Herbert L. White
As North Carolina looks to add toll lanes along I-77 South, an advocacy group is asking the public for design alternatives.
Sustain Charlotte has launched of “Reimagining 77 South: A Vision for Repairing and Reconnecting Charlotte,” for residents, designers, and students to suggest new options for the corridor that reconnect neighborhoods, improve mobility and create healthier public spaces. The state’s proposed project has been temporarily paused.
April 6 is the deadline for idea submissions and professional experience is not required. Hand-drawn sketches are welcome. Selected submissions will be displayed at a free public exhibit on April 13 at the Dubois Center at UNC Charlotte Center City, as part of a free public event called How the Cities We Build Shape How We Live, featuring Charles Montgomery, the author of “Happy City.”
“For decades, highways built through cities divided neighborhoods and limited opportunity,” said Shannon Binns, founder and executive director of Sustain Charlotte. “This challenge invites local residents to imagine what it could look like to repair past harm and reconnect our communities, as so many other cities have already begun to do.”
NCDOT announced earlier this month it will delay release of the first Request for Proposals for the $3.2 billion project until June in order to conduct community meetings. Final design of the project isn’t expected until the end of 2027 at the earliest and construction would begin in the early 2030s.
Eradication of the all-Black Brooklyn neighborhood in Second Ward in the 1960s and disconnection of Black communities in west Charlotte – fueled by urban renewal and highway construction initiatives – has been a rallying point for opponents of the toll lanes. State Sens. DeAndrea Salvador and Caleb Theodros, who each represent communities that would be impacted by the planned elevated toll lanes, have appealed to Gov. Josh Stein to stop the project.
The impacted communities stretch from John Belk Freeway to Brookshire Boulevard between Third and Fourth wards in Uptown from Wesley Heights, Seversville, and McCrorey Heights and other historically Black neighborhoods in west Charlotte.
People can submit visual concepts that reinterpret how the corridor would serve neighborhoods and the environment while accommodating growth. Ideas can include freeway caps or tunnels, parks and greenways, new walking and biking connections, restored waterways, or other approaches that reconnect communities and improve quality of life.
The organizers cite instances where other cities across the country are transforming highways and the neighborhoods they once divided. Freeway caps and similar projects have already been built in more than 60 cities, with nearly 20 more proposed or in the development stage in Dallas, Texas; Seattle, Washington; Denver, Colorado and Phoenix, Arizona.
