- How can the city of Charlotte boost both the value of its neighborhoods and their quality of life?
- What national trends should developers, planners and neighborhood residents be aware of?
- How do different...
Mary is a lifelong newspaper journalist who spent several decades at The Charlotte Observer as an editorial board member and columnist, concentrating on Charlotte regional urban and suburban growth, planning, urban design, transportation and land preservation. She left the Observer and joined the UNC Charlotte Urban Institute in June 2011, where she works on strategic community and university partnerships and oversees the institute’s online communications. She had a year-long Nieman Fellowship at Harvard University and was a Knight Fellow in Community Building at the University of Miami.
A.B. Journalism UNC Chapel Hill
Urban and suburban issues, Charlotte region and North Carolina politics and government, writing, editing and journalism.
MOST RECENT POSTINGS
Wednesday, May 8, 2013 - 14:43
Can Charlotte growth policies get smarter?
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
Wednesday, April 24, 2013 - 14:54
Contest-winning photos evoke sense of place
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
When PlanCharlotte.org decided to hold a photo contest to celebrate our first birthday, we expected we’d receive plenty of snapshot-caliber photos. We were delighted to be wrong. Among a number of strong photos evoking a powerful sense of...
Wednesday, April 24, 2013 - 14:14
Beloved places in the Piedmont
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
A moody night-time shot of a more than 200-year-old house outside Huntersville, and a sliver of a moon over uptown Charlotte. Those photos, by Kevin J. Beaty, were what took the top honors in PlanCharlotte.org's one-year anniversary photo...
Wednesday, April 17, 2013 - 11:57
Regional cooperation at risk?
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
The implied threat Monday from Charlotte City Council members, to withdraw support for the proposed Monroe Bypass, is more fallout from an increasingly fractious local political battle over control of Charlotte’s airport. And now,...
Tuesday, April 2, 2013 - 17:18
The measure of a metro
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
In January, Charlotte had 1.8 million people. Today it has 2.3 million people. And no, there was no airlift of half a million residents from the Rust Belt or anywhere else. How can a city gain a half-million people almost overnight? How can a...
Thursday, January 10, 2013 - 08:25
Tracking neighborhood trends just got easier
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
Since 1993 the City of Charlotte has tallied information about some (and in later years all) city neighborhoods, in its regular Quality of Life reports. But this year major changes are afoot for the project, which ...
Thursday, July 12, 2012 - 14:08
Charlotte joins global bike phenomenon
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
By officially launching a bike-sharing system Thursday, Charlotte stepped to the forefront of a phenomenon rapidly taking root in cities around the world.
Charlotte B-cycle, the first bike-sharing system in North Carolina, will provide...
Wednesday, June 27, 2012 - 16:53
Finding a lesson in city’s budget, streetcar impasse
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
How did this happen? How did a Charlotte City Council – with all 11 members willing to vote for a small property tax hike to pay for an ambitious, five-year plan of neighborhood improvements – wind up killing that five-year plan?...
Thursday, May 17, 2012 - 07:32
In Jane Jacobs’ footsteps, exploring what's ‘urban’
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
Tom Hanchett and I have been having this discussion – some might call it a debate – over what’s the most “urban” part of Charlotte.
Hanchett, staff historian at...
Friday, May 4, 2012 - 06:26
Uptown time traveler
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
Published To: ui.uncc.edu --
How has uptown Charlotte changed in the past century? Launch the map below for an interactive graphic that depicts the dramatic change since 1911. A century ago, uptown's urban pattern was fine-grained, with numerous small buildings on small...