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Considering Im a Concord resident I am little concerned with the population of Charlotte. I am much more interested in Mecks population and the entire CSA. For those that seldom if ever leave the Great State of Mecklenburg you should take a drive up 85 and take Poplar Tent rd west all the way to 73. Its such an interesting drive. No only do you get the opportunity to enjoy the new quirky interchanges popping up around Charlotte, you will see a great view to your left of uptown (pick a clear day).

You will pass the Carolina International School located on 82 acres up on a big hill after you pass Cox Mill Rd.( The new Cox Mill High School is on that rd and it will also take you all the way back to Concord Mills bypassing the interstate). As you continue up Poplar Tent Rd you may notice you are climbing and rounding curve after curve. That's because you are. The highest elevation in the county is nearby at just under 900ft. Of course there are tons of Subdivisions and new Grocery anchored shopping centers to fill your sprawling crave. You may notice or feel some history around the Cannon Cross roads area. Harris Teeter will be on your right. The Renaissance Festival will be on the right eventually and then you would reach State Highway 73. BTW from what I understand plans are well underway for 73 to be widened to two lanes each way. This project is of course about 20 yrs too late but we all know how the NCDOT works. 

 

I recommend this little outing so the urban dwellers can see why its so great to see the Charlotte becoming more urban so that sprawl can be somewhat contained. However sprawl isnt going away. We need to come up with some way to allow people to live in the suburbs but still in an urban environment with the amenities they are looking for. This drive will also show you why the express busses are so important and eventually the blue line extension needs to come into Cabarrus county and the train to lake Norman should already be in development. Hope I havent bored you too much , but Im one of those people that most likely will not visit uptown until the BLE is finished. I don't want to worry about parking, driving or my vehicle in any way. However having been a former Philly resident, once PT is an option for me, Ill be at as many Knights games as possible, visit the Mint and Bechtler and just generally enjoy the city with friends and family. toodles!@

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Nice posting, Sky.

Everyone up in that neck of woods keeps telling me over an over, "growth is inevitable". But, they say it as some sort of rationalization for their next sprawling neighborhood. It probably is, but is that any reason to encourage it?  Kannapolis, in a developer-driven frenzy, annexed an area where you're describing before any development was built. In order to do this, they annexed a highway for at least a mile so that the newly annexed area looks like a balloon. It was done purely for the developers who wanted infrastructure. There might even be a lawsuit over this somewhere. Across the street from me is a subdivision (about a mile NW of the HT) where the plans call for 800 houses. This is considered Kannapolis despite it being 3.5 miles from the old Kannapolis boundary. Insane.

FWIW, I had been considering putting my land in The Davidson Land Conservancy, but now it looks like I'll be an island of trees in a sea of vinyl housing. 

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  • 1 month later...

State Populations have been released ending July 1, 2015.  NC is officially over the 10M mark at 10,042,802.  That puts us 9th most populous in the nation!  Interesting to see that Illinois actually lost over 20,000 residents and Florida added more residents than California did for the first time in a decade.  Seems like Georgia, Arizona, Washington state and Colorado are adding close to the same numbers as we are annually.  I wonder how many more people NC would've had if Charlotte's metro area didn't bump into SC.  I would say a huge percentage of SC's 66,000+ gain is in the York County and Lancaster County areas.  The growth here continues to be massive and I hope we start keeping up with it as far as infrastructure and schools goes.  

 

http://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2015/cb15-215.html

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On 12/24/2015 at 2:51 PM, caterpillar2 said:

At the rate we are growing, we (and Georgia)  could potentially be ahead of Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Illinois in the next 15 years.

Very unlikely. We might catch Ohio in about 18 years, but Illinois currently has over 11.8 million people, Pennsylvania over 12.8 million.  Although Illinois is losing people, it would have a huge acceleration in that loss and increase in NC's growth rate to catch up to that state within 15 years.  currently.   Even if PA didn't grow at all, it would take about 25 years for NC to catch up with PA at current growth rates.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Ohio's population is approximately 11.8 million. From 2000 to 2014, they grew 2.1 percent. On the other hand, N.C. has a population of just over 10 million.  From 2000-2014, , N.C.  grew at a rate of 23.6 percent. Based on current populations and growth rates, our populations should reach the following in 14 years: Ohio, 12,048,000 and N.C. 12,360,000.

