MZT

The trolleys scoot along pretty fast across the 277 bridge... but is adding an extra trolley or two really going to do much to increase capacity? Nah. I'd rather just see the line down Elizabeth done. Maybe when the blue line is extended, the trolleys will be in service from about NODA to New Bern. It's a long enough distance they could be semi-practical.

I stopped in the Best Buy to pick up a few items. The parking garage was empty on the second floor with a handful of cars parked on the ground floor. Only a few other customers were inside, and I couldn't help but start thinking about how expensive it must be, to stock the store and run the A/C and all those displays... I bet the management is anxious for the construction to end, and the smaller infill retailers to set up.

I don't think LYNX is "growing by leaps and bounds" anymore. The people inclined to use it, are on the train. The next wave of riders will probably be from the people moving into The Silos, Circle, etc.

Wow. You have to really want to shop at Eastland, in order to get off work early enough on a weekday and go inside before it closes.

I suspect people that are confused by the downtown diagonal streets or who generally don't like traffic jams are very likely to "drive out of their way" to find a LYNX park'n'ride. There are probably a great number of folks using it on event nights that do not live in south Charlotte.

A tile contractor told me today that Laufen Tile (near the LRV maintenance facility) will close. He said it's mainly a matter of their business alignment, to be less direct-to-consumer. But I would presume this will put another parcel in play.

I've read blog rumors elsewhere on the InterTubes that General Growth Properties is hunkering down on other projects... I'm not surprised that they "would not return phone calls". My hunch is that there will be a longer delay than currently announced.

Sounds like some people saw much larger hail than I did, and yesterday's storms did have powerful winds. (It was mostly rain and lightning for me). http://www.wcnc.com/news/local/stories/wcn...s.858bef4a.html

I was typing a reply to RaleighHeelsFan when the power went out. I had just glanced at the radar and could tell the cell had passed, but was growing larger east of me and about to merge with another growing cell coming out of South Carolina. Weddington and Matthews were clearly going to take a beating, with 70+ DBz readings appearing on the radar! The storm wasn't too bad from where I live (Johnston/Carmel) but I could tell the rain was heavier and the storm more "concentrated" than the night before. There was peanut sized hail in it, and lots of lightning. The kind of environment that makes me think about tornados! It was over fairly quickly though, followed by clear air and an eiree pink light. Various neighbors were outside trying to figure out where their dogs went, or whose dogs they had found... At this point I grabbed my digital and shot a few stills before the batteries gave out. Definately an aggressive storm had formed to my southeast, as I saw lightning flashing rapidly, with sparse pauses. Here are my shots of the back of the storm, in the pink afterglow. (I got my power back around 1AM, after hearing Duke Power working one street over, with chainsaws.)

The paper has some photos of damage from last night... the forecast says we could have another night of these. http://www.charlotte.com/multimedia/galler...ery/724540.html

Another good site is National Center for Atmospheric Research You can get nice, long satellite loops that are hours long. I like checking out the Multicolor Infrared when tropical weather gets close.

Allright people, enough stills. Let's put up a loop to show the out of towners.

At least I wasn't the only one lurking on Wunderground. I'm near Johnston & Carmel, it wasn't too bad but clearly there was a lot of lightning nearby and I thought it strange how long it's taken for these storms to clear out. We'll probably be reading about power outages and damage in the news. The radar loops show these storms really burst forth after crossing north into center city.

I won't make much of this - someone with a tighter zoom than 3X could do better. But FYI, this is from the shoulder of Independence in front of Keffer Hyundai. There is also an embankment a little farther out by the tire store, which looks like it would work for taking long distance shots.

I think that's an eggageration. There were never 4 definate votes on the board to end the sales tax. Just a lot of grousing about how the money was being managed, and the opportunity to "talk tough" behind a safe wall of 5 Democrat's votes.

The GOP members of the board would not have voted to end the tax. The whole reason it took a signature drive, was there was no political will to repeal it. I do think a GOP majority would have roped in Tober faster, though instead of leaving the south line on auto-pilot.

Considering that this is a 92 page thread now, and that EpiCenter is actually opening, perhaps it's time for an EpiCenter-only thread, and let the F&C drama fold into a separate thread.

A vertical crack like that can develop in the center of an automobile windshield because the frame of the car will flex back and forth a little on curves. Because that crack is on the center window of a train, I think it could be caused by similar flexing on curved track.

Yeah I was riding it in the storms last night at 10 mph as all that lightning was cracking around us. There were a couple of occasions that they simply stopped the trains and held them at stations.

I think it's clear enough that Levine would rather the Treolar house just degrade to the point that it's unsalvageable. Maybe it would make more sense to just ask that some of the facades be moved elsewhere into whatever happens.

In the future (probably within 10 years, maybe even 5) You're going to see more of the largest planes retired. It's inefficient to punch a large hole through the air at high speeds. But it was popular to move passengers fast, and the crew-to-passenger cost is less under that model. As fuel becomes the major concern, you will see smaller and slower planes in the fleets. Passengers can just accept a slower flight, or drive. And airlines will need smaller planes anyway, since fewer people will be flying and paying the higher rates. Trans-ocean flights will become much less common, and they will involve refueling (perhaps in Iceland or Ireland in the Atlantic, and Hawaii or Alaska in the Pacific). Part of what makes long distance travel expensive, is "the cost of fuel to carry fuel." It's cheaper to move the fuel by ship and have it wait at a storage facility. Weight taken up by the extra fuel for non-stop flights, instead is used for more fare-payers.

Maybe the Sears will convert to a "clearance center" now.

I drove to work for the first time in several months, and an odd realization hit me - that I get more exercise driving than taking the train. The distance from the LYNX parking lot to a station is negligible. Then it's just a block and a half to my desk. When I drive, I usually take the cheaper fringe lots on Carson street or 8th street.

There's no reason to think of malls as temples that will last for centuries. If the mall is not economically viable anymore, then it's time to convert it to something else. CMS seems to be always needing space for schools. I wonder if part of the mall could be converted to classrooms and we could get rid of some trailers in East Charlotte.

Commercial real estate is the next big shoe to drop. Seems like all the rumors of a new HQ relocating to Charlotte have dried up... so I would not expect a deep pocketed spec builder to pick up completing 210 as office.