Mary Newsom – Page 10 – The Naked City Blog

Transportation officials dispute my one-way theory

When I wrote last month about the surprising (to me) prominence of one-way streets uptown on the city’s High Accident List, aka HAL (“One-way to higher traffic accidents?“) , I said I had asked for a response to my observation from Transportation Director Danny Pleasant. He responded today. Here’s what he said:

Mary – Sorry it took a while to respond. I was in one of your favorite cities, Boston, earlier this week. It could not have been more beautiful. I explored the city on foot along two incredibly vibrant one-way streets: Boylston and Newberry. I’m not sure it would be possible to create more robustness, regardless of whether the streets were one-way or two.

Here is information regarding Charlotte’s one-way streets, prepared by Debbie Self, a talented engineer in charge of CDOT’s traffic and pedestrian safety programs:

“It’s fair to say there is not a significant safety concern with one-way streets. In uptown, there are roughly 150 intersections (100 are signalized and 50 are unsignalized). Of that total, the majority of intersections involve at least 1 one-way street. So one could say most of the intersections in uptown that have one-way streets are not on the HAL. There are 15 uptown locations (defined as inside the I-277 loop) on the 2013 HAL.

Other noteworthy comments:

Uptown collisions tend to involve fewer injuries because the travel speeds are much lower. Injury rates are not reflected in the HAL.

A few of the Uptown locations rose to the top 10 based on more accurate traffic volume counts. The updated traffic counts were lower which resulted in a higher ranking on the HAL (the crashes by year remained about the same). Some of last year’s top 10 locations moved down because of higher volumes or a safety enhancement was completed.

5th/Caldwell had fewer crashes in 2012 because CDOT installed reflective back plates on the traffic signals to address angle crashes.

College Street in the areas of 7th, 8th & 9th Streets has been on the HAL for many years. It’s been hard to pin point a single underlying cause. Angle crashes account for about half of the crashes at College and 7th, 8th and 9th. CDOT will likely consider reflective back plates at the signals as a mitigation given our successful reduction in crashes at 5th/Caldwell.

The HAL is published annually to raise awareness of intersections with an elevated crash rate. It is a tool to identify location that have potential opportunity for mitigation of crashes and/or reduction in the severity of crashes.

Distractions/not paying attention continue to be the highest contributing circumstance for all crashes. That’s true for drivers, pedestrians and cyclists. We want to emphasize keeping your mind on the task at hand – walking, driving, or biking.”

Find answers behind candidate rhetoric

Campaign season is here. As always with local elections, voters must first try to sort out he candidates who know which end is up regarding local government, and only then dive into figuring out who they agree with on the issues.

This is not always easy. Read on for some helpful questions for Charlotteans.

(If you’re wondering, in North Carolina municipal elections are in odd-numbered years. In Charlotte, the mayor and City Council members serve two-year terms and are elected in partisan elections. So you can hardly turn around between elections. This year we have a Sept. 10 primary, with the possibility of an Oct. 8 runoff election, and then a Nov. 5 election.)

In an earlier life, I had the honor and duty as an editorial board member at the Charlotte Observer, of helping interview all the city and county candidates as part of the editorial endorsement process. You might be surprised to learn:

How many candidates are crazy as loons. People who complain about editorial pages’ so-called bias (hey, they are PAID to have opinions) sometimes concoct intricate conspiracy theories about some endorsements, when the truth is that you really don’t want to endorse a nut bucket, yet you can’t call someone a nut bucket without risking a libel suit. The good news is that usually the nut buckets don’t make it through the primary. And in my experience, looniness crosses all party lines.
How hard it is to get candidates to take a position. Sure, some will be forthright. But too many won’t go beyond being in favor of low taxes, fighting crime and loving barbecue and sweet tea.

Today I spotted the always-revealing local candidate questionnaire from the local real estate and development community political action committee known as SPPACE. Click here for a link to it. This may shock you, but sometimes candidates will put one thing in the questionnaire for developers and something else entirely in the questionnaire for, say, an environmental group.

And later, I had an email from an acquaintance who’s putting together a Charlotte City Council candidate forum for her neighborhood and wanted some ideas for questions that might – if she is lucky – elicit answers that go beyond predictable rhetoric. Here’s what I came up with. If you encounter any Charlotte candidates and want to ask them any of these, you’re welcome to:

1. Does the Charlotte-Mecklenburg zoning ordinance need an overhaul, as the city is considering? Please explain your answer.

