Who decided that Charlotte needed to "move in a direction"?

[monsoon]

Hmm. Seems to me I first heard the term in the 80s and I always assumed it had negative connotations as it was most often applied to young people who had sold out to corporate life. At the time American companies were going through their first big cycle of greed, excess, scandal, and finally collapse (stock market crash of 1987) followed by arrests and jail time of some of their CEOs. This is when leveraged buyouts, junk bonds, and mergers all entered into business. Many companies had quite trying to grow by serving their customers and producing innovative products and instead jumped on this bandwagon. Yuppies, I believe, were considered to be the footsoldiers of all of this mess.

There was this rather infamous AT&T commercial that showed this young fairly good looking guy in a suit who at the same time was arrogant and annoying and was using AT&T to further his personal gains at the expense of others. (AT&T in all is wisdom didn't realize this ) This guy was often referred to as the "proto-yuppie".

[dubone]

The city's plan for Light Rail and the density around South Blvd and the other corridors is overtly designed to protect the so called wedges from excessive growth and infill.

Currently, growth creates a lot of pressure to infill into existing neighborhoods like Eastover, Myer's Park, Dilworth, etc.. The hope is, that by creating new density along LRT and uptown, that growth can both stay in this city, as well as avoid some of the stable suburban neighborhoods that exist throughout the city.

Cities cannot stop growth. They either lose people or gain people. Charlotte has always designed itself to be a fast growing city, often making serious mistakes in that pursuit that causes a lack of quality of development. I believe that with current market values for real estate, and the new density supporting infrastructure that we can have a lot more growth without the same level of impact to quality of life.

That is good thing about mass transit and density, if you don't like people, then it means fewer of those people are on your rural roads, and in your suburb. If you like people, it means you can ride with them to work, and live over, under, and next to them.

Charlotte has been pursuing both urbanism and suburbanism simultaneously. But there is no stopping growth. No matter how many labels and names people create to call them. They'll keep coming.

[orulz]

i am all for development....downtown. just stop expanding and expanding until there is no suburban area left.

That's one thing that Charlotte, and any other city in NC or the whole US, is not in danger of running out of any time soon. It's not as if suburban land with inexpensive homes targeted at the middle class is in such short supply that it's all going to evaporate unless somebody stops this urbanization thing, and quick!

Historic neighborhoods are another thing, and there is a very finite supply of them - but then again, homes in historic neighborhoods don't generally fall into the "affordable" category, do they?

[RiverwoodCLT]

I lived in a city that was losing population. The town was sick, jobs lost, school problems and etc.

I moved to Charlotte in 1985, and have not looked back. It is better to live in a growing city than one that is shrinking.

[nyxmike]

another poster commented about me calling the cities left behind "crapholes". this is because i visit a website called craigslist. go there. www.craigslist.org. everyday, in triplicate, you get people from other cities saying "i want to leave this citie because this sucks, and this sucks and i am so tired of this...should i come to charlotte?" i based my statement on people who are contemplating moving here and their comments about their own cities, which range from la, ny, kansas city, etc.

You base it on craigslist? Have you ever visited these cities? There are just as many people that want to leave as there are people who would never move to Charlotte from those cities. It's a matter of preference, not whether a place is a "craphole".

[atlrvr]

I'm from here.....love the growth.....I'm sure there were lots of Native Americans that were pretty pissed when the city was developed at all.....there are probably a lot of animals pissed that your desire for sprawl is ruining your habitat.

For those that know me, I'm by no means left leaning, but I am realistic. This city IS going to grow. Five years ago it was growing almost as fast, and it was 5 years before then.......we have reached a critical mass of demand for new types of development patterns, and do you know what the best barometer of whether the citizens of Charlotte support it? Well....are they buying these new condos?

But don't worry, there are many more contributing to the suburban euphoric lifestyle, and seeing as we have few natural boundaries to prevent exurban growth, I suspect we will continue to be dominated by low-density housing throughout the foreseeable future. You need to accept that people will continue to move here, and people living here will continue to get drunk and forget to use condoms.....and I assure you that allowing housing to be built for them is far better than shutting them out, then your rising home price complaint might have some merit.

One last thing before I end my rant....you keep speaking down on pretension, but you listed your location at "eastover"...Charlotte would have surficed.

[charlotte_bon_vivant]

By the way - at what point did the term yuppie turn into a disparaging remark? Does it still apply to those fitting the literal description of "not-old, city-dwelling, person-with-a-good-job"? Seems its only used now to describe smug people with lots of money and no good taste. Just curious.

