KCRag Forum

I thought you guys might like this photo. I'm not really trying to compare KC to Charlotte but if you follow Charlotte at all, this might be of interest.

Charlotte has really changed in the past 15 years. It's still not my cup of tea. It's too newish. But they have really invested a lot in transit there and it has paid off. They have a nice light rail line in fully dedicated right of way that has been expanded and more lines planned. And their streetcar line was a short heritage streetcar that has been upgraded to modern streetcar and extended several miles across the city. That will open next month I think. They also have a huge downtown transit center.

Here is a pic I took this past weekend of the south side of "uptown" along the light rail line. You can some new large office towers going up. This is where KC is still struggling. Getting companies to move downtown. I think Charlotte has finally pulled away from being a peer to KC and is now heading toward Denver, MSP even Seattle territory. Again, not really a comparison to KC, but more of an analysis of Charlotte. Nashville and Austin are where Charlotte was 15 years ago but are catching up fast. I still like KC better.

Liberal banking laws fueled the city's growth. In 1930, Charlotte had just a few thousand more people than St. Joseph, Missouri does now. In 1930, Kansas City had four times as many people as Charlotte. Kansas City had more people than Charlotte up until 1990.

Charlotte hasn't retained hardly any historic building stock in its' downtown, even though it's a much older city than Kansas City.

Their light rail line through downtown both ways seems to have stimulated a lot of growth.