Charlotte Off Topic

[KJHburg]

^^^ I grew up in the DC area (I was there right after the Orange Line opened to Vienna) but for a metro area of 9 Million combined they need this kind of rail system and with generous and I mean generous Federal support it can be done. 

 

[urbanlover568]

On 7/15/2019 at 9:22 PM, AirNostrumMAD said:

 

Parking garages make uptown more livable though. Who would want to live anywhere in Charlotte without a car besides a few UP nerds with no spouse? 

 

My my best friend goes to uptown all the time. He lives in Huntersville. He drives nearly daily uptown to eat or charge his car. When he goes to eat, he chooses uptown. He’s not the most urban person, total suburbanite but uptown is a place casual suburbanites are choosing to go now. He’s not going to make a 15 minute car ride into a 2 hour affair just getting to and from uptown taking light rail. This weekend I came down. I recommended cedar street tavern in gateway. We parked in a deck to eat there. The amount of hell it would be, hours of time, light rail tickets for 3 guys (vs. 5$ deck)... not worth Cedar street tavern....

 

Thats the reality of living in a city built after cars became a huge part of society. 

Parking decks can be done correctly:

 

Charlotte:

 

Charlotte:

 

 

Charlotte:

Rhino market, B Good, JJ’s

 

You have the epicenter, you have Where Amelies is located, etc. 

 

We can have parking decks AND they can contribute to the vibrancy, livability if done correctly. If we didn’t have ample parking, I fear there would be less people going uptown, less customers to support stores which would hurt residents uptown who like having more stores, etc. 

People around Charlotte are not taking buses unless they have to & The blue line is massively inadequate to even dream of wanting to limit parking, etc.  for the foreseeable future. That doesn’t mean Uptown can’t rival the most walkable cities in the US and be a thriving downtown district. We just need to make sure people in Ballantyne, Concord, NorthLake, etc can access uptown because the CBD is the playground for the region. 

Parking decks aren’t the enemy. Crappy developments are.

 

build 4 more light rail lines hitting 485, increase capacity by a good amount vs. what the blue line currently handles and then.... I could be a little more anti-car.

 

I moved this here.  I look at cities like New York, Seattle, Toronto. Even Tampa, my former city.  The majority of major developments in those cities do not include a parking decks. The reduction in parking and the fostering of mass transit is the only way for a city to become a mega city. My friends and colleagues in Seattle use mass transit all the time. I see Light Rail taking off, bike lanes, and other mass transit increasing in Charlotte. The only thing about it is that it still resembles a work city where you go to work and sometimes have dinner there then go home to the burbs. Legacy Union could have been more remarkable but developers were short sighted. City Center in Miami is what It should have become, now it's just office and parking and maybe a hotel. Tampa is not known for a transit or bike friendly city, but Waterstreet Tampa got the first ever LEED certification.  This type of transformation requires visionary developers and public planning. I lived in Charlotte for most of my life and sad to see the shortcuts taken. Charlotte can do better and should expect more from developers. 

 

[tozmervo]

I continue to be entertained by the ads on UP. 

[Guest]

I continue to be entertained by the ads on UP. 

Sounds just like your type Toz


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[lit]

Saw this last weekend, the dry cleaners in our beloved 129 w Trade building closed. 

[KJHburg]

^^^ they sold quite a bit of gum it looks like. 

[15895]

44 minutes ago, lit said:

Saw this last weekend, the dry cleaners in our beloved 129 w Trade building closed. 

How much is the man in the window? 

[tozmervo]

Almost all the sundries stores in uptown have been wiped out. Only a couple left I can think of.

[videtur quam contuor]

Cemetery information: Elmwood is one of several city cemeteries. Elmwood is the oldest, established in 1853 when First Presbyterian was no longer able to satisfy demand, along with other churchyard grounds. Over the years Elmwood sold all of their plots. If one is interested in buying spaces there are two options. One may find someone with a plot for sale and negotiate with them for the rights. These are sometimes posted at the Evergreen office.  Another is to go to the city cemetery office at Evergreen Cemetery on Central Avenue and the people in that office can find plots that have had no activity in 75 years. They will advertise (somewhere) to heirs of the purchaser. If there is no reply then they will send a cemetery worker to use a probe to determine if the plot has a burial. If the answer is yes then it is unavailable. If the answer is no then it is possible to (re-)purchase the plot through the Cemetery office. Same for multiple plots. This is how I bought my plots at Elmwood.  

