Future Charlotte: The Podcast

Michael Gallis is a longtime planner with a big idea for Charlotte: Throw out the city's transit expansion plans and start from scratch. Gallis, who's been involved in some of the big plans guiding Charlotte's future, doesn't hold back when he talks about what's wrong with Charlotte's plans and how the city should do something different. Gallis joined the Future Charlotte podcast to talk about transit, transportation, what's driving economic growth and why the city he nicknames "Boosterville" needs to get real about the threats looming on the horizon, from climate change to a lack of equitable growth.

Charlotte loves its trees. But are we willing to do all that we can to save them? That's the paradoxical question confronting Jane Singleton Myers, executive director of TreesCharlotte. The city's iconic tree canopy has shrunk from 49% to 45% coverage as of 2017, and likely more in the five years since the last comprehensive measurement. Myers joined the Future Charlotte podcast to talk about how Charlotte can preserve its tree canopy, why it matters that we do so (hint: shade and rain), and how a city that loves both growth and trees can balance competing interests. Myers also talks about her favorite tree, and why trees hold such a powerful place in many of our childhood memories.

From seemingly endless heat waves in the west to catastrophic floods from Kentucky to Pakistan, a drumbeat of extreme weather has dominated the news this summer. In Charlotte, it can feel like we’re not on the front lines of climate change — we’re not on the coast watching sea levels creep up, or out west watching rivers wither under record droughts — but we’re seeing the effects too. Hotter, muggier summers, heavier downpours, stronger storms. And we’re going to see more changes in the coming years. There are few people watching our weather as closely as Brad Panovich, chief meteorologist for WCNC, and few people who provide as much information about our climate and post as prolifically, and on as many platforms. He joined the Future Charlotte podcast to discuss everything from why it feels like our summers are muggier and grosser-feeling than they used to be (hint: dewpoints), what Charlotte's climate will look like in the future and what we can do locally to address impacts such as more rainfall, flash floods and the biggest weather-related killer — heat. Panovich also lets us in on what's his favorite season, why Charlotte is a good place to be a meteorologist and what he'd change about Charlotte if he could change anything (it's not the weather).

When it comes to the creative scene, Charlotte isn’t often mentioned in the same breath as peer cities like Austin or Nashville. After all, our city’s unofficial tagline is “Banktown,” not “Music City” or “Keep Austin Weird.” But Charlotte does have a thriving creative community. And a new study by the UNC Charlotte Urban Institute provides more details about that community’s assets, challenges and what we can do to provide artists, singers, graphic designers and other creatives with more support. Based on a survey of more than 630 local creatives, this new study found many encouraging signs. A majority of Charlotte creatives said they’re happy working here, and that the city offers a supportive environment. But there were also trouble spots. Many creatives described financially precarious situations, having to work other jobs to make ends meet, and a sense that, to truly be appreciated, they need to leave Charlotte and work elsewhere. Charlotte is Creative co-founders Tim Miner and Matt Olin, who commissioned this study, join Future Charlotte to talk about the city's creative community. We tackle questions like "Is Charlotte creative?" (Yes), why some creatives feel like they have to leave to Charlotte to succeed, and why it matters that our creative community is healthy. More information: https://www.charlotteiscreative.com/ Full survey: https://bit.ly/CLTCreativeSurvey

Charlotte’s seen rapid growth over the past several decades, but many say that boom has come at the cost of inclusivity and, perhaps, even a bit of the city’s soul. With the loss of many historic buildings and without much of an identifiable design vernacular — aside, perhaps, from the profusion of five-story apartment buildings — Charlotte’s even been accused of looking bland. And many of the city’s residents have been excluded from decision-making about Charlotte’s growth, exemplified most strikingly in the urban renewal program that demolished Black neighborhoods such as Brooklyn in uptown Charlotte. A new design paradigm could start to change that, however. Sekou Cooke is the Director of the Master of Urban Design Program at UNC Charlotte, and the author of “Hip-Hop Architecture,” a book published in 2021. He joins Future Charlotte to talk about what hip-hop architecture is, what it isn't, and why we need to change the way we build things.

One of Charlotte's quintessential suburban communities has big plans to transform itself into a dense, walkable, mixed-use center. Greenways, sidewalks, protected bike lanes and transit would replace the car-choked expressways and huge parking lots that dominate the auto-centric area now. We're not talking about Ballantyne or SouthPark. Leaders in University City — Charlotte's second-largest employment district and youngest neighborhood — are betting they can take a part of the city that developed in the heyday of the car and turn it into a walkable neighborhood. Tobe Holmes, interim executive director of University City Partners, joins the Future Charlotte podcast to talk about how they're reorienting development away from the suburban patterns that have long defined the area, how University City is establishing an identity in a place that's long seemed like a somewhat anonymous collection of office parks and houses, and the challenges of reengineering a road network over which the city has only limited control.

When WFAE, The Charlotte Ledger and the UNC Charlotte Urban Institute launched a joint newsletter last year to cover transit and transportation, we assumed that the main focus would be the 1-cent transit sales tax vote. Well, that vote didn't happen and the transit plan is in a bit of limbo, but we've still found plenty to write about, from Chick-fil-A's humongous backups to the NC DOT's yawning budget hole, the "stigma" facing bus riders to the real reason there are no plans for a train directly to the airport. Hear from Ely Portillo (UNC Charlotte), Steve Harrison (WFAE) and Tony Mecia (Charlotte Ledger) about what's next for getting around in our city. Sign up for the newsletter at www.transittimeclt.com.