2. With annexation no longer possible and with the majority of single-family residences in the city having stayed the same or lost value in the most recent revaluation, what should the city do to protect and enhance its tax base?

3. Traffic is only going to get worse. The historic practice of “just add more lanes” is expensive and disruptive in established neighborhoods. What should the city do to boost mobility?

4. More than half the city’s property tax revenue comes from the pie-shaped wedge lying south of uptown. Is that a problem? Why or why not? If it’s a problem, what should be done about it?

When it comes to I-277 cap, bold Charlotte gets timid

I-77 is one side of the noose encircling uptown Charlotte.(Photo by Nancy Pierce)

If you think it’s too bold, too “out there” – too gutsy – to seriously plan to put a roof atop part of the freeway encircling uptown Charlotte, consider what’s up in St. Louis. As Eric Jaffe in The Atlantic Cities website describes in “Should We Be Thrilled Or Disappointed by St. Louis’ New Highway Park?” other cities think freeway capping is too timid. (Charlotteans might note the appearance of former Mayor Anthony Foxx, as transportation secretary, at the groundbreaking in St. Louis.)

The article notes that the “Park over the Highway” (aka “the lid”) is part of a $380 million project to connect the rest of downtown St. Louis to the Mississippi River, funded by a mixture of public money (federal grants and a voter-approved local sales tax) and private contributions (via the CityArchRiver foundation).

But in St. Louis, it seems, the local debate is not whether it’s a waste of money to build a park downtown on top of a freeway, but on whether the freeway itself should just, well, go away, and turn into a boulevard.

“On the contrary, some local observers see the ‘the lid’ as a bandage for the urban interstate, when what’s really needed is reconstructive surgery. Rather than toss a green carpet over I-70, they would prefer to knock down the highway completely and construct grade-level boulevards in its place — truly integrating city and riverfront.” Indeed, as Jaffe reports, “Writing at Next City in April, city alderman Scott Ogilvie pointed out that nearly every public comment about the current ‘Park over the Highway’ project supported further study of the I-70 demolition.”

What are we to make of this in the Queen City? We have a highway (Interstate 277, with a leg of I-77) that encircles our uptown, cutting it off from all the surrounding neighborhoods. This highway was planned in the 1950s! That was when Le Corbusier was envisioning cities of nothing but towers, lawns and highways (and apparently he never envisioned parking lots, but that’s a topic for another day), and when Robert Moses was gutting New York neighborhoods for highways, until opposition finally stopped him. But here in the QC our highway didn’t even get finished until the 1980s, by which time other cities were seriously questioning this technique of strangling their downtowns. And, yes, it gutted plenty of Charlotte neighborhoods as well, but they were mostly poor, so city fathers paid little heed to any protests they might have raised.

It was the mid- to late 1990s when I first heard the idea to cap a part of I-277, the part that’s below grade from about Church Street to Caldwell or Davidson streets, So … why is St. Louis so far ahead of Charlotte on this endeavor? OK, maybe it’s that giant, extraordinary river just beyond their freeway. Nevertheless, it’s past time for Charlotte to get its act in gear on this. We may not have the Mighty Mississippi and the Gateway Arch, but we have a wonderfully reviving uptown, surrounded by some great neighborhoods. We have Little Sugar Creek, and its greenway is pretty much blocked by the I-277-U.S. 74 spaghetti-bowl junction. Is a cap better than boulevard-ization? I don’t know, but I do know either would be better than what we have now. Since when has Charlotte become so timid?

Buggy whips still gone, but protest petitions survive

Bill that would limit N.C. cities’ power to ban projecting garages passed the N.C. House but not the N.C. Senate. This street in Corpus Christi, Texas, features so-called “snout houses.” Photo: Brett VA, Creative Commons

It turns out protest petitions did NOT go the way of buggy whips, at least not in the just-ended session of the N.C. General Assembly.

Here’s what I wrote last month: “Protest petitions going the way of buggy whips.” But elected officials are nothing if not predictably unpredictable. As The Charlotte Observer’s Jim Morrill wrote (while I was vacationing at the beach) : “Right to protest zoning changes survives N.C. Legislature.“

The bill that contained the end of protest petitions also contained a variety of other regulatory changes. This one will be of particular concern to environmentalists: As the blog for the Real Estate and Building Industry Coalition put it, “For the next year, local governments are prohibited from adopting any new environmental regulations that exceed state or federal law, unless they do by unanimous vote.” Here’s a link to that REBIC blog item.