North Carolina will likely exceed Ohio's population in less than 10 years. It will take 15 years at the present growth rate for N.C. to catch up with Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania had a growth rate of 4.1 percent from 2000-2014 while Ohio's was only 2.1 percent  (second slowest in the nation). Georgia should pass Ohio in population in the next five years while remaining neck to neck with N.C.  Just for the record, Arizona should jump way past Massachusetts in the next year or two and Virginia should bypass New Jersey in the next five years. 

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On 12/23/2015 at 11:26 PM, Temeteron said:

 

 

53 minutes ago, caterpillar2 said:

Ohio's population is approximately 11.8 million. From 2000 to 2014, they grew 2.1 percent. On the other hand, N.C. has a population of just over 10 million.  From 2000-2014, , N.C.  grew at a rate of 23.6 percent. Based on current populations and growth rates, our populations should reach the following in 14 years: Ohio, 12,048,000 and N.C. 12,360,000.

North Carolina will likely exceed Ohio's population in less than 10 years. It will take 15 years at the present growth rate for N.C. to catch up with Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania had a growth rate of 4.1 percent from 2000-2014 while Ohio's was only 2.1 percent  (second slowest in the nation). Georgia should pass Ohio in population in the next five years while remaining neck to neck with N.C.  Just for the record, Arizona should jump way past Massachusetts in the next year or two and Virginia should bypass New Jersey in the next five years. 

The nation has been moving south and west ever since its founding. The weather, lower costs, a sense and feel and look of newness, etc.

But we're going to lose our advantage over more unionized states, sooner or later. More states have adopted right-to-work laws (notably, Michigan) and there's a Supreme Court case being heard soon, Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, that is likely to result in a ruling against compulsory union dues, at least for public workers.

This is why some people (like me) believe North Carolina is on a highway to hell with all the cuts to UNC and the low pay for teachers. When costs become more equally aligned, most companies are not going to choose the dumb state as a relocation target.

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4 hours ago, Silicon Dogwoods said:

 

The nation has been moving south and west ever since its founding. The weather, lower costs, a sense and feel and look of newness, etc.

But we're going to lose our advantage over more unionized states, sooner or later. More states have adopted right-to-work laws (notably, Michigan) and there's a Supreme Court case being heard soon, Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, that is likely to result in a ruling against compulsory union dues, at least for public workers.

This is why some people (like me) believe North Carolina is on a highway to hell with all the cuts to UNC and the low pay for teachers. When costs become more equally aligned, most companies are not going to choose the dumb state as a relocation target.

I believe that "right to work" is the key reason that foreign and other huge industries are moving to this area. We have a dedicated work force that enjoys a higher standard of living for much less, meaning that the corporations and industries pay fair wages that are lower. Teachers have always paid  low wages. A person that has a good educational background would not teach in a public school regardless of the salaries. Thanks to the old adage, "Those that can't, teach.) Bad humor but I retired from teaching after 12 years. I really don't understand your logic. How does eliminating unions make us a tentative "highway to hell?"  Union states may pay higher salaries, but as you know, our standard of living kills theirs. What am I missing? A person with a union mentality will find it difficult to get hired around here anyway. There isn't much demand. My in-laws are unionist in Minnesota. I wouldn't hire any of them. LOL

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^^^I think he is arguing that once the South's comparative advantage of cheap labor goes away as more states adopt right to work laws, NC's dis-investment in higher education is going to be to our economic detriment.  If we lose our cheap labor advantage,  we will no longer be able to attract the employers who benefit from cheap labor to the extent we once were, and if we don't have an educated workforce, we will not be able to attract knowledge economy type jobs.  Is it a highway to hell? Perhaps not.  Is there any economic benefit to dis-investing in higher education? Absolutely not.  

