After our week of worry, it feels like we dodged a bullet when Hurricane Florence shifted south. In Chapel Hill, the power outages were short-lived, the flooding no worse than expected, and no one has died. Those of us who lived here through Hurricane Fran feel a guilty relief — and empathy after seeing the […]
All posts in category Land Use
The Florence side of trees
Posted by Nancy Oates on September 24, 2018
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2018/09/24/the-florence-side-of-trees/
Do We Want Diversity?
In an effort to improve our chances of recouping through tax revenue the $10 million taxpayers invested in infrastructure in the area now known as Blue Hill, Town Council members considered options for increasing the amount of commercial space in the district. At our June 27 council meeting, we talked about changing the form-based code […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on July 9, 2018
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2018/07/09/do-we-want-diversity/
2018 Season Finale
As the bad news piled up — cruelty and crassness at the national level and callousness from state legislators — a friend commented: “I no longer feel proud to be an American.” I know the feeling. At last Wednesday’s Town Council meeting — our last of the season — we treated the public to 5 […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on July 2, 2018
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2018/07/02/2018-season-finale/
Won’t you be my neighbor?
Is all affordable housing good? Is it morally defensible to put affordable housing somewhere that you wouldn’t put other housing? These questions came to mind last Wednesday during a Chapel Hill Town Council meeting at which representatives of the town’s Office for Housing and Community proposed putting affordable housing on three parcels of town-owned land […]
Posted by Don Evans on June 25, 2018
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2018/06/25/wont-you-be-my-neighbor/
Autopsy of a vote
After my colleagues on Town Council blew off applying for a quarter million dollars of free money toward the purchase of the American Legion property at the April 18 meeting, I was so disheartened I went out and got #NeverAgain tattooed on my chest. (Just kidding, Mom.) So when I walked into the April 25 […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on April 30, 2018
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2018/04/30/autopsy-of-a-vote/
Guidelines Matter
In its quest to increase the commercial tax base, the Town Council in 2014 approved form-based code for the Ephesus-Fordham, now Blue Hill, district. FBC shifted approval for development projects from council to the town manager in that defined area around Rams and Village plazas and Eastgate. Council drew up some guidelines about maximum building […]
Posted by NancyDon on March 26, 2018
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2018/03/26/guidelines-matter/
Noisy Neighbors
Chapel Hill’s noise ordinance aims to ensure reasonable peace and quiet for residents in their homes. Typically, people use the law to rein in loud parties or construction projects that go on into the wee hours of the morning. Does that mean people who work from home or cover night shifts and sleep during the […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on March 12, 2018
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2018/03/12/noisy-neighbors/
Our chance at the gold — gone
Chapel Hill should bid on hosting a Winter Olympics. Sure, we’d need to build a couple of ski slopes, one with fancy rails and jumps. We would have to retrofit the Dean Dome into an ice-skating rink. And we’d need to build a housing complex for the athletes, though we could repurpose it into affordable […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on February 19, 2018
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2018/02/19/our-chance-at-the-gold-gone/
At what price?
When has Chapel Hill ever forced an entire neighborhood to pack up and move away? When has the town ever told more than 100 of its residents they must leave their homes en masse and find other housing? It sure looks like that’s about to happen to the Lakeview mobile home community in north Chapel […]
Posted by Don Evans on January 29, 2018
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2018/01/29/at-what-price/
What’s worth preserving
Would a time traveler from the turn of the 19th century into the 20th, walking through one of Chapel Hill’s historic districts, recognize the neighborhood? Amber Kidd, a preservationist with the N.C. Historic Preservation Office who advises local governments on how to set up and run a Historic District Commission, put that question to Chapel […]
Posted by Nancy Oates on January 22, 2018
https://chapelhillwatch.com/2018/01/22/whats-worth-preserving/