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monsoon

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^ Shrug. It would certainly be a blow to the ego but (from my perspective) BoA essentially left town when Ken Lewis stepped down. The new C-Suite guys are no longer the active corporate citizens they once were (and lots of them live elsewhere). Even if the HQ is formally relocated it seems likely that the vast majority of BoA's local employment would remain here (e.g. Wellscovia). Finally, I think the days of the corporation actively exerting their local political influence in Charlotte are also long gone due to the size and geographic diversity of BoA.

Keep in mind that the future of retail banking is kinda hinky -- there are no guarentees that BoA (or any bank) will flourish over the coming decades. Our best bet (IMO) is to ramp up local expertise in Fintech as quickly as possible to hold onto our skilled financial workforce. 

Finally, if political winds shift back to being worried about "too big to fail" and BoA should be broken up in to retail and investment arms then Charlotte returns to being the ideal HQ site for the retail side, particularly as retail banks begin to shrink.

 

Edited by kermit
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  • 2 weeks later...

This is far off topic, but I watched the take-off and landing of SpaceX Dragon cargo mission to the ISS the other day.  It is amazing to see the first stage rocket fly back and nail a perfect landing.  This is totally lowering the cost of getting into space.

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I love old maps and current ones too here is a link to all of NC state highway maps from 1916 on to 2000.  It is really interesting to see the interstate system come together in pieces.  My mother told me that Troutman was so far from Charlotte they used to take the train because there no good roads up there and it took so long.

http://web.lib.unc.edu/nc-maps/highway.php

 

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NC has the second largest state highways system, after Texas. There are no county roads. This is a relic of the penury of our state, similar to the state education system. Most counties were far too poor to build and maintain roads so the state took control, as with education and schools. As those who survived the Great Depression relate, one cannot take blood from a turnip, especially if one has no turnip in the first place.

Those maps until WWII had holes in Eastern NC, and if one were to plan a trip across the Appalachians to Tennessee the route had to be clear because a detour to the next passage west would be a day's drive.

Urban Planet, indeed. (Thank you KJH)

Edited by tarhoosier
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Most of my family is from the western foothills (Rutherford/Cleveland County). Charlotte, where one of my dad's grandfathers lived, was a three or four hour trip. This would've been in the forties. There were train stations in Kings Mountain, Shelby, Lattimore, and so on, but they were too poor to ride. By the time he was in the military (early 1960s), Greyhound buses were available that could take you to Fayetteville. That ride took 8 hours.

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On 12/26/2017 at 8:44 PM, KJHburg said:

I love old maps and current ones too here is a link to all of NC state highway maps from 1916 on to 2000.  It is really interesting to see the interstate system come together in pieces.  My mother told me that Troutman was so far from Charlotte they used to take the train because there no good roads up there and it took so long.

http://web.lib.unc.edu/nc-maps/highway.php

 

a friend recently posted this research article that compared Google vs Apple  maps and the changes that each has implemented over the last couple of years... https://www.justinobeirne.com/a-year-of-google-maps-and-apple-maps

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The Jerry Awards:

http://crpjerryawards.com/history/

The Charlotte Regional Partnership presents these annually and the award is named for Jerry Orr, longtime director of the airport and Jerry Richardson of the Panthers. Orr was fired in a controversial move when he tried to undermine his employers and move the airport to state supervision. Jerry Richardson everyone is aware of.

What will be the new name for these awards?

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2018 is coming up. Which will make around 9 years as an official member plus I’ve been lurking daily since 2005. I think in all those days, I went less than a week without UP.

 

then smart phones became popular and now I have UP everywhere I go.... yas...

 

i know lots of you have been members even longer. CLT has came a long way.

 

i distinctly remember some trolls saying uptown was literally farm land. Replace the parking lots with grass, and it’d be a farm. I remember RDF showing maps of highlighted blocks that would be developed.  Lolz. Not sure anyone would say that about CLT now (that was on skyscraper city though)

Edited by AirNostrumMAD
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14 minutes ago, AirNostrumMAD said:

2018 is coming up. Which will make around 9 years as an official member plus I’ve been lurking daily since 2005. I think in all those days, I went less than a week without UP.

 

then smart phones became popular and now I have UP everywhere I go.... yas...

 

i know lots of you have been members even longer. CLT has came a long way.

 

i distinctly remember some trolls saying uptown was literally farm land. Replace the parking lots with grass, and it’d be a farm. I remember RDF showing maps of highlighted blocks that would be developed.  Lolz. Not sure anyone would say that about CLT now 

jesus, I've been posting since I was 17, I'm now 32.  take that @monsoon

Edited by Guest
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On 12/7/2017 at 11:02 AM, CLT704 said:

Is anyone else terrified that Bank of America is going to one day move their HQ out of CLT? I don't know why but I've been thinking about that more often recently. 

Not a bit concerned. If it didnt happen after 2008/2009 Merrill Lynch deal I dont think it will happen.  NC has a lot of advantages that NYC specifically does not have. 

If California keeps harassing Wells Fargo maybe they will one day move here (because they are not growing in California adding jobs elsewhere mainly here in Charlotte) 

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15 minutes ago, cltbwimob said:

I joined about 8.5 years ago.  I remember Monsoon, but don't exactly remember the reign of terror everyone is describing.  Maybe I just caught the end of his tenure.  

Would any of those who suffered at the hands of the [purported] UP equivalent of Josef Stalin care to share some stories?

This isn't so much a story as just to say I remember him and wish someone on here still knew him in real life so they could tell me about his current misery. I'm not proud of that, but it's wishful schadenfreude.

Edited by jednc
No edit, just to clarify... I'm not wishing anything bad on him, I just imagine he's miserable of his own making and I'd like to know about it!
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12 hours ago, cltbwimob said:

I joined about 8.5 years ago.  I remember Monsoon, but don't exactly remember the reign of terror everyone is describing.  Maybe I just caught the end of his tenure.  

Would any of those who suffered at the hands of the [purported] UP equivalent of Josef Stalin care to share some stories?

I'll start by saying he had lots of interesting and useful information to share with the group. He also appeared to work really hard on behalf of UP (from my perspective as a poster). 

The fundamental issue (as I remember it) was he was always right and anyone else who posted was always wrong. This got to the point where he would tell people who were working directly on projects that they were not knowledgeable enough about it to comment on it  While this attitude was annoying by itself, he would use his moderator power to ban folks who disagreed with him at the drop of a hat. There were very few people that he didn't ban at some point.

It seemed pretty clear that at the end of his reign he wanted UP to be a platform that would exclusively display his genius and  everything else was just noise that he needed to swat away.  

 

Edited by kermit
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I maybe relatively new here since 2016 but I have been following development here for much longer than most of you but not all of you. Cutting out old articles out of the Observer( Doug Smith I think that was his name)  who wrote about new buildings and such in the pre Internet days.  And to prove it I took  the photos below LOL.  Charlotte Plaza under construction,  the Square before they knocked over the small retail buildings for the Polk Park,  and Tryon St when it was 6 glorious lanes wide right through uptown.  I remember telling my grandmother to get on that new super highway the Brookshire Freeway when she did not even know where it went despite living in Charlotte all her adult life.  (I told her it bypassed uptown) 

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Recently just purchased a new DSLR and remembered from various threads about photography Uptown.  People having problems in Romare with the Park Officials when using a Tri-pod or having "professional" looking equipment.  Or taking photos of BOAC (from the outside).  Going to the top of parking decks, etc...Are these real laws that are enforced or are these one-off situations?

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