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23 hours ago, caterpillar2 said:

I believe that "right to work" is the key reason that foreign and other huge industries are moving to this area. We have a dedicated work force that enjoys a higher standard of living for much less, meaning that the corporations and industries pay fair wages that are lower. Teachers have always paid  low wages. A person that has a good educational background would not teach in a public school regardless of the salaries. Thanks to the old adage, "Those that can't, teach.) Bad humor but I retired from teaching after 12 years. I really don't understand your logic. How does eliminating unions make us a tentative "highway to hell?"  Union states may pay higher salaries, but as you know, our standard of living kills theirs. What am I missing? A person with a union mentality will find it difficult to get hired around here anyway. There isn't much demand. My in-laws are unionist in Minnesota. I wouldn't hire any of them. LOL

I didn't say eliminating unions made us a highway to hell. I said that about the cuts to UNC and low pay for teachers.

Minnesota isn't growing as quickly as North Carolina, but it's still growing. Minneapolis is a highly regarded place to live, unions (and cold, brrr) notwithstanding.

"but as you know, our standard of living kills theirs."

I think you're completely mistaken about this. All rankings that I have seen rate Minnesota more highly than North Carolina using standard of living metrics. Same with Minneapolis v Charlotte. It's not even close.

Cost of living is about the same:  https://www.expatistan.com/cost-of-living/comparison/minneapolis/charlotte-united-states. So this is not an advantage for us. The COL is growing quickly in Charlotte-property taxes, rent, house prices, new fees imposed by the GOP on low and middle-income earners.

This list has Minnesota #2: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/10-states-best-quality-life-170446095.html

"Minnesota is one of the top states in the nation by a range of well-being metrics. Notably, the state was tied for second best with Vermont for education, as nearly 92% of the labor force had at least a high school diploma. Minnesota was also a top state for health, with a mortality rate of 7.5 per 1,000 residents and a life expectancy of over 81 years, both among the best nationwide. Per capita household disposable income was also quite high at $32,257, ninth-best nationwide. Census Bureau figures also indicate Minnesota compares favorably with other states in ensuring residents are living well. The state’s poverty rate of 11.2% was among the lowest nationwide in 2013. "

From nerdwallet vis Huffington Post, Minneapolis #3 US city on quality-of-life rankings: (Charlotte was # 64 on this list)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/08/27/cities-quality-of-life_n_5718585.html

I love Charlotte; it's my hometown. I am one with the long boom, believe me. I am thrilled to pieces that we have CLT and its AA hub. Charlotte affords a very nice quality of life if you're well-employed and live in the wedge or uptown.  I have a nice life and I also have a good job and live in the wedge. But this hardly describes everyone here, far from it. We have one of the highest incidences of income disparity in the nation. Sooner or later, this is going to bite us and it will be ugly.

I think I would not be able to live in Minneapolis because of the cold (6 years in NY/NJ was quite enough cold, thank you!) But Minneapolis beats us on almost any quality of life metric and it's not even close.

One other thing: Minnesota was cnbc.com's top state for business in their 2015 rankings.

 

Edited by Silicon Dogwoods
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Minnesota's great, but the state is pretty much all white. It is the 18th most white state while North Carolina is 37th. Minneapolis Metro is 87% white vs. 70% in Charlotte metro. Charlotte MSA's largest minority, blacks at 24%, have a median of $37,785. In Minneapolis MSA, blacks are #2 at 6.5% of the population and have a median of $29,765. Minneapolis hasn't exactly solved income disparity... its just super white.

For % of population with a bachelor degree... Charlotte MSA: 29% of whites, 17% of blacks, 11% of Hispanics. Minneapolis: 29% of whites, 15% of blacks, 12% of Hispanics. Minneapolis doesn't have minorities with a higher rate of bachelor degree attainment... they again, just have less minorities, so "overall" the MSA is more educated. They haven't done anything better than Charlotte at creating an economy and society that helps minorities up the income ladder/education ladder.

Minneapolis high today.... 8 degrees, low of - 7.

Edited by CLT2014
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25 minutes ago, CLT2014 said:

Minnesota's great, but the state is pretty much all white. It is the 18th most white state while North Carolina is 37th. Minneapolis Metro is 87% white vs. 70% in Charlotte metro. Charlotte MSA's largest minority, blacks at 24%, have a median of $37,785. In Minneapolis MSA, blacks are #2 at 6.5% of the population and have a median of $29,765. Minneapolis hasn't exactly solved income disparity... its just super white.

