My hometown

This may seem an odd choice to “honor” in this way on the occasion of my turning 30. But I don’t think I would be where I am today were it not for the place I came from, my beloved hometown, Charlotte, North Carolina.

Shortly before I was born in 1982, the 1980 United States Census ascribed to Charlotte a population of 315,473. As of this writing, Charlotte’s estimated population is 772,627, well more than double its population of just 32 years ago. As I grew and matured, so did the city I lived in. I witnessed first hand much of that growth, along with the opportunities and challenges it presented. As the city and its leaders faced and answered tough questions—who we were as a city and what physical form the city should take—I was deeply interested and impacted. Without it, I don’t think I would have my intense passion for urban planning. I don’t know I would appreciate the importance of place and the need for people to care about the communities they live in and the cities they call home. I’m not sure I would understand the impact that thoughtfully-planned, well-built cities can have on their citizens, on the environment, on the economy, and on the world.

That’s not to say that Charlotte is any of those things. It has made a lot a mistakes, and answered a lot of questions the wrong way—or, perhaps worse, not answered them at all. Among its missteps, there are two that I think are particularly egregious.

First, it has disregarded its history. It has too frequently, too swiftly, and too recklessly torn down the markers of its past and in so doing torn the fabric that made it what it was and is. It seems like hardly a building built before my lifetime stands in the city center any more. And perhaps that is why it has had such trouble deciding where it is going: it does not always remember where it has been, because the reminders and evidence of its past have been wiped away. That is just as lamentable for a city as it is for a person.

Second, it has chosen a physical form that places primacy on the automobile over anything else. The economic, fiscal, and environmental effects of this decision and its impact on the city’s livability and its residents’ health are manifold and deep.

But that’s also not to say that Charlotte hasn’t made many good choices. It has built one of the most beautiful skylines in the country and one of America’s liveliest and most walkable downtowns. It has likewise launched one of the nation’s most ambitious transit-building programs. (The first segment of this plan, the South Corridor light-rail line dubbed the LYNX Blue Line, opened 24 November 2007. My friend Andrea Braswell and I were aboard the first train that ran, with the mayor and a number of other public officials.)

The economic turmoil that began in 2008 has deeply impacted the city. Many construction projects in the city center and elsewhere have been delayed or cancelled. The sales tax that supports construction of the transit plan has brought in lower revenues than projected, causing the entire plan to be delayed and leading to debates over whether parts of the plan should be eliminated. In perhaps the most bruising blow to the city’s ego, the nation’s fourth largest bank, Wachovia, a Fortune 500 company headquartered in Charlotte that was one of the city’s largest employers, was purchased by San Francisco’s Wells Fargo. After decades of out-competing its rivals, Charlotte had to endure the bitter taste of its own medicine.

I have learned from both my hometown’s triumphs and its struggles. Growing up there is why I became so interested in urban planning and transportation issues in the first place. It’s why I majored in urban and regional planning at the University of Utah, studies which eventually took me to The Netherlands and then back to America and an internship at The United States Conference of Mayors in Washington, D.C. It was that internship, of course, that led to the job that kept me in D.C. for much longer than just that summer I had expected to stay. And it was in Washington, D.C., that Susan and I met. I am where I am because of where I came from.