Uptowngrrl, entries at Wikipedia and Urban Dictionary claim the term was always derogatory. It fits my recollection as well. I was a kid in the 80s, but I don't ever remember hearing "yuppie" used as a term of endearment.

Yeah..., sometimes growing is better than not growing. Sometimes change is necessary to preserve the history we can save. It's possible that without growth and change, Charlotte would be a stagnant city with no economic future. I'd rather see it grow than die. Of course, I'm a transplant. My words don't carry as much weight...

[Miesian Corners]

One last thing before I end my rant....you keep speaking down on pretension, but you listed your location at "eastover"...Charlotte would have surficed.

I couldn't have said it better myself. Eastover...more giant SUVs than any other Charlotte neighborhood.

[voyager12]

I support light rail and the dense development that is planned around it. Anything that helps to control congestion and encourage pedestrian use is great. I do think all mass transit and planning will end up being a pyrrhic victory because outside of the City of Charlotte and Huntersville/Davidson/Corneilius the majority of the municipalities in the metro area are galloping in the opposite direction: endless sprawl, monthly approvals of massive tree denuded tract housing developments. So in the end we will have a small node "smart growth" in the core surrounded by the exact opposite .Every time I read The Observer, Gaston has approved another subdivision where a farm used to be. And thats just one county. Our light rail could easily become a version of Marta . A small and underutilized service that basically serves the affluent few that can afford to live near it and is ignored and laughed at by the majority that continue to use their cars and worsen Atlanta's already horrid traffic situation.

[Charlotte_native]

I support light rail and the dense development that is planned around it. Anything that helps to control congestion and encourage pedestrian use is great. I do think all mass transit and planning will end up being a pyrrhic victory because outside of the City of Charlotte and Huntersville/Davidson/Corneilius the majority of the municipalities in the metro area are galloping in the opposite direction: endless sprawl, monthly approvals of massive tree denuded tract housing developments. So in the end we will have a small node "smart growth" in the core surrounded by the exact opposite .Every time I read The Observer, Gaston has approved another subdivision where a farm used to be. And thats just one county. Our light rail could easily become a version of Marta . A small and underutilized service that basically serves the affluent few that can afford to live near it and is ignored and laughed at by the majority that continue to use their cars and worsen Atlanta's already horrid traffic situation.

I agree with the endless sprawl problems that are here and growing but I don't think the light-rail will be as underused as Marta. Though I am not nearly as familiar with Atlanta -- did they actually get much dense development around it? All I have seen when I visit in the areas I have gone are parking lots for Park-and-Ride around the stops -- no additional development.

We have already had development, true development, around the proposed stops and more coming every day. The Southend area has had lots of announcements for density within a couple blocks of each stop, the most recent on Tremont Avenue in Dilworth that sold out before it was actually announced. Maybe the light rail stop a block away had nothing to do with it, but maybe it did. I at least suspect it influenced the developers decision to build there. I've heard whispers about at least a half dozen more projects all around that same area.

[UptownGrrl]

I guess application has loosened these days, in terms of behavior that causes someone to be castigated as a yuppie. Now, its a label for anyone who drives a car over 30K, wears nice shoes or buys coffee at a chain. I just find it interesting from a sociological point of view -- seeing it thrown around as yet another way to classify and stereotype those who are "other". 'All those yuppies moving here' are convenient, anonymous scapegoats who can be blamed for any policy or development you don't agree with. It's always easier to blame and get upset than to adapt to change - especially if you feel the changes, which are inevitable, are leaving you behind.

[monsoon]

Well its like countless other labels that get applied to people. 20 years prior to yuppies it was the hippies. Same age group, but this time applied to people who didn't want to work or sell out to corporations. Amazing how perceptions of good and bad change over time.

[Charlotte_native]

Well its like countless other labels that get applied to people. 20 years prior to yuppies it was the hippies. Same age group, but this time applied to people who didn't want to work or sell out to corporations. Amazing how perceptions of good and bad change over time.

Essentially people like for there to be "others" so they have someone to vent towards. It certainly couldn't be that every type of group has its pros and cons and good and bad. Stereotyping is bad across the board but it is also human nature.

[voyager12]

Having lived in downtown Charleston and watched as yuppies drove out almost all the local residents including me off the peninsula through condo conversions and bought up all the houses SOB I can understand the animus against yuppies. Charleston has completely sold out and pushed out almost all of the locally owned merchants as well. King St. might as well be a mall. If Asheville is not proactive and watchful their downtown will end up the same way. Its the same all over the country, neighborhoods go from dangerous and abandoned to funky to yuppie because they want to feel "hip" and they drive out all the interesting people that made the neighborhoods attractive in the first place. Hence the "Keep Austin ( replace with any other distinctive city bumper sticker campaign).Charlotte does not have an historic downtown so takeover is occuring through condos.I don't have anything against yuppies. My whole family is full of them. I happen to loathe corporate culture so after college I chose to do my own thing,it may not pay me enough to buy a BMW but I don't and should not be made to feel inferior to them, unfortunately most "yuppies" don't give me the same courtesy and respect in return.