For % of population with a bachelor degree... Charlotte MSA: 29% of whites, 17% of blacks, 11% of Hispanics. Minneapolis: 29% of whites, 15% of blacks, 12% of Hispanics. Minneapolis doesn't have minorities with a higher rate of bachelor degree attainment... they again, just have less minorities, so "overall" the MSA is more educated. They haven't done anything better than Charlotte at creating an economy and society that helps minorities up the income ladder/education ladder.

Minneapolis high today.... 8 degrees, low of - 7.

Can't deny it.

But it's Charlotte that's getting the dings for income disparity, not Minneapolis. Because race aside, it's worse here than there. There are plenty of poor white people in the Charlotte MSA, too.

Have a read: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/11/us/minneapoliss-less-visible-and-more-troubled-side.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=mini-moth&region=top-stories-below&WT.nav=top-stories-below

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32.8% of inbound movers to South Carolina moved to retire. Retirees are 17.7% for North Carolina.

vs.

56.1% inbound moved to NC, picked NC for a job. 41.7 of inbound movers to SC, picked SC for a job.

24% of NY left for retirement,31% of NJ left for retirement, and 20% of IL left for retirement.

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29 minutes ago, Dale said:

And there is also a distinct, Upstate NY --> CLT pipeline.

We got pipelines everywhere, honey!

That one, plus pipelines from Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsylvania (especially western PA), Ohio, Michigan and I see plates from Wisconsin and Illinois with some regularity. Essentially, we mirror the United Van Lines list.

I even see a California plate or two wandering Charlotte's streets. Sometimes, I see an NC plate on back and a California plate on front. Poor things, forced to leave California for North Carolina, pity. :rolleyes:

But I never see a plate from Minnesota.

41 minutes ago, Dale said:

Y'all come on down (or up) !

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-01-08/americans-cant-wait-get-out-these-five-states

Oregon, Nevada and Washington are California exiles.

 

 

Edited by Silicon Dogwoods
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24 minutes ago, Silicon Dogwoods said:

Sometimes, I see an NC plate on back and a California plate on front. Poor things, forced to leave California for North Carolina, pity. 

Hey that's me! I don't need pity though, I was glad to leave Los Angeles, where I grew up. Things changed after college and the fun wore off to reality.

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9 minutes ago, Silicon Dogwoods said:

Reality drove me out of California, too. :)

NC is much much better than where most ex-Californians flee. Desert life in AZ and NV aren't my thing. The Inland Empire.... expensive for no jobs and essentially a 2 hour drive to the beach... let alone the sprawl. Texas is ok, but not for me. Colorado is nice, but CLT was better for my industry.

Edited by CLT2014
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It's funny how some Californians are, just about being Californian - some people have such a superiority complex. And don't get me wrong - parts of California are awesome, but I worked with a guy from San Bernardino, part of the not-so-lovely and smog-plagued Inland Empire. He visited Charlotte once and complained about the homeless problem downtown. He said "we don't have homeless people like that where I'm from." Then I started to recall a certain time when I was staying in San Bernardino and a homeless man literally jumped on the hood of my car in my hotel parking lot, screaming for money. And the following day, I was propositioned by a meth-head prostitute. Later on he said that uptown Charlotte must really be a dangerous place at night because of all the security guards at the entrances to bank building parking garages or loading docks. And to top it off, after I stated how his organization was doing something different than most of our customers, he said, "Well, EVERYTHING'S different in California. And the South will NOT rise again, that's for sure." with this cocky tone. I don't know what prompted him to say that, but needless to say, he was in love with himself and his wonderful life in San Bernardino. And that's not the only Inland Empirer that has acted that way towards me when visiting Charlotte. But it doesn't bother me - I'll let them live in their own little wonderland. One where when you ask someone for a good local restaurant, they point you to this "great Italian restaurant" called Olive Garden (seriously - not making this up) or Black Angus (think Longhorn Steakhouse) for a good steak. I hate the Inland Empire.

