Ira Alexander vividly remembers working on the Norfolk Southern O-line in the early aughts.

The retired locomotive engineer joined the company in the 70s and the tracks along North Graham Street would decades later become his regular route. Alexander would spend his days transporting precious cargo up and down the railway. His job gave him a first row seat to the progress that sprung up along the tracks over the years: steel industries, bakeries, vinegar distilleries and factories that built the Gama Goat Jeeps made famous from the Vietnam War.

And then he watched as they left.

But as a lifelong Charlottean he’s seen how transportation projects like the Lynx Blue Line have breathed new life into places like South End, bringing historic investment into the area. Alexander, a 77-year-old resident who lives on North Graham Street, believes the city’s Red Line commuter rail could do the same.

“I’m thinking it’s going to similarly happen all along that line,” he said. “We’ve kind of seen it take place before.”

The long planned Red Line is a 25-mile commuter rail project that will use existing Norfolk Southern Rail line. It would connect uptown Charlotte to the downtowns of places as far north as Davidson and possibly Mount Mourne in Mooresville.

Residents just north of uptown have long pushed the city to add additional stops, and while officials have warmed to adding a station in Camp North End, a proposed West Craighead station has been met with a tepid response, despite residents saying the area has been underinvested in for decades.

But Alexander sees the proposed station on the Red Line as a potential benefit for the nearby Sugar Creek community.

“There’s a lot of land around it that could be developed into commercial and residential,” he said. “It would be an ideal spot, in my opinion, and it would help the people who live there to get downtown and beyond.”

Residents are pushing for the station to be placed at the intersection of North Graham and West Craighead Road. The proposed stop could bring historic investment to the nearby community, according to several residents who spoke at a Metropolitan Public Transportation Authority Board meeting in June. Among them was Hidden Valley Community Association President Marjorie Parker.

She said residents in the area have faced disproportionate environmental burdens due to neighborhoods being near industrial and manufacturing facilities for years.

“A station at West Craighead Road would help address these longstanding challenges by improving mobility, reducing transportation barriers and expanding access to cleaner, more equitable transit options,” Parker said.

Catalyst for transformation

Driving along North Graham Street tracks where the Red Line will run a driver could simply just see an industrial corridor. A person could pass companies like auto body shops and trailer truck rentals, and not see much.

But for Sugar Creek resident Karen Sullivan, she sees the possibility of more.

“With the Craighead station, we have a catalyst for transformation,” Sullivan said.

The station is at the centerpiece of what she’s calling the West Craighead mobility corridor, the community’s environmental action plan to improve connectivity and mobility for residents while also reducing environmental burdens. It could also diversify jobs in the area, she said.

As it stands the Red Line could bring more than 40 trains a day through the area without directly benefiting nearby residents, according to Sullivan.

“It would travel four miles through territories where people need access to jobs, education and opportunity,” she said. “We are asking for equitable access to the Red Line.”

Brian Nadolny, Red Line Senior Project Manager, said in a MPTA committee meeting last month that much of the corridor along North Graham Street doesn’t have high residential density, is very industrial and is a mile from the nearest community. It’s why the Charlotte Area Transit System’s staff does not currently recommend the proposed station.

But the Sugar Creek-Ritch Avenue area, which includes the intersection of North Graham Street and West Craighead Road, includes a population of around 4,700 residents.

And the nearby Sugar Creek Blue Line station is an example of how transit can transform a more industrialized area, according to Sullivan.

“Sugar Creek at the opposite end of Craighead was all industrial,” Sullivan said. “There was not a lot of residential around there, so we have a precedent for doing that.”

Construction along the Blue Line sharply increased, according to an analysis by UNC Charlotte.

Between 2001 and 2012, construction spending averaged about $20 million per year along the area where the Blue Line Extension would run. But in 2013, the year work began on the 9.3 mile long Blue Line Extension, construction spending increased to $48 million. And 2019 would see an at the time record year, totalling $305 million in investment.

A mix of new construction developments and townhouses exist today near the Sugar Creek Blue Line station. But prior to the Blue Line that development was nonexistent.

Sullivan said it’s the kind of change the Red Line station they’re pushing for could bring, even if it stops around a mile away.

Delicate balance

There are differences between a light rail like the Blue Line and a commuter rail like the proposed Red Line. A light rail connects neighborhoods within a city, stopping more frequently. In comparison, a commuter rail stops miles apart more infrequently and typically connects suburbs to a city’s center.

But a commuter rail could bring the kind of investment residents are pushing for, even in a more industrialized area, according to Matthew Palm, an assistant UNC-Chapel Hill professor who specializes in transportation planning

“The case that the city is making is not unreasonable in so far as wanting to prioritize destinations where there’s a very high density of jobs nearby,” Palm said. “But that’s looking at it right now, a station can always attract that kind of activity.”

Palm said at a glance it could look like history being replayed: more affluent suburbs being connected to a city’s downtown while areas in need are looked over.

But it’s also the kind of complex questions planners are asked to consider when planning transit projects. He said officials are often weighing placing projects where they know they can get a guaranteed return on any investment, against the needs long held by communities.

“Navigating that tradeoff is kind of at the heart of what a good regional planner does in trying to balance both fairness but also building the most competitive system you can,” Palmer said.

CATS’ officials have pointed to the planned Derita station on the Red Line and, if approved, the additional Camp North End station as locations residents could be connected to.

But it falls short of what Sugar Creek residents are currently pushing for.

Support for West Craighead

The push for the West Craighead station has garnered support from those near and far. An online petition currently has hundreds of signatures.

Meg Fencil with Sustain Charlotte,said her organization also supports the residents because the Sugar Creek community has not seen as much economic opportunity as other parts of the city.

“We really think that they should be considering not just present land use, but the future potential of this area,” Fencil said. “Nobody has a crystal ball to know how the area is going to change or how rapidly.”

She said there are numerous residents within a one-mile radius of where the station is proposed. While that means it would likely look like a park and ride station, it could still send a strong signal to investors in the area, she added.

Fencil said it’s a fantastic opportunity to move in the right direction at a time when the city is heavily investing in the future of its transportation infrastructure.

“We’re making this big public investment as taxpayers,” Fencil said. “A large percentage of the folks paying the sales tax are Charlotte residents, and certainly North Mecklenburg residents are paying as well, but adding this station would help really provide value to Charlotte residents to get to jobs without having to drive.”

Monifah Drayton, a Mecklenburg County Commissioner candidate for District 2, shared similar sentiments.

“That would be a great opportunity for those people and the residents of that area to get on the train and go the opposite direction to work for the facilities in the northern part of the area,” Drayton said. “So that’s what would be lost without it – equity.”

She said she understood and respected the burden of work that CATS’ staff and the MPTA are tasked with to bring this long discussed project to fruition. But the city can’t forget those who have long been overlooked.

“We can’t keep dismissing history,” Drayton said. “We can’t keep making the same historical mistakes over and over again.”

The MPTA Planning and Project Delivery Committee will consider adding additional stops on the Red Line at its meeting on Wednesday. The full board is expected to then make a decision in August.

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