Pick up any North Carolina state road map. Look at the close-up map of the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill area. It’s liberally splashed with green: William B. Umstead State Park, Eno River State Park, Falls Lake State Recreation Area around Falls Lake, Jordan Lake State Recreation Area surrounding Jordan Lake.
Look at the close-up map of the Charlotte area. No state parks. The closest are Crowders Mountain State Park, west of Gastonia, and way at the tippy top of Lake Norman you’ll find modest Lake Norman State Park.
This lack of state largesse for parks around here has bugged me for years, just on general equitability grounds. I note the Triad – Greensboro, Winston-Salem and High Point – has a similar lack of state parks. What ticked me off afresh was a three-article package July 16 in the Neighbors of Lake Norman section of the Observer: “520 miles of shoreline. 125 yards of beach.” (Click here and here to see the rest of the package.)
Yep, that’s the only public swimming area on all of Lake Norman. Compare: B. Everett Jordan Lake in the Triangle serves the state’s second-largest metro area. It’s less than half the size of Lake Norman – 14,000 acres of water to Norman’s 32,500 – but has six public swimming areas. Who runs them? You guessed it: the state
Yeah, yeah, it’s an apples-to-oranges comparison: Jordan Lake was built by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Norman by private Duke Power Co., now Duke Energy. Duke acquired all its lakefront land decades ago after being granted the power of eminent domain, because building electric power plants was in the public interest. But in terms of lakefront access, the general public hasn’t benefited much, from what I see, at least not compared with the general public that’s getting the use of those state recreation areas in the Triangle.
Sure, Duke was willing to SELL the land. Mecklenburg County taxpayers have paid millions over the years to preserve land along the Duke Power lakes at McDowell Nature Preserve, Latta Nature Preserve and around Mountain Island Lake. And yes, the state helped a bit with some of those purchases, primarily through Clean Water Trust Fund grants.
But as far as major money for major state parks? From what I see, the state’s response has been: “Tough beans, Charlotte.”