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5 minutes ago, ScottCLT said:

It's funny how some Californians are, just about being Californian - some people have such a superiority complex. And don't get me wrong - parts of California are awesome, but I worked with a guy from San Bernardino, part of the not-so-lovely and smog-plagued Inland Empire. He visited Charlotte once and complained about the homeless problem downtown. He said "we don't have homeless people like that where I'm from." Then I started to recall a certain time when I was staying in San Bernardino and a homeless man literally jumped on the hood of my car in my hotel parking lot, screaming for money. And the following day, I was propositioned by a meth-head prostitute. Later on he said that uptown Charlotte must really be a dangerous place at night because of all the security guards at the entrances to bank building parking garages or loading docks. And to top it off, after I stated how his organization was doing something different than most of our customers, he said, "Well, EVERYTHING'S different in California. And the South will NOT rise again, that's for sure." with this cocky tone. I don't know what prompted him to say that, but needless to say, he was in love with himself and his wonderful life in San Bernardino. And that's not the only Inland Empirer that has acted that way towards me when visiting Charlotte. But it doesn't bother me - I'll let them live in their own little wonderland. One where when you ask someone for a good local restaurant, they point you to this "great Italian restaurant" called Olive Garden (seriously - not making this up) or Black Angus (think Longhorn Steakhouse) for a good steak. I hate the Inland Empire.

Going slightly off topic here, when I was walking through Uptown the other day, I was approached by 2 homeless people, one annoyed themselves as:

"Hi, I'm Jimmy, I'm a little homeless." What does that mean? 

and...

homeless "Can you spare some change?"

me "I only have twenties on me."

homeless "I can break that for you."

True stories right here. 

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My sides hurt. "I can break that for you" haha

Education raises the quality of life because once people get more educated, they get better jobs and learn to take better care of themselves. We have some excellent universities and even our community college system is doing extremely well at developing technical degrees and training. But the fact that we pay our k-12 teachers one of the lowest amounts in the country really hurts us. Students don't like school because the teachers don't like teaching. If the pay was higher, the better teachers would win out because there would be more competition for the same positions.

Also, education level has a huge positive correlation on level of health, income, and even happiness (to a smaller extent until a certain point). Education is one of the most important things for families too. Sure private schools are great but most middle class families can't afford them and to be more attractive to these families to move here, we have to have better public schools.

The state is doing a good job at attracting new business and subsequently new people to fill those positions but if we fix the worst things about our state, even more people would flock here. Imagine if we spent in the top 5 on $ per student and how much of a positive effect it would have on NC's image.

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25 minutes ago, Nick2 said:

My sides hurt. "I can break that for you" haha

Education raises the quality of life because once people get more educated, they get better jobs and learn to take better care of themselves. We have some excellent universities and even our community college system is doing extremely well at developing technical degrees and training. But the fact that we pay our k-12 teachers one of the lowest amounts in the country really hurts us. Students don't like school because the teachers don't like teaching. If the pay was higher, the better teachers would win out because there would be more competition for the same positions.

Also, education level has a huge positive correlation on level of health, income, and even happiness (to a smaller extent until a certain point). Education is one of the most important things for families too. Sure private schools are great but most middle class families can't afford them and to be more attractive to these families to move here, we have to have better public schools.

The state is doing a good job at attracting new business and subsequently new people to fill those positions but if we fix the worst things about our state, even more people would flock here. Imagine if we spent in the top 5 on $ per student and how much of a positive effect it would have on NC's image.

We should dramatically pour money into education: teacher salaries, schools, UNC system, community colleges. There should be income tax hikes to pay for it. I would gladly pay more. I already give to UNC every year but there should be income tax hikes, too. More for people who can afford it (ouch.) The so-called tax relief doled out by the GOP didn't do much for me. Mortgage interest is now capped; I lose part of that. 

The best places to live nearly always have the best schools, K-PhD.

Edited by Silicon Dogwoods
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On 1/11/2016 at 3:47 PM, ScottCLT said:

"Well, EVERYTHING'S different in California. And the South will NOT rise again, that's for sure." with this cocky tone. I don't know what prompted him to say that, but needless to say, he was in love with himself and his wonderful life in San Bernardino.

 

Clearly you had to kill this person and bury his body over by THE 485. Nobody blames you man...it had to be done.

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