NoDa: A contrary view

Paul McBroom takes issue with an Observer editorial – the unsigned pieces that run on the Opinion Page – that I wrote last month.

The editorial said the historic North Davidson Street neighborhood known as NoDa (formerly North Charlotte) is at risk from intense, transit-oriented development. It said high-rise buildings, which are in general a welcome transit-oriented form of development, would create irresistible economic pressure through rising land values. Without some protections in place, it said, those rising values would doom the historic commercial area and its older, one- and two-story buildings that now house art galleries and restaurants. The rising values would also doom the surrounding small, historic mill village.

McBroom, who with wife Sharon Pate owns Neighborhood Properties and formerly ran Neighborhood Realty, took me on a quick NoDa tour last week to explain why he thinks high-rise development is the only thing that will save the area. I’m familiar with the neighborhood, having visited it off and on since it was a fading mill neighborhood knows as North Charlotte.

But I hadn’t driven through the residential streets in a few years. It’s booming with home renovations. Houses are being expanded, front and back. Some are losing their old mill-house look; others retain it, but with updates. There’s even an in-ground swimming pool going in next to an old mill house.

McBroom has been involved with NoDa properties for more than 15 years. “I came to NoDa early, but I wasn’t one of the first ones with the vision,” he says. He and Sharon own the Neighborhood Theatre building, a venue they launched in 1997 until leasing its management to others in 2003.

Here’s his view: He thinks high-rise buildings along the to-be-built light rail line – which will run along railroad tracks that cross 36th Street about a block from North Davidson – will help preserve the low-scale downtown area. In his view, high-intensity development at the tracks would provide an outlet for development pressure that otherwise would doom the historic commercial area.

Further, he thinks all the renovations, including the ones erasing the character of the old mill houses, are necessary in order to attract today’s homebuyers. Without those newcomers and their money, he says, the area still risks being perceived as a low-income, high-crime area. Right now it’s hot, but he says, “There are too many things that are fragile.”

He also says, “What’s happening on the other side of 485 is going to hurt NoDa more than anything that’s going to happen here.” He means NoDa’s competition for economic development dollars isn’t uptown, Elizabeth or Dilworth, but Ballantyne and farther out.

“What’s here now isn’t sustainable without drastic new growth,” he says. I hope he’s right, because I have real affection for the neighborhood. Do I think he’s right? Sadly, no. Since the 1970s I’ve watched rising land values in uptown Charlotte set off an economic domino game that swept away almost all the older, personality-filled buildings that many uptown boosters now longingly wish we had.

It would be nice if some reasonable blend of new and old can be crafted, with strategic forethought to protect the flavor of the area, but allowing enough new to provide the economic rebirth McBroom talks about. But I don’t see any of that planning happening, which is why I’m afraid for the neighborhood.

But this is one area where I’d be happy to be proven wrong.