The not-loved-by-planners provision that would limit local government’s ability to regulate the placement of doors, windows and other architectural elements for single-family housing and some multifamily – House Bill 150 – passed the N.C. House but didn’t make it out of the Senate. REBIC notes this bill was its top priority.

Planners had deep concerns that it would ban them from regulating so-called snout houses, in which garages projecting from the front of houses can, in subdivisions of look-alike houses, create the visual image of a street of garages, rather than a street of houses. In addition, a growing number of communities have adopted form-based zoning codes (here’s a link to the Form-Based Codes Institute) which worry less about density or the uses of buildings, giving developers far more flexibility, but which instead concentrate on how well buildings fit in with their surroundings. Architectural design elements play a larger role in a form-based code than in a conventional zoning ordinance.

For a pro-con package on House Bill 150, check out PlanCharlotte.org‘s articles from March: Bill to limit local zoning powers: two views.

One-way to higher traffic accidents?

I don’t want this bit of city-traffic-related news to get lost in the recent deluge of news about Charlotte’s airport. The numbers raise a question, in my mind at least, about the safety of one-way streets uptown.

Earlier this month Charlotte’s Department of Transportation released its annual list of High Accident Locations. To see it, download it here. (Be sure to notice what it does and doesn’t measure; for instance it doesn’t measure traffic accidents on interstate highways.) The report drew a news article in The Charlotte Observer, “Report: Charlotte traffic collisions down; fatalities up.”

Here’s what I noticed: Among the Top 10 high accident locations, seven were either uptown or nearby. Of those seven, all but one involved one-way streets. The only one of those seven that did not was East Seventh Street and Hawthorne Lane, in the Elizabeth neighborhood.

The city’s top high accident location was Cambridge Commons Drive and Harrisburg Road (average daily traffic of 15,000), in east Charlotte near I-485, with a three-year total of 49 accidents and a crash rate (a formula taking into account the traffic volume – to know more download the report) of 2.98.

Other in-town streets:
2. North College Street and East Eighth Street.
3. North College Street and East Ninth Street.
5. Third-fourth Connector Street and East Fourth Street at Kings Drive.
7. East Seventh Street and Hawthorne Lane.
8. South Church Street and West Hill Street and the ramp to West Belk Freeway.
9. East Seventh and North College Street.

If you’re thinking that correlation (one-way streets and high number of accidents) does not equal causation, of course you are right. The streets were converted to one-way years ago by traffic engineers who wanted to get vehicles into and out of uptown as efficiently as possible. That was the thinking several decades ago. So busy streets are going to have more accidents.

But the crash rate takes the street’s business into account. What else might account for the striking number of uptown one-way streets that are atop the high accident list? Could it be speed? Could it be people driving home from work and just not taking as much care? (The report also shows that mid- to late afternoon rush hour is the time of day with more accidents.)

But notice something interesting: The No. 11 High Accident Location was East Fifth Street and North Caldwell Street. Notice the accident numbers over three years: 10 in 2010, 11 in 2011 but dropping to 6 in 2012. That intersection used to be where two one-way streets crossed. But from Fifth Street south, Caldwell has been converted to two-way. Did that cause the lower number of accidents in 2012?

I’ve emailed CDOT Director Danny Pleasant, to see if he had comments. I’ll add them if he responds.

Protest petitions going the way of buggy whips

If you’ve paid attention to Charlotte planning and zoning matters you know the powerful role that protest petitions have played in stopping rezonings that neighbors oppose. The N.C. legislature is moving rapidly toward eliminating protest petitions.

It’s part of a larger bill that would remove a number of local environmental regulations that are stronger than state regulations. The bill passed the N.C. House on Thursday. (“Bill eliminates protest-petition rights in zoning cases“) It now goes back to the N.C. Senate, which passed it without the protest petition section.

Here’s a synopsis of the action, from the blog of Charlotte’s Real Estate and Building Industry Coalition. It notes how many local legislators in both parties voted for the bill, which would, among other things, scrap a key local storm-water pollution ordinance. “House passes landmark regulatory reform package.”

