly different from what you experience now, when beyond the Charlotte metropolitan area and in remaining, typical rural areas, that's a result of the South's revisionist history. The war maybe impoverished the South, but it didn't fundamentally alter its character. It had always been largely populated by subsistence farmers who varied in levels of industriousness, and among the white population there was a stark divide between the haves and have nots. I know most people know the basic fact that the majority of white people didn't even own slaves, and that just like now, there really was a one percent, who owned the majority of them, but The Mind of the South really brings to light what that meant for the region's lived society. It was far more corn pone and hog jowl than it was pheasant and Madeira. As a native Carolinian, one 'data point' that I learned from the book (and loved) is that the so-called Deep South states (Alabama through upper Louisiana) that still like to claim extreme "Southern gentility" originally was just pretense, then delusion after the war (with profound implications for race relations and retributions ever after). I knew intellectually, but had never really thought about it in context, that those areas weren't truly settled until the 1820s and '30s, and were literally just a generation away from living in actual log cabins with dirt floors when the war began (even if many of the settlers had come from established areas and families), and what they represented as a cultured and sophisticated society was really little more than wish fulfillment. The book is in two parts, and the second half is about the politics and culture of the South after the war, and I have to admit it's a little... dry. But the first half is a genuine classic that should be far more widely known and read. I especially think it should be mandatory reading for schoolchildren in the Charlotte region, not only to inform them of what life was actually like in the area during the 19th century, but more importantly so they realize that such a significant figure and work came from right where they are. My God, I bet most Gaffney-ites have never even heard of him--he was from Gaffney (and later worked for a newspaper in Shelby too, I think). To make this a little more relevant and less of a digression (I've been working remotely for over a week now, and I got time on my hands!), the city of Charlotte should try and find ways to play up its connections to him, and the fact he wrote some or all (I think) of the book while there. His final days are still a complete mystery, dead by his own hand in Mexico City. Was he just schizophrenic, or were Nazi agents after him?? Probably the former, but it would make a good movie, if made with real talent and finesse.

I wrote a letter to the editor (which I'm not expecting to get published) basically saying that businesses and organizations can't see this as an isolated incident--epidemiologists and the like are saying this is going to happen with increasing frequency--and the remedial efforts some orgs are starting to put into place now need to become the new normal. Specifically, I am seeing a disjuncture in the discussions of higher level systems (or lack thereof) in the media and the individual efforts we're encouraged to take--there's a gaping hole between the two. It may sound crazy, but I think we've got to make it a priority, and insist, that our view and expectations of janitorial and cleaning services change, radically. The things they principally do now--cleaning for cosmetic purposes (vacuuming, washing windows, dusting) and basic hygiene (which obviously still has to be done) need to be superseded by routine, consistent and rigorous disinfecting of the objects people touch every day: doorknobs, elevator buttons, light switches, sink faucets, etc. Those things don't get cleaned now unless they look smudged or dirty, but the operational focus of our cleaning staffs have to be flipped, to focus first on the things that are trafficked the most by human hands. And businesses and organizations need to pay for either the additional hours required, or raise wages, and/or for training. Just this week I saw our building's on staff maintenance guy dutifully squeegee-ing our front doors and lobby, and I wanted to scream at him that he had more important things to focus on, but of course his mandate is to make sure our building entrance *looks* clean at all times. I hate the often ridiculous over professionalization of so many facets of our society, but our cleaning crews--or at least select members of each of them--need to be transformed into Infection Prevention Technicians (or something like that). Companies need to really think about how much this event is (and is ultimately) going to cost them, individually and as an economy, and perform a true cost-benefit analysis. Paying more or better wages to these IPTs, as part of a dedicated budget line item, will be well worth the expense--and come on, it won't, in the scope of most businesses, cost them all that much more.

My two quibbles with this building, which in general I like and think does add a good, dramatic element to West Trade, are the "campanile"--I have always, and still, think it's out of proportion and needs to be a few feet shorter--and I do not understand why the farthest right bay--on the ground floor only--is so narrow (or to get technical, "squooshed")--Unless it was a support pier that just couldn't be moved, I can't see why they didn't eliminate the penultimate right column and combine those two bays to create one large one, at the end, which would've balanced the entrance portal to the left.

My mother's house is surrounded by willow oaks (she hates them). People plant them because they're super fast-growing. They're readily identifiable by their long, thin leaves, without the typical bulges most oak leaves have, and they get caught in any available crevice when they fall, such as your car's trunk, windows...

I don't know, it seems pretty perfect to me. I think the moon being obscured by the clouds a little bit makes it *more* visually interesting--less predictable, if you will.