In addition, when there are unknown burials discovered in the county, which happens occasionally through development, roadbuilding and other activities, the developer contacts Elmwood (or other cemetery) and takes one of the available plots with no burial and places the remains there. At least this is the way it should happen. 

(Extra bonus information: When I went with the cemetery worker to test my preferred plot at Elmwood his name was Will Berry)

[KJHburg]

My dad bought 4 burial plots at Sharon Memorial Park at Monroe and Sharon Amity in the early 1960s.  The rate of return of these was greater than any real estate they ever owned even if they held on to for 60 years.   While some people like me like to buried in the ground many now are choosing cremation which is lessen the demand for cemeteries nationwide.  

Completely changing this subject I was updating my Airbnb listing and I saw the following experiences listed here in Charlotte.  Basically where you can stay somewhere with something extra and some of these are let;s say off beat.

Drive a Tractor in Stanly County from $49 a person,  Learn Magic and drink Craft Brews from $50 a person plus lodging, Paint with a guy named Mark in Ft Mill from $55 person,  Flyboard above Lake Hickory from $65 person        Who says Charlotte ain't gotta a lot!    All these are listed as "Experiences" on Airbnb in the Charlotte area. 

Edited July 23, 2019 by KJHburg

[videtur quam contuor]

My sister has her stone there but her remains are scattered to the winds from Grandfather mountain. It is comforting to have a place to go to see and remember and leave a memento.  These are all for the survivors and not for the departed.

[cltcane]

On 7/20/2019 at 7:48 PM, KJHburg said:

Drive a Tractor in Stanly County from $49 a person.

Haha. The things urban millennials spend their money on these days.  Growing up on farmland in Stanly County, I would pay someone $49 for them to drive a tractor for me.  Hearing one crank up when we were kids meant that playtime was over and that it was time to start working.

Edited July 23, 2019 by cltcane

[videtur quam contuor]

Paying to pick strawberries.  Paying to cut and drag your Christmas tree.

[Nick2]

Found this cool gif of Charlotte satellite images from 1984-2016

Source

[grodney]

I made it to Russian River brewing last week, and had my first Pliny the Elder.  It did not disappoint......one of the best beers I've ever had.  And for the rant you knew was coming, it's 8.0%abv and a full 16oz draft pint was $5.25.  5.25!!  I am so tired of these Charlotte breweries charging 6, 6.50, 7 bucks a pint.  Screw you Wooden Robot.

And while I'm at it, the pedestrian experience out there is amazing.  Sonoma, Santa Rosa, Berkeley, wherever......pedestrians just walk out in front of traffic!  And while we were being pedestrians, if we got within 10 feet of a crosswalk, traffic would stop and wave us across.  Awesome.  It was a whole other world.

[InSouthPark]

8 minutes ago, grodney said:

I made it to Russian River brewing last week, and had my first Pliny the Elder.  It did not disappoint......one of the best beers I've ever had.  And for the rant you knew was coming, it's 8.0%abv and a full 16oz draft pint was $5.25.  5.25!!  I am so tired of these Charlotte breweries charging 6, 6.50, 7 bucks a pint.  Screw you Wooden Robot.

And while I'm at it, the pedestrian experience out there is amazing.  Sonoma, Santa Rosa, Berkeley, wherever......pedestrians just walk out in front of traffic!  And while we were being pedestrians, if we got within 10 feet of a crosswalk, traffic would stop and wave us across.  Awesome.  It was a whole other world.

Did you go to the Windsor or Santa Rosa location?  I have been to both but the new Windsor location blew me away when I visited it this April.  Just a beautiful brewery and the food was really good as well.  The metal cups to protect your IPA outside was amazing as I have never heard of anyone doing that.  Came home with a suitcase of the sours (I had bought Pliny all week in San Fran and Napa). 

[grodney]

2 hours ago, InSouthPark said:

Did you go to the Windsor or Santa Rosa location?  I have been to both but the new Windsor location blew me away when I visited it this April.  Just a beautiful brewery and the food was really good as well.  The metal cups to protect your IPA outside was amazing as I have never heard of anyone doing that.  Came home with a suitcase of the sours (I had bought Pliny all week in San Fran and Napa). 