My last rant: a "good job" is not only defined by how much money you make!

[atlrvr]

Right....life it about choices.....you choose to make less, and there is a trade off. It doesn't make your career bad, but I can't imagine too many people believe people who chose to make more money should be penalized for this decision.

I feel we have the same conversation in every thread, but I would like to add one more point.

Every old, gritty house that now is an affordable rental started out as a brand new house as some point in time. When we build something new and shiny, many of those products over time will become relatively cheaper compared to the newest and shiniest....this provides opportunities again for people to live in varied neighborhoods.

Not that its really fair to compare Charlotte to NYC, but I think their history and housing stock applies here. With the exception of a few stunning buildings on Central Park West, and some townhomes on the UES, most anything new always commands a premium over what is existing...

Charlotte is too young of a city and has too small of an existing building stock to experience this on a large scale yet, but today's new condos, townhouses, towers are tomorrows relatively affordable housing.

[voyager12]

I don't have any issues with wealthy people. Our society worships them and everyone is told that they have to be that way or they are somehow "less". I guess I just have issues with snobs.

[Charlotte_native]

Right....life it about choices.....you choose to make less, and there is a trade off. It doesn't make your career bad, but I can't imagine too many people believe people who chose to make more money should be penalized for this decision.

I feel we have the same conversation in every thread, but I would like to add one more point.

Every old, gritty house that now is an affordable rental started out as a brand new house as some point in time. When we build something new and shiny, many of those products over time will become relatively cheaper compared to the newest and shiniest....this provides opportunities again for people to live in varied neighborhoods.

Not that its really fair to compare Charlotte to NYC, but I think their history and housing stock applies here. With the exception of a few stunning buildings on Central Park West, and some townhomes on the UES, most anything new always commands a premium over what is existing...

Charlotte is too young of a city and has too small of an existing building stock to experience this on a large scale yet, but today's new condos, townhouses, towers are tomorrows relatively affordable housing.

Everything in the world runs in cycles. Great places now might be bad places later. Neighborhoods go up and down and each time they change the group moving or being pushed out dislikes the group that is coming in.

Wilmore in Charlotte as an example: white neighbors didn't like blacks coming in in the 60's and 70's, the black residents don't like the white neighbors and gay neighbors moving in now (though plenty are black also -- just black neighbors with more money). So...who does the neighborhood "belong" to? The first residents? The next ones? The next ones? It belongs to who is in it at the time AND it WILL change again sometime in the future. Sorry you lost "your" neighborhood in Charleston, but the city is hundreds of years old so no place there "belongs" to anyone for very long.

As for painting broad pictures about yuppies (no I am not one nor do I care about the "yuppie" lifestyle), it sounds like a lot of people on here have an ax to grind with these folks. As stated above, every group likes another to blame. The "hippies" I went to school with at App hated everyone that conformed, yet they conformed to birkenstocks, dirty clothes, long hair even though most were driving their parents used BMW or Volvo. The yuppies don't like the grungy folks for what they think are reasonable reasons. Just because someone makes more money than someone else and decides to spend their money doesn't make them a bad person any more than if someone decides to be a teacher and make little salary. Lots of yuppies I've seen have done things that I am happy about -- opening restaurants I go to, shops I shop at, houses I've lived in. Someone has to have money to do these things. If everyone decided to never have extra money, none of these things would happen. If the folks that started with nothing created something and their business was successful, would you then dislike them for having more cash than they did before? Whoa, and especially if they decided to buy themself something...

Get over the broad stereotyping, it doesn't ever truly apply across the board.

I don't have any issues with wealthy people. Our society worships them and everyone is told that they have to be that way or they are somehow "less". I guess I just have issues with snobs.

That statement I can completely agree with!

[UptownGrrl]

Having lived in downtown Charleston and watched as yuppies drove out almost all the local residents including me off the peninsula through condo conversions and bought up all the houses SOB I can understand the animus against yuppies.

