West Inner

map review

Lots of great thought and content in here! I'd love to see it boiled down in an Executive Summary that includes the top 10 "Do This Now" recommendations for the West Inner area. Seems like it could be important to communicate intentions with that clarity and useful to provide that focus for staff. Even better if these recommendations are more specific than the broad policy recommendations in the implementation guide. Things like, "Complete a corridor study for multimodal improvements on Freedom Dr." or "Leverage the I-77 South Express Lanes project to extend the Irwin Creek Greenway through the Belk Interchange (I-77/I-277)." That's the level of specificity I'd hope to see in these CAPs.

Can extending greenway corridors be a bigger part of the SIA / CAP implementation strategy? Future extensions to the Irwin Creek Greenway and Stewart Creek Greenway systems, and connections to the planned Uptown CycleLink network, are critical to the multimodal / trails-oriented development goals for this CAP. I know that the County typically builds and maintains the greenway network (with some notable exceptions, like the City-built segments of the Cross Charlotte Trail), but I'd love to see more emphasis on building out the future greenway network in this CAP.

There are a lot of implementation strategies to sift through here. It would be nice to prioritize these in some way and identify a small subset of strategies that are most important to implement for the future success of the West Inner area.

Thank you for the work that went into putting this plan together. That said, at 106 slides, it’s a lot to ask of the general public to review and provide informed feedback—most people simply don’t have the time to digest a document of that length and density.

Much of the content felt high-level and generic, with extensive focus on methodologies and frameworks that could probably be moved to an appendix. The document highlights things that can improve communities in general, and it points to potential opportunity areas within our own—but it doesn’t lay out any tangible plans. There are generic renderings and mockups, but very little clarity on what the highest priority items actually are, or how we’re expected to move toward them in a meaningful, actionable way. How are we thinking about prioritizing these different initatives?

What would be incredibly helpful is an executive summary: a brief, focused section that lays out the top 5–10 changes the city wants to make happen, and where the funding might come from. Something like that would be far more accessible and impactful for residents who want to engage but don’t have hours to spend parsing slides.

In its current form, I find it difficult to form an opinion about the plan, or what the plan really is.

The number one priority in 10 out of the 15 neighborhoods is for housing availability? There is no shortage of housing or apartments we have vancancies because they overbuilt! So the only reasonable conclusion is that the study suggests our housing prices are too high? That's capitalism...you can't control the market prices or the macro-economic environment. Just because I want to live in quail hollow doesn't give me the right or mean they should build cheap duplexes so I can. This study focuses on a far-left socialist agenda rather than real ways to improve the city. Genuinely curious how many tax dollars were spent on this study to tell us we need more of this race here and that race there. Charlotte councilemen let me save you some of our money in the future build bike lanes and improve walkability.

Yes, please convert the massive surface lots in the shopping streets along Freedom Drive into dense, mixed-use villages. How will this get funded though? Will the city consider developer incentives (carrots) to do this?

Please consider curb bump-outs or or curb extensions at all intersections so that cars don't race into right turns making for perilous conditions for walkers.

Should we revisit the strategy of biking lanes sharing our streets with cars, and instead focus on citywide biking infrastructure completely removed from fast-moving, 2-ton machines? That infrastructure could be greenways and urban trails. Would seem to me that more residents would attempt biking for mobility if they didn't have to worry about a distracted motor vehicle operator on his cell phone veering into the bike lane from the street.

Can we consider the impact of "plat consolidation" on the built environment? Instead of a vast variety of individual-lot owners holding property in the city, there seems to be more and more land assemblage in Charlotte. These much larger and assembled plots are often owned and held by outside, faraway institutions like REITs and/or Pension Plans. The end result is that a greater and greater share of Charlotte is owned by outside institutions instead of actual Charlotteans, or at least local denizens who live and breathe and experience the places that make up Charlotte on a daily basis. After all this land assemblage, we end up with big stacks of podium parking underneath big-box stacks of offices or housing or hotels. I much prefer duplexes and triplexes and quadplexes on eclectically owned lots throughout West Inner so that we get urban, walkable density that's still "locally-owned" and with local stakeholders. Plus, I much prefer to tread our streets and sidewalks and greenways adjacent to a density of porches than canyons of concrete.

Where is c12(west blvd) on page 68? Seems to be missing.

What is an example of a "unique building gateway?" Would that be a city building? Is there anything in the UDO to incentivize a developer to build what would be considered a "unique building gateway?"

What is a mobility hub? Do they exist in the city already?

Along Ashley Road, can't we see brownstone-like townhome developments without front lawns, and instead reduced setbacks with low-maintenance landscaping and street trees? This discourages speeding and the streetscape framing helps encourage pedestrians and walkers.

Please eliminate setback requirements along Tuckaseegee so that the effect is to frame the streetscape better and discourage speeding. With less front lawn, housing occupants can have low-maintenance landscaping options. Also, please eliminate parking minimums to encourage build-outs of the old Cuzzo's parcel which is mostly surface parking, and adjacent lots which are vacant eyesores and make the surrounding areas less attractive and appealing.

A new and improved Freedom Drive should significantly reduce setbacks, eliminate front-facing surface parking relegating it to the rear of a building, and eliminate parking minimums. For example, the "fast-food" restaurants are so spaced out with parking, that Freedom isn't at all inviting to pedestrians but feels dominated and overwhelmed by surface parking. How to encourage a density of adjacent mixed uses so it's easier to walk from use to use without crossing over massive surface parking lots?

All Freedom Drive & Tuckaseegee intersections/corners need corner bulb-outs, also known as curb extensions or bump-outs. I've seen too many close calls as cars speed into right turns creating perilous conditions for pedestrians, and conditions which deter many, many additional would-be pedestrians.