Santa Rosa location.  Nothing special (but nothing bad) about the brewery in my mind, and the food was good but not great.  And although pints were only $5.25, a to-go bottle (I think it was 17.6? oz) was $5.50......so I only bought a few, and none of them made it back to CLT, hahahaha.  By the way, I found the Heist of the West at Fieldwork Brewing in Berkeley.  They had 7 IPAs on tap and 6 of them were Hazy.  So I had 5 hazy and the 1 west coast.....all 6 were really delicious.   Also shook hands with Jerry Brown and chatted a bit (he criticized our food choices and suggested "veggies") after randomly running into him at a diner.  So this was an amazing trip, hahahaha.

Edited July 25, 2019 by grodney

[InSouthPark]

9 minutes ago, grodney said:

Santa Rosa location.  Nothing special (but nothing bad) about the brewery in my mind, and the food was good but not great.  And although pints were only $5.25, a to-go bottle (I think it was 17.6? oz) was $5.50......so I only bought a few, and none of them made it back to CLT, hahahaha.  By the way, I found the Heist of the West at Fieldwork Brewing in Berkeley.  They had 7 IPAs on tap and 6 of them were Hazy.  So I had 5 hazy and the 1 west coast.....all 6 were really delicious.   Also shook hands with Jerry Brown and chatted a bit (he criticized our food choices and suggested "veggies") after randomly running into him at a diner.  So this was an amazing trip, hahahaha.

Yeah the Santa Rosa brewpub is nothing special space wise (besides the great beer).  The Windsor location is 180 degrees different.  Bright and airy, tons of room, large beer/merch shop, etc.  Its also a massive production brewery.  Acres of grass / open space (kids had room to play soccer when we stopped by).  They just opened it in the fall so still new and shiny.  

The pliny bottles are 500ml (so 16.9oz) and the same price at Whole Foods in the Valleys.   Still the original king of WCIPA!   The ones I was getting  at the stores out there were 7-10 days old...can't beat that!  

I heard great things about Fieldworks but I didn't want to take Bart an hour when I could get to Cellarmaker with a 5min walk from my class. Great tiny brewery in SoMa. 

[JHart]

6 hours ago, grodney said:

I made it to Russian River brewing last week, and had my first Pliny the Elder.  It did not disappoint......one of the best beers I've ever had.  And for the rant you knew was coming, it's 8.0%abv and a full 16oz draft pint was $5.25.  5.25!!  I am so tired of these Charlotte breweries charging 6, 6.50, 7 bucks a pint.  Screw you Wooden Robot.

I love a Good Morning Vietnam but the $7 thing irks me too. Luckily we still have Birdsong with honest priced local beers

[Skyybutter]

On 7/24/2019 at 11:00 PM, Nick2 said:

Found this cool gif of Charlotte satellite images from 1984-2016

Source

I have been watching this for hours. My life is complete. Thank You!!

[Nick2]

2 hours ago, Skyybutter said:

I have been watching this for hours. My life is complete. Thank You!!

You're very welcome! Glad I was able to share my excitement over such a cool gif 

[Nick2]

Perfection

Source

[KJHburg]

why was the Wells Fargo thread move to a general Coffee House discussion where aliens are also discussed about and not here to the Charlotte coffee house?  That seems to be incorrect way to handle the topic can it not be moved to the Charlotte Coffee House?    As one of the top 2 employers in town what happens with Wells Fargo is VERY important to Charlotte.  

[KJHburg]

Lets bring home the championship for Charlotte.  Best Loo in America with La Belle Helene's bathroom.  Vote here

http://www.bestrestroom.com/us/vote.asp

[CharlotteWkndBuzz]

I didn't want to derail the Ally thread but Re: dog parks...who owns this giant piece of grassy land by the charlotte plaza building across from the hilton. This plot is massive and has got to be one of the largest, centrally located grassy/tree-y areas left uptown and I dont even think it's labelled a park or anything really. I've said this a long time ago in the romare thread when dog parks got brought up, but this plot is super underutilized and would be perfect for a dog park. Plenty of space to throw frisbees and run around. Until a developer builds a tower here, you aren't going to find an area that large and grassy and centrally located than this spot here. 

 

Edited August 13, 2019 by CharlotteWkndBuzz