RugbyPike#11

I believe Hawthorne is the border of Belmont and Plaza Midwood. If it's on the west side of Hawthorne, then it's a Belmont project.

Doesn't Marsh Properties own the shopping center and all of those rental properties in the vicinity? A nice walkable retail center could make those residential properties very desirable if they were converted to denser townhomes.

After further consideration, I would bring back the Hornets logo and colors as it was when they left Charlotte. Maximize goodwill from the old Hornets fans, get those fans back in the fold, and then if you want to modernize the logo or adjust the color shading you can do it in 5-7 years. I think if they tried to drastically change the logo or color shading off the bat, they might lose some of those old die-hard Hornets fans.

I would be more than okay with changing that cartoon mascot. They could keep it as a secondary old school logo to sell stuff for kids and placate the old Hornets fans, but I would prefer a simpler logo that was somehow Charlotte or Carolina themed. To me, any teal color scheme feels dated. As a Michigan native, it also reminds me of the Pistons' sad anti-glory years when they wore teal jerseys with tacky cartoon horse jerseys. This was after the Bad Boys but before the Ben Wallace/Chauncey Billups/Rip Hamilton/Rasheed Wallace run. Then again, maybe I'm just out-of-touch. Either way, I would take the teal and purple Hornets over the blue and orange Bobcats.

I love the name, but I hope we can adjust the color pallette a little. Maybe more blue than teal, and a very dark purple.

What do you think about using UNCC's soccer stadium for an NASL club? I know many universities frown upon selling alcohol at campus facilities which might be the biggest obstacle to Transamerica Field as a venue. They would also be competing with the UNCC team which I hear has been a big time college program lately. Transamerica seats 4,000, which would accommodate the Railhawks' average capacity. If an NASL or USL club could consistently sell out a 4,000 seat stadium, there's more incentive to rebuild a soccer appropriate field at Memorial. The professional lacrosse club in Charlotte is claiming an average attendance of 5,700 in Memorial Stadium, which is a bit surprising to me. I wouldn't be shocked if NASL could do better. http://mll.stats.pointstreak.com/attendance.html?leagueid=323&seasonid=8519 It's too bad that Charlotte Rugby has dropped from Rugby Super League all the way down to Division 3. We briefly looked at potential larger venues a few years ago when the club was very successful and busting at the seams at the clubhouse, but we weren't interested in the narrow field at Memorial Stadium and we assumed that our fans wouldn't be very interested in moving to a larger venue if they couldn't buy drinks, plus it was hard for a bunch of amateurs to fathom paying money to rent a stadium when the club owned its own small facility. I haven't talked to anyone at the club since I moved away from the area in 2007, but I would guess that now some of the experienced players have retired and the club may be suffering from cannibalism with the D3 club that started in Charlotte. Hopefully with all the youth and high school rugby that is developing in Charlotte, one of the local amateur clubs will re-emerge as a top notch D1 club or RSL candidate. Anyway, tangent over. The point of my rambling is that it would be cool if there was a sport like soccer, lacrosse, or rugby playing at Memorial Stadium almost every weekend. In addition to the local clubs, a reconstructed Memorial Stadium could also host nonmajor college sports conference championships, national tournaments/championships, etc.

There was some MLS vs. MLB discussion in the Knights thread followed by a request to keep the Knights thread about the Knights, so I wanted to followup on that discussion here. BOA Stadium is probably too big of a venue for MLS and definitely too big for an NALS club. Memorial Stadium is more appropriately sized but currently in pretty rough shape and it could really use a wider field for soccer. A wider field would also be more appropriate for sports like rugby and lacrosse, and obviously wouldn't preclude American football from also being played there. Anyway, so I was curious if the city was considering some work to Memorial Stadium so I did a little research and found that they are considering stadium improvements. It's a nice central location, even if the existing stadium itself is kind of dumpy. The streetcar would probably provide service to Memorial stadium, if it's ever built. There are three options being considered: Option 1: Minor repairs to existing stadium, $3-4 million, approximately 3 year lifespan Option 2: Reconstruction of existing stadium, $22-25 million, approximately 50 year lifespan Option 3: New stadium, $30+ million, approximately 50 year lifespan. More detail at the following link: http://charmeck.org/mecklenburg/county/ParkandRec/Facilities/EventFacilities/Pages/Memorial%20Stadium.aspx

I'm not much of an MLB or MLS fan, but I think we'd do better with an MLS club. I know many of the MLS clubs prefer smaller stadiums than BOA, but a handful of the clubs do play in NFL stadiums, and BOA was built with a wide enough field to be used for soccer. Most clubs only average 15-20 K attendance, but Seattle averaged over 40 K attendees in Centurylink Stadium! It would be great to get all those extra events out of Bank of America. It does nobody any good to be sitting there unused. Alternatively, I think it would be cool to see a restored Memorial Stadium, but that project would required widening the field of play and probably cost prohibitive.