The protest petition is a 90-year-old section of state law that has let adjoining property owners file official protests against proposed rezonings. If enough of these protests are deemed valid, then that rezoning can’t pass without a three-quarters vote from the elected body which in Charlotte is the City Council. In development-happy Charlotte, the provision occasionally means the defeat of rezonings that would otherwise pass, although the council OKs the overwhelming majority of proposed rezonings.

Here’s an editorial from the Greensboro News & Record about the bill: http://www.news-record.com/opinion/n_and_r_editorials/article_41619342-ea81-11e2-b870-0019bb30f31a.html

The editorial says: “… There was no chance for compromise, just a wholesale repeal with little warning.

“In principle, the action contradicts what the Republican legislature has done in regard to involuntary annexations. It has empowered affected residents to call for a referendum. This measure takes power from residents.

“But some developers don’t like protest petitions because it’s harder for them to advance projects that neighbors don’t want. They’re “costly and hinder development,” Rep. Rob Bryan, R-Mecklenburg, said Thursday.”

It’s part of a bill that state planners are calling the “Billboards Forever” bill. Read this report from The Charlotte Observer’s Jim Morrill: http://campaigntracker.blogspot.com/2013/07/surprises-not-surpising-near-sessions.html

By Jove, I think they’ve got it!

There, that wasn’t so hard to figure out, was it?

Back in the winter, when the reverse-angle parking was installed in the Plaza-Central business district, which requires you to back in, and people weren’t doing it right, I wondered if they’d ever figure it out. Here’s a link to a WCNC-TV piece on motorists’ inability to grasp the concept.

As this hilarious article from Charlotte magazine recounts, so many people were just not getting it that the city held a press conference and hired a guy to do a rap song, to demonstrate:

“This was a news conference, an honest-to-God news conference, in which Charlotte city officials demonstrated how to back into a parking spot. And they brought a rapper.”

Last Saturday, my spouse and I decided we should visit the amazing new Harris Teeter grocery store at Central and The Plaza (It’s two stories, y’all!) because we do lead rather boring lives. After we conquered the problem of how to find the second floor, and ascended and realized there’s nothing there but tables where you can eat your Teeter Deli purchases, we bought a few necessaries and left.

On the way home, we drove past the formerly infamous reverse-angle parking. If Saturday is anything typical, I’m here to report that by cracky, people have figured it out. Not a single car was parked front-end-in.

Way to go, PM-ers.

Waxhaw: Once a small town, now it wonders what’s next

Historic downtown Waxhaw. Photo: Nancy Pierce

WAXHAW – The question came from the back row of the small audience, during a presentation from planning consultants about the future for N.C. 16 as it bisects the fast-growing Union County town.

“If we do all this, will we still be considered a small town?”

Consultant Monica Holmes of Lawrence Group paused briefly before answering: “A very important part of this discussion is, ‘What does Waxhaw want to be?’ ”

Good question. Waxhaw – a railroad hamlet chartered in 1889 and named for the Indians who before the Europeans arrived gave their name to the region called “the Waxhaws” – is growing like kudzu. In 2000 it was the 42nd largest municipality in the Charlotte region, and by 2010 it was No. 25. Growth since then has already likely notched it up to No. 17 or 18. And now it is studying how it could shape the growth along its main highway, growth that is all but promised to arrive in the next 20 years.

Read my article on Waxhaw looks to future for N.C. 16.

That’s the way the modern concrete crumbles

Here’s yet another interesting piece I found last week while doing the daily news headline roundups from around the Charlotte region for PlanCharlotte.org and the UNC Charlotte Urban Institute homepage. (Yes, we read the region’s news and link to what’s of note in terms of public policy and urban growth topics, so you won’t have to. Wonky? Sure, and proud of it!)

The long-lost secret of Roman concrete’s endurance: If you have ever seen crumbling concrete and said – as I have trudging across the parts of the UNC Charlotte campus dating to the 1960s-1980s (see photo below) – “Good grief, I’ve seen ancient Roman concrete in better shape than this!” the next article will open your eyes. I spotted it on the excellent Planetizen.com website, which links to the original article on Bloomberg Businessweek: Ancient Roman concrete is about to revolutionize modern architecture. The Romans used lime and volcanic rock, and their process produces less carbon dioxide than today’s process.

Steps I walk on daily at UNC Charlotte. Photo: Mary Newsom