TheRealClayton

Taking it down costs about 5 months of rent on the crane, putting it back, because of where it'll need to be, probably 10 months of crane rent.

Its an innovation lab/center at the Furniture Store.

Already said your opinion doesn't matter until the building is done, so no opinion was missed. In the end this building represents a company much maligned when their utility prices go up, expecting them to go out of the box is a fools errand. What we are getting is an incredibly sleek and clean building that'll complement the uptown skyline greatly. Y'all would complain about a gold metal if you found a eyelash on it.

You are missing the point, you are judging the bland part of the building, so of course you will think its bland. I'm saying stop giving your opinion until the entire building is done. Easy as that, let it finish and then I'll gladly listen to your opinion. Until then, you'll just be judging a glass curtain wall, and I see no value in that opinion.

So if you see it everyday then you know that 0% of what will make the building different is done, the street level and the crown. You are judging the glass curtain wall that goes from floor 2 to floor 40.

You've seen literally 2 renderings of this building, none of which show off any of its details, as its zoomed out to see a 600' tall building.... What was it my mom said, "Don't judge a book by its cover." You aren't even judging it by the cover, you are judging it before it's even been bound. Maybe let people finish the damn building.

This is being designed by one of the top architecture firms in the world Skidmore, Owings & Merrill. It has an incredible amount of public activation.

And in regards to the warehouse district providing more vibrancy, this is all the land at play right now between Carolina Pipe & Foundry, Current City Land Holdings tied to the Panthers, Gateway Station, Duke Energy's land they own, and a few projects that are active. Gateway will be just one of the catalysts for this area, and I can promise you its more comparable to Denver Union Station than it is to RUS. And Making sure that all these areas connect better with one another will be a huge part of the process.

Looks a lot like a taller version of this that tapers as it goes up.

The "It looks like the airport" renderings are the RFP renderings produced for the city, not what is planned, which is literally the densest project in the South. Gateway will be 4 towers over 30 floors, plus a large component along Smith St with another 20+ floor tower. Intermixed amongst the buildings will be an indoor/outdoor public spaces much like Essex Crossings in the Lower East Side.

The full taller building kind of resembles The Independent in Austin, except that the boxes don't cantilever, they step inward. Facing Uptown and SouthEnd the facade alternates placement the height of the building 3 times. Each time it alternates the building steps in about 10-25 feet and creates terraces. Between the step ins there is 1 patio every 3 floors. The facade on the South Tryon side rises to about the 39th floor and then steps in the final 3. Along Morehead Square it rises 42 floors to the sky. It's a pretty cool building, hard to describe.

Freedom Drive Ramp: I would imagine its to move 65,000 people out of the area quickly (I hear that's the target size for a new stadium.) I would imagine you get an Atlantic Station style development adjacent to a stadium with an ass ton of underground parking beneath the development.

Seems to me 2nd ward might be one of the more residentially dense areas in Charlotte The Francis: 459 Units Uptown 550: 421 Units Savoy: 302 Units Radcliffe: 57 Units Skye Condos: 67 Units The Madison: 26 Units The Presley: 230 Units Hotels: Embassy Suites Hilton Sheraton Le Meridien Fairfield Inn AC Hotel Hyatt Place Westin JW Marriott Marriott Courtyard Omni Charlotte Grocery Store: Uptown's only full service grocery, Whole Foods Oh and Charlotte's central prison ;-)

Not sure why you think it'd get laughed out of the room. This is how convention hotels are built. 33.3% taxes, 33.3% debt 33.3% equity. This will happen in Charlotte too, and has almost happened a number of times.

I don't think anyone should have considered them "plans." They own it, and are marketing it. If someone comes forward with a ton of capital to burn they will partner. If someone comes to them and would like to purchase the land, they sell.

CTC Station Redo will fix this. I also wouldn't be surprised to see BB&T imploded one day.

https://charlottenc.gov/newsroom/cityhighlights/Pages/Urban-Design-Awards.aspx We did this, I was on the jury. It was supposed to be unveiled to much revelry at Charlotte Shouts but that event was cancelled so we did it a little too quietly. It will be back and bigger than ever next year.

and that's just PR speak. They absolutely have plans for it.

To bring this all back on topic, and to apologize to @SydneyCartonfor so diligently trying to burst his bubble, I just wanted to say that we all want to see something high quality that brings an "it" factor back to uptown. Super high end is just not what we need. If you walk past those incredible homes in the upper east side, they are as devoid of pedestrian activity (beyond gawkers) as 1st ward's parking lots. We need to create communities that will encourage people to walk, bike, and ride transit, not multimillion dollar vertical fortresses of wealth. This happens by investing in communities with a healthy mix of market rate, below market rate, and above market rate housing, places for people to work, as well as places to enjoy themselves. We are so desperately behind many peer cities in urbanity and for us to have the opportunity to take a suburban oriented district, and make it part of the city, is something we should celebrate. Its also something we need to loudly advocate for.

FYI, the tower would have been closer to 600' had covid not happened. Something we know all too well in Charlotte, our Duke Energy Tower under construction was slated to be 780' behind closed doors, but was cut because the board didn't think it would be right for a tower that tall to be built by a utility company, now we have 3 feet shorter than 600 feet :-(

And as someone who has been paid to write about Development in NYC, just like I have in Charlotte, I know exactly what I'm talking about. What I have said is very well documented. Your thought that that Charlotte could sustain the kind of development you are suggesting has also been proven wrong time and time again by the fact that high priced speculative urban homes have failed to happen almost every single time they've been attempted. As far as NYC goes, here is EIGHT different reputable sources: https://www.nytimes.com/news-event/shell-company-towers-of-secrecy-real-estate https://theweek.com/articles/736313/how-foreign-investors-launder-money-new-york-real-estate https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/how-new-york-real-estate-became-dumping-ground-worlds-dirty-money/ https://slate.com/business/2014/07/new-york-city-real-estate-launder-money-without-swiss-banks.html https://eurasianet.org/new-york-law-will-shine-light-on-shadowy-real-estate-deals https://commercialobserver.com/2021/02/llcs-real-estate-law-shell-companies/ https://www.globalwitness.org/en/campaigns/corruption-and-money-laundering/anonymous-companies-used-to-launder-money-in-us-real-estate/ https://nymag.com/news/features/foreigners-hiding-money-new-york-real-estate-2014-6/

you just aren't correct, not even a little bit.

Structurally yes, The glass will not be completely flush to the steel though.

But to whom Sydney? People with local jobs that give back to their neighborhood economy? Or to a shell company in Russia, Saudi Arabia, China, South Africa, Germany, Brazil or India that is parking money in NYC.

They just simply could not, they would be enormously expensive to recreate wish there only being a hand full of craftspeople in the United States that could match it. These would be $10-18M townhouse properties in Charlotte, which is obviously completely unheard of. The economics of what you propose throughout this thread is impossible in Charlotte.