I don't know how feasible this would be, but I'd love to see the Hurricanes play something like 25% of their home games in Time Warner Arena. They already have an appropriate geographic name for a move like that, and I know a lot of transplants down here who would be totally thrilled to see NHL hockey in Charlotte. If we can get 13,000 people to watch a Checkers game, I bet we can sell out plenty of Hurricanes game. The Hurricanes' average attendance is over 16,000, and Time Warner only seats about 14,000 for hockey, so the Hurricanes would have to make up that money in ticket prices or some piece of Suite sales. I would be even happier with a permanent move because playoff hockey is a whole other level. I would even be willing to let Raleigh keep 25-50% of the regular season home games if we could get the team for the playoffs. Also, I hope Jordan gets bored with the Bobcats and sells the team to somebody who can build a winner. He is a dreadful owner and an even worse NBA Executive. With the new luxury tax rules, I think even big spending teams will start treating the luxury tax threshold as a hard cap, which will benefit the smaller market teams like the Hornets.... er, the Bobcats for now.

Maybe I missed this, but don't the red line tracks extend past Gateway station to the airport? Could we simply supplement a commuter train stop to the airport with additional RDC service between uptown and the airport? Maybe the RDC could stop at Gateway Station and also service the Light Rail via the Parkwood station.

I contacted the development managaer to find out the timeline for residential construction. Riverwalk residential sales are scheduled to start in the fall, construction is set to begin in the spring. I thought that they might push out residential construction for a couple years, but it looks like they're moving forward. They didn't give me any pricing information, but if I had to guess I'd say that prices should be comparable to Baxter.

Memorial Stadium could be a nice venue, but as currently fitted, it's about 20-30 meters too narrow for a professional soccer pitch. At Memorial Stadium, the corners of the field barely contain a 50 meter wide American Football field, but a professional soccer pitch should be 65-75 meters wide. I wonder if they could knock out some of the seats closest to the stadium without completely rebuilding the stands.

It's hard to be sure from the executive summary, but I get the feeling that the bus would operate in mixed traffic on Cherry Road, and that a dedicated bus lane would be built when 21 is widened. I'd still prefer the commuter rail line, especially since you could run a train all the way between Rock Hill and Mooresville (assuming the north line is built in Charlotte), but I'd still be pretty happy with BRT. Then again, if I move back to Rock Hill like I expect to do in the next few months, I'd probably use 82X and I doubt BRT would save much time on that trip in the short-term. On the other hand, as Charlotte grows out towards Rock Hill, highway traffic will probably get more congested, and BRT would probably move much faster than mixed traffic lanes. When I get back in town this summer, I'd like to get my hands on that detailed report.

It looks like Rock Hill is considering BRT from downtown Rock Hill, down Cherry Down, and up US 21 to Charlotte, as a mass transit option. I'd prefer to see commuter rail extending Charlotte's North Line through Fort Mill and ending in downtown Rock Hill. The textile corridor/downtown Rock Hill would seem to support dense TOD, and there's a lot of undeveloped land on the existing rail that could be built from the ground up as TOD. I looked for the detailed study but I couldn't find it. http://www.ci.rock-hill.sc.us/userfiles/file/Planning%20Services%20Webpage%20Documents/Transportation/RFATS%20Exec%20Summary_final%202-23-07.pdf

I agree that this is the preferable route. Unless you have an underpowered vehicle (like my Xterra), then you might struggle up some of the hills and mountains.

Why the hate for Dick's? Do you guys just hate big box sporting goods stores or is it something about Dick's that particularly urks you?