Corporate landlords like American Homes 4 Rent and Invitation Homes now own 40,000 single-family homes across North Carolina. In Mecklenburg County, they now account for one in four rental properties. That's according to a new, months-long investigation by the Charlotte Observer and the Raleigh News & Observer. The series, "Security for Sale," details how Wall Street-backed companies built a money-making machine in the aftermath of the Great Recession, buying huge portfolios of houses and converting them into financial products. Tyler Dukes, one of the investigative reporters behind the series, joined the "Future Charlotte" podcast this week to talk about the rise of the Wall Street landlords in Charlotte and across the state, and what this might mean for the future of one of the fundamental ways we build weatlh and security in the U.S.

John Holmes III was a budding urbanist in Charlotte, reading books like "Street Fight" and wondering why we built our cities to drive everywhere. A Marine veteran working at Chick-fil-A, Holmes was trying to reconcile his workplace's busy drive-thru with his own ideas about building better cities. When he posted his opinion online about new drive-thru-only restaurants, he quickly found himself out of a job and into the spotlight.

Lots of people want to make Charlotte less car-dependent. Harrison Tucker, the CEO of SpaceCraft, is taking concrete steps to do so. He's the developer behind the Joinery, a parking-free apartment building along the Blue Line in Charlotte. The city's first such development, Tucker's project is a test case for Charlotte - are enough people ready for a car-free (or car-lite) lifestyle to make it work?

Charlotte is usually described as a car-dependent city, where you have to have an automobile to effectively get around. Pam Murray tries to show that's not the case, living her life almost car-free in sprawling Charlotte. And she thinks a lot more of us could be doing the same - even if it sounds a little daunting at first.

Charlotte Douglas International Airport is one of the busiest hubs in the world, despite the city of Charlotte's modest size. That disproportionate air service is usually cited as one of the city's biggest economic advantages. But COVID-19 impacted the air travel industry in a profound way, with Charlotte Douglas in the midst of a multibillion-dollar expansion program. How is the airport coping - even thriving - and what's next for CLT?

What if the future looks radically different? That's the vision of Curators, a collective of young, multinational designers who hope to build something very different in Charlotte. Join us as we talk about two pilot ideas: Controlled indoor farming with solar panel glass windows to bring fresh food onto every block, and the Next City. See more at www.wecurators.com

Donald Shoup (www.shoupdogg.com) is a distinguished research professor at UCLA in the department of urban planning. His work revolutionized the way a lot of people viewed the impact of parking, development rules and land economics in cities, and he continues to produce provocative work about the ways parking can degrade our urban environment. It’s not too much of a stretch to say he’s made parking, a seemingly totally mundane topic, into something fascinating — and consequential for the health and future of our cities.

Technology and artificial intelligence are starting to reshape every aspect of our lives, and the built environment is next. Ben Goebel, an architect with Gresham Smith in Charlotte, joins Future Charlotte to talk about how wearables, biometrics, advanced sensors, video cameras and AI can help designers make spaces that are less stressful, more efficient and better designed - and how we can avoid the "Big Brother" factor that might conjure up.

Let's get a little nerdy and jump right into the alphabet soup of zoning, land use, planning and development on this episode. Join us for a talk with Keba Samuel and Phillip Gussman about why the city's planning effort wasn't finished with the 2040 plan's passage, what happens next, and why your input on the policy map and other parts of the plan is vital, right now. You can go to www.cltfuture2040.com to learn more, and send feedback to the city through that website or via cltfuture2040@charlottenc.gov.

When it comes to urban design, Charlotte sometimes has a reputation for being bland. But that's not the whole story, and the new Urban Design Awards - the Urbies - are celebrating some of the real design achievements in our city. This episode, join former Charlotte Mayor Harvey Gantt, Damon Hemmerdinger of ATCO Properties (the developers behind Camp North End) and UNC Charlotte Prof. Deb Ryan to hear about the Urbies, how design in Charlotte is getting better, what's still holding us back - and what we can do about it.

Charlotte has a reputation for tearing down grand old buildings and replacing them with bland new apartments. But that's not the whole story. Dan Morrill, longtime preservationist and co-founder of Preserve Mecklenburg, and Tommy Lee, a textile executive and Preserve Mecklenburg board member, talk about keeping pieces of the past alive. A development-friendly, market-based preservation strategy can leave everyone "happy as a church mouse," Morrill said.

Water seems like a limitless resource - just turn on the faucet and it's there for you - until it's not. Charlotte is a city adjacent to a major series of manmade lakes, split by hundreds of streams, but it's easy to ignore the central role water plays in our lives if you're not paying attention. Hear from Catawba Riverkeeper Brandon Jones about how he keeps watch on over 9,000 miles of linear streams, what the biggest challenges facing our water are (hint: growth), and how we can all play a part in protecting our most important, most overlooked resource.

We talk a lot about infrastructure and new developments on this show - the buildings, roads, rail lines and more that define our next chapter. On this episode, we focus on the industry that actually builds those things, construction. Marcus Rabun, an industry veteran and CEO of Myers & Chapman, breaks down what changes are coming, how the industry can build the skilled workforce it needs, and how construction firms are still dealing with the aftermath of the covid-19 pandemic in Charlotte.