York County

‘You can only make roads so big’: Charlotte region launches first transit plan

Leaders from across the region gathered Monday in a conference room at Charlotte Douglas International Airport with an ambitious goal: Creating a comprehensive plan for public transit, covering a dozen counties and setting the transit agenda for decades.  Called CONNECT Beyond, the 18-month planning effort by the Centralina Council of Governments is, to put it simply, big. The planning area covers 12 counties, in two states, with 17 different transit systems. Previous transit planning efforts have been focused mostly on one county at a time. The goal here is to come up with a plan to coordinate and prioritize projects, as well as funding requests, across the whole region.  “Twenty years from now, I think everyone is going to look back on this as the jumping-off point,” said John Muth, the Charlotte Area Transit System’s chief development officer. 

Can we build our way out of the housing affordability crisis?

There’s a growing consensus that if we want to get out of the housing affordability mess we’re in, we need to hear a lot more swinging hammers. Policymakers, developers and housing advocates are all talking about the need to build more, and more of everything: single-family houses, duplexes, triplexes, quadplexes, townhouses and apartments. It’s fast become the conventional wisdom that we need to lower regulatory barriers, streamline the development process and unleash the power of the market on our housing problems by allowing as much density as possible.

Invisible pollution: Spotlight on clean air coming to Charlotte

It’s all around us, but we usually can’t smell or see air pollution. A major art piece and a series of events coming to Charlotte this spring could help change that.

CATS is zeroing in on light rail expansion to Pineville, Ballantyne

Is the future of cities in the suburbs?

As cities continue to grow and thrive, with downtowns reviving and old neighborhoods being redeveloped, is their future still really in the suburbs? That's what one advocate said this week at a real estate forum, provoking debate about growth, transit and sprawl.

Study: Charlotte region lags in food economy, farmers markets

A new report finds Charlotte and its region are underperforming in many measurements of its local food economy. 

More self-storage can mean more abandoned goods

As the number of self-storage facilities increases across the Charlotte region, renters can’t always keep up payments. When that happens, their belongings can be auctioned to the highest bidder.

Feds want metro transportation planning less fractured. Good luck with that.

Transportation planning in the greater Charlotte region is split among five planning groups. Will a federal push to consolidate make a difference?

Booming York County growth provokes zoning, impact fee debates

The pace of growth in northern York County concerns residents, who worry officials aren’t paying enough attention to the environment or moving quickly enough to deal with problems.

Fighting over growth on Charlotte’s southern border

In the booming South Carolina communities nudging the southern edges of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County a civil war of sorts is erupting over how to manage growth.