This actually isn't all that surprising. I worked there for a few summers when I was in high school and college and there were always rumors flying around that Paramount was looking at selling off their parks. I imagine that they'll keep the Star Trek Experience but that they're selling all of their traditional parks. I have to agree with those of you that think customer service is poor. The "best" employees are promoted to Team Lead roles soon after they start which means they spend most of their time in the back rooms trying to run a shop or food stand. This is a great resume builder for a high school kid, but it leaves the bottom barrel and mediocre kids to associate with the customers. Also, when I worked there, we sometimes worked ridiculously long hours. Very common to work 50-60 hours, not uncommon to hit 70+, and I even hit close to 100 hours one week. It was nice to have more money than all my high school friends but it probably didn't do much for my congeniality. It will be interesting to see who steps up and makes the purchase. I doubt Paramount would make an announcement if they didn't have some potential buyers in mind. The rumor when I worked at Carowinds a few years back was that Six Flags had put a freeze on buying new parks and Premier Parks was the most likely buyer.

Even the Charlotte stadium would have a retractable roof. I don't think weather will be one of the primary factors in the Marlins' decision making. Do you all think there's any chance this development would go off without the stadium and the Marlins? And did I read this part correctly? 6,000 new homes in uptown?! I'm sure the development of those would be stretched out but wow, that's a huge amount of residency! I wonder what their timeline would be for the entire development. Very interesting.

I do remember the Hornets and as a basketball fan, I'm glad the city got a second chance to host the NBA. Despite the fact that the NBA may be a "money grubbing business," if the Bobcats were to leave Charlotte within 5-10 years due to low interest, I don't think Charlotte would get a third chance for a very long time. We'd be left with a fabulous and very expensive downtown arena without a consistent high dollar draw.

I'm actually a Michigan native currently living in Charlotte so I consider my self a die-hard Pistons fan and an up and coming Bobcats fan. I was skeptical about the hire of Bickerstaff when it was first announced because he hadn't really seen a great deal of success when he was the GM in Washington. That said, if the team continues to progress and grow as a unit, they will become contenders within a few years. They've got solid young players across the board. More importantly, they've got a potential star in Raymond Felton and point guard is one of the most difficult positions to solidify for a young team. Felton is being helped along by a great cerebral veteran in Brevin Knight. You also can't sleep on Gerald Wallace. It will be a travesty if this kid isn't named 1st Team Defense at the end of the year! He also provides a ton of versatility as he's fast enough to defend almost anybody on the perimeter and he's shown recently that he's able to defend the post. The kid is a jump shot away from being a star. Even if he never develops a jumper, he's still a very capable third option and would be a remarkable role player for a championship level team. Think more athletic Michael Cooper (from showtime Lakers) without the jump shot. I hope we take a look at Al Harrington in the off-season. He's an unrestricted free agent, great scorer, versatile (can play SF or PF), and still very young. He's the ideal free agent to add to our core. The team is still bad enough to pull in a potential star through the draft as well. Remember that Amare Stoudemire was picked 9th overall! People, do not sleep on the Bobcats. The team is young and inexperienced but full of hard workers and character guys. Bernie and company are building the team right. Please please pleas go to some games and show some support. If we were to lose this franchise the NBA would probably never come back!

Thanks for the feedback everybody! There is actually another women's club in the Charlotte area. They are currently known as the Charlotte Mayhem (http://www.charlottemayhem.com). As far as the Charlotte Men's Club, we currently play our matches in North Charlotte off Bellhaven Blvd. If any of you are interested in watching a match, you can get a schedule and directions from our website (http://www.charlotterugby.com). USA Rugby is still an amateur sport so I believe all of the matches are free, but parking can be brutal for big games so get there early if you'd like to watch. Also, food and beer are sold at matches. All of the home matches this spring are Super League competition so you'll be seeing the highest level of competition in the US outside of the national team and regional all-star teams. Also, for those of you that aren't familiar with the sport, a number of our former players (old boys as we call them) attend matches and are happy to explain the rules to new spectators. Its not very often a rugby player gets the chance to sound intelligent to strangers! I don

Just out of curiosity, what kind of attendance do you all think the Charlotte Rugby Club would see if it played their Saturday home matches at Memorial Stadium? For those of you that are unaware of the team, Charlotte Rugby Club, affectionately known as the Olde Originals, is the newest member of the US Rugby Super League. The Super League is a collection of the top sixteen teams in the country and includes clubs from other large markets including New York City, Washington DC, Chicago, Boston, Los Angeles, San Diego, San Francisco, and a few others.