SHOPPES AT UNIVERSITY PLACE
THE BUZZ
JW CLAY BLVD.
JM KEYNES DRIVE
BARTON CREEK GREENWAY
ATRIUM HEALTH URGENT CARE
JW CLAY LIGHT RAIL STATION JW MARRIOTT CHARLOTTE
N. TRYON ST./US-29 UNC CHARLOTTE LYNX BLUE LINE
The University City Vision Plan will guide the neighborhood away from car-oriented development (above) and toward a pedestrianfriendly model that unites urban and green space (below).
CO M M U N I T Y
UNIVERSITY CITY’S REBOOT
The classic suburb’s new vision plan maps out a transit-oriented lifestyle at the intersection of Main Street and greenway
FOR DECADES, the intersection of W.T. Harris Boulevard and North Tryon Street was little more than a rural crossroads. The Mecklenburg County Poor House operated there from 1904 until 1957, when it became the Green Acres care facility. Five years later, Charlotte College established a 1,300-acre campus in the neighborhood (and would become UNC Charlotte shortly after). Then, in 1984, what is now Atrium Health opened a hospital on the Green Acres site. That once-quiet crossroads became the busiest intersection in North Carolina, where, today, light rail trains whiz overhead. Tobe Holmes joined University City Partners, which promotes the area’s economic vitality, as planning and development director in 2015. The organization tasked him with developing a strategy to guide the neighborhood’s next 20 years of development. The plan, released in November, capitalizes on existing assets, including the university and hospital, and lays out a modern vision for this northeastern pocket of Charlotte. “We already have all the pieces of the puzzle,” Holmes says. “It’s just a matter of making them connect better, so we can be a better version of what we are today.”
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University City, which encompasses a roughly 3-mile radius from the W.T. Harris-Tryon intersection, is in many ways a classic suburb. Unlike the mixeduse developments in vogue today, the University Research Park, founded in 1966, is all business; the 450-acre site still houses East Coast headquarters and outposts for Fortune 500 companies like Electrolux. Most of the shopping centers along North Tryon were built between 1984 and 2005, and they reflect the era’s automobile obsession: huge thoroughfares, sprawling parking lots, big box stores. But the neighborhood is also home to plenty of natural settings that seem a world away from the exhaust-choked main drags. “It never fails to amaze me when I walk from University Place down to Barton Creek Greenway, right off the Mallard Creek Greenway,” Holmes says. “You’re standing in the town center of University City, and 10 minutes later you’re standing in the middle of the woods. And that is what I conceive of as what suburbia was intended to be.” The suburban format—as opposed to rural or urban—dominates every American city, and it’s not hard to see why. The suburbs were conceived as a place
where you could have it all: nature, lots of space, a quick commute, and acres of free parking. Parts of that model are worth holding onto, Holmes believes, but other parts will have to adapt as city dwellers ditch the car and embrace transit. All of the University City Vision Plan’s 10 key strategies, from pedestrian safety to housing diversity, dovetail with the goals of Charlotte’s 2040 Comprehensive Plan, which the City Council adopted in June and will guide the entire city through this inflection point. While the University City plan is not a binding policy document, Holmes says that “both the comp plan and our vision share a lot of aspirations for the future and, honestly, a lot of hope that we can achieve what we said we would achieve.” University City, which welcomed the Blue Line in 2018, is well positioned to navigate that transformation. “Here, in this place, there are the ingredients to start to figure out how we change what so much of America is,” Holmes says. “To be something that reflects a more walkable, bikeable place that is able to host so much more than the commercial strips Continued on page 18
COURTESY UNIVERSITY CITY PARTNERS
BY ALLISON BRADEN