Well, you're certainly entitled to feel that way. Its just interesting to observe how this happens when [insert class of person that you can define as 'not you' and about whom you can feel all sorts of smug satisfaction when compared to your own perceived streetcred] has come to "drive everyone out". Like it has nothing to do with a landowner's personal property rights and his/her ability to respond to the market. The sour grapes argument is universal, no matter your lifestyle or how much money you make. It lets you tell yourself you wouldn't want it anyway - its for yuppies, its for snobs, its for people with good credit scores, its for corporate sell-outs, its for [some other identifiable group that I don't feel welcomed by]. Its a defense mechanism to make you feel better about yourself and your choices.

[voyager12]

Clearly you have the need to look down on people with less money and different choices then yours to feel good about YOURSELF. Cuts both ways my dear.

[monsoon]

Charlotte is too young of a city and has too small of an existing building stock to experience this on a large scale yet, but today's new condos, townhouses, towers are tomorrows relatively affordable housing.

I agree that 228 years isn't that old in the scheme of things but it is old for a city in the USA. The reason there is no existing building stock in Charlotte is because every generation believes they have all the answers to the mistakes of the past and then move to tear down and rebuild the city with something "better".

• It happened with urban renewal that was supposed to make the city better by removing derelict houses and replace them with monumental architecture.

• It happened with the removal of the trolley system in lieu of automobiles and city buses which was supposed to be more efficient and give people more freedom.

• It happened when they make the city more accessable by building the inner loop and in the process destroyed dozens of square miles of what could have been considered historic housing today

• It happened when they decided the city would be better by building the overstreet mall and closing all of the retail on the street. That way people could shop in airconditioned confort.

• It happened when they destroyed the historic train depot and moved it to die in a concrete building in a bad part of town.

• It happened when they decided to build suburban housing starting with Dilworth and Myers Park. They haven't stopped building these since and the result is most of what we see in Charlotte today

And I am sure there is more, however .....

It's great to be in a city that is not dying and losing people and instead has the financial ability to do almost anything it wants. One can look at Charlotte's spectacular growth, even in these bad economic time, and honesty say the above isn't that bad.

And there is at least at some level, a recognition in most parts of the government, business and the community that mistakes have been made in the past and efforts being made not to make them again. Mistakes will be made, we talk about them here at UrbanPlanet, but we are not like many rust belt cities with dying cores and no hope of doing anything, or larger Sunbelt cities that have been out of control for so long they are a lost cause. I think Charlotte is at the right size at the right place in time to see a lot of good things in the future. Change is good.

[UptownGrrl]

Clearly you have the need to look down on people with less money and different choices then yours to feel good about YOURSELF. Cuts both ways my dear.

Clearly? Blind assumptions, so often correct, they. I consider myself more a devil's advocate. I'm merely pointing out my observation of an unspoken prejudice and hypocrisy. And, I'm calling out the behavior, not the target. In this case, using economic status as a basis to foster stereotypes and get all pissy. Is there something less wrong about bashing someone with more money than someone with less money? Maybe its the grown up equivalent of picking on someone your own size. I don't think its productive either way.

So, something happened you didn't like and it worsened your personal circumstances. I'm sure the root cause of your dissatisfaction is the guy with a tie, a blackberry and an appreciation for full-bodied red wine who came and kicked you out of your house in the middle of the night and told you to go sleep in the street.

But we digress...

[turbocraig]

UptownGrrl, I think I love you.

[voyager12]

Yes I live in the street,in the sewers and gaze from afar at your perfect life

[voyager12]

stereotypically speaking I am a worthless lazy hippie and you are an overachieving snob Neither of us are entirely both things but since I am partially ruining the thread. I will cease on my end. PeaceandLove

[UptownGrrl]

stereotypically speaking I am a worthless lazy hippie and you are an overachieving snob Neither of us are entirely both things but since I am partially ruining the thread. I will cease on my end. PeaceandLove

And, UNstereotypically speaking - we're probably both very nice people who each deserve to go our own way in the world. Maybe you'd be surprised to know I'm much closer to being a lazy hippie - with a drive to better understand the rationality behind human nature.

But, my point is not about you or about me - its about respecting other people and not personifying market forces over which you have no control as a separate slice of society on whom you can place blame. That's how social conflict gets started and perpetuated - people feel much better having some entity they can hold responsible for a perceived wrong. A person can be much more in control of, and feel validated in, an emotion directed at a specific person or group rather than at an abstract concept. I just find it worthy of remark that nine times out of 10, the villian in this context is the person who comes in to buy the house or open the store -- never the person who sells that land to put their kid through college or some other honorable purpose (which is never...profit). But, if these landowners or homeowners who are likely to be longer term members of the community to begin with, never agreed to the transaction... well, there you go. It's an economic engine that drives all the parties; but the instinct is always to hold the outsider liable for any negative impact - though they're more often the innocent bystander trying to make the best of their own circumstances.