Thursday, May 10, 2007

East side speaks out

What do east Charlotte residents like about where they live? What would they improve?

Those topics generated some deeply felt remarks by a small group of East-siders at a Monday night discussion sponsored by AIA Charlotte (the American Institute of Architects' Charlotte Chapter. The impetus for this is a project by AIA Charlotte that aims to study the Central Avenue corridor and come up with a vision for improving it, looking at issues of (their words) "safety, connectivity, transportation alternatives, walkability, open space, image and economic vitality."

So they've been talking with residents. Monday night's session was one stab at that. About two dozen residents attended, although it looked to me as if hardly any were from the Latino community (you can't always tell from a glance, obviously) or the immigrant community (which takes in Asian, Middle Eastern and Eastern European as well as Latino).

Some of the comments:

-- Residents like the diversity of the area and think that newcomers who move to the area do, too.

-- They feel as though they get an unjustified bad reputation, especially about crime. "I have such good neighbors," said one woman, a widow who's lived in the neighborhood for 52 years.

-- Roberta Farman, who lives in Medford Acres and who just resigned from the city-county planning commission, talked with affection about the great old trees and rural look of her neighborhood. "You're 4 miles from downtown and could almost be in the country," she said.

-- "Someone needs to mention food," said Tom Tate, school board member who lives in Plaza-Midwood. "Anything you want, you can find it."

-- Schools are an issue, although Tate said some schools in the area are like East Charlotte overall, in that they're better than the perception. But people who move in with young kids will either move away or put their kids in private or magnet schools because of the reputations of Eastway Middle School and Garinger High School.

-- Gentrification, as in rising property values and more upscale development, is generally welcomed. It's coming out Central Avenue, they predicted.

-- That said, Louise Barden whispered to me about two houses for sale, both on half-acre lots, on Progress Lane -- a street lined with huge, Myers Park-worthy old oak trees. They'd be eye-popping steals in other neighborhoods. One with four bedrooms and 1,700 square feet and a tax value of $104,000 is to be auctioned this weekend. Another, with a pool and 1,900 square feet, but only two bedrooms, is listed at $195,000.

-- There's much concern about big boxes, dilapidated buildings and generally shoddy development left over from a few decades ago. " '60s strip centers," one man said. "Their life cycle was 20- 30 years at most." Residents want better guidelines for new development, so they're not left with 2007's version of those flimsy '60s strip centers.

Life, as they say, is complicated. It's precisely because those dilapidated old buildings are available, cheap, that they've attracted the rich mix of ethnic restaurants from all over the world. Start-up businesses tend to need cheap, old buildings.

On the other hand, as some of the residents noted, the grungy look of some of those falling-down 60s strip centers is likely to be a turn-off to the more upscale residents that gentrification is expected to produce.

The Naked City solution -- I've written this before and I expect I'll write it again -- is for the city to revamp the standards for its older zoning categories, such as B-1. The old standards allow and in some cases even require suburbia -- buffers, large setbacks, too much parking. Changing those standards for B-1 would mean when new places are built on old zoning they'd have a more urban look. Examples of new buildings on old zoning: Eckerds in Myers Park and Dilworth, the Bojangles at Third and Indy Blvd, and Burger King on Fourth Street in Midtown. Compare the Bo and the BK to the much nicer-looking buildings along Third street just off Indy.

Like the good planner he is, Kent Main of the planning department attended the East Charlotte meeting. I asked him if there were any plans afoot to change the old zoning standards. It's on their long-term list, he said, but they're deluged with other things (rezonings, TODs, etc.) so it's back-burnered.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

Mary,
What specific changes would The Naked City recommend for B1 zoning? We are forming an east side PAC and this may be an item that we want to pursue.

Schools are a major problem in the east side. Young families with children who care about their children's schools will not move to homes in the east side. This will keep the values down. But if schools don't matter, there are some very good reasons to move to the east side. There are lots of trees, wildlife, big lots, nice places to walk and ride a bike.

Anonymous said...

There are lots of subtle issues to consider in the planning of the Eastside. Our second meeting with neighbors on May 14 revealed many issues and concerns that were worth noting (and have been mentioned in past studies by residents who live behind the Central Ave. business corridor).

As a kick off event for our AIA150 Grant, San Diego architect, Teddy Cruz gave a presentation and conducted a workshop with team members to helped think through some of the important concerns that often are neglected. Zoning is one way of addressing some of the concerns that Mary N. points out. However, there are other methods that are less about policing and regulatory standards and more about building social understanding and finding commonground between the melting pot of diverse interest groups. In other words, people need to get involved with each other in more direct ways before making structured design proposals that might leave out vested players.

Here is a link to the lecture Teddy give at UNCCharlotte's College of Architecture in early April. Perhaps it will help us think outside the box with regard to improving the quality of the International Corridor and its neighborhoods.

http://www.coa.uncc.edu/index.php?option=com_gallery2&Itemid=163&g2_itemId=134383
(be patient, it takes about 5mins to load)

Peter Wong, Associate Professor
College of Architecture
UNCCharlotte
AIA150 Team Member

Anonymous said...

As far as perception goes, by watching local news one would assume that all crime occurs in the East and West. I used to read the Police Blotter in the Neighbors section of the Observer until they took it out. It revealed, believe it or not, that crime is not concentrated in one area. Why not ask the news media why they focus on certain areas? I live on the west side but I don't like unfair and inaccurate reporting of local issues in any area. We all live in the same city. By the way, can we get the Blotter back?

Second, old strip shopping centers CAN be improved without being torn down. The city has a grant program that gives money to businesses for facade improvements. I was on the review committee for 6 years and it can work wonders visually. Of course, street fronting buildings is the most desirable approach, but fixing up outdated facades is not a bad short term fix and can be cost effective for the owners.

John Howard
Planning Department

Anonymous said...

I agree that not all the strip centers are bad. Anyone who was around the corner of Central and Rosehaven on Mothers' Day afternoon and evening would have seen a place full of life -- lots of people at restaurants, people walking, people selling vegetables and sandwiches from trucks. They were families with kids, and the whole area felt like a place where people are really living. We walked down the street to Ben Thanh for dinner about 6 p.m., and the place was so busy the owners were literally running to take care of everyone. This area is a place where the food is authentic because the restaurants are owned by people who grew up cooking their native dishes. This is the very type of area we like to visit in New York and San Francisco.

I know parts of Central Avenue need to be renovated and maybe even torn down. But there has to be some way to accommodate that kind of activity and liveliness -- and yes, "diversity" --into whatever happens. If I wanted to live at Morrocroft, I would have moved there. If this is the international corridor, I hope we can keep it feeling like a true international district in a cosmopolitan city and not turn it into a plastic imitation.

But, then, I've never been too fond of the pseudo-world of Epcot either. So maybe I'm just getting old and cranky.
Louise Barden