South Charlotte land crunch limits school sites
CMS seems focused on Olde Providence, but land brokers say there are a small number of alternative locations for south Charlotte high school
A version of this article appeared in the August 23, 2019, edition of the Charlotte Ledger, an e-newsletter on local business news. Sign up for free here.
We all know that south Charlotte has been developing at a rapid pace. First there was Ballantyne. Then Blakeney. Now Rea Farms and Waverly. And plenty of subdivisions that fill in the gaps.
But you might not appreciate just how little undeveloped land there is in south Charlotte. Get this: Local real-estate brokers say there are only five privately owned parcels in south Charlotte that might be big enough to accommodate a new high school. Five.
And the ones that exist would likely cost millions of dollars just for the raw land — if the owners were even willing to sell to the school district instead of continuing to hang onto their investments.
“It is hard to find 60 acres for a 2,500-student school in S. Charlotte,” school board member Sean Strain told the Ledger in an email. In addition to privately owned parcels, there are some government-owned pieces of land in the area that might be suitable, but it’s tough.
That shortage of undeveloped land helps explain why Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools appears interested in building a new high school at the site of Olde Providence Elementary School on Rea Road. It already owns that property, which includes baseball fields and woods.
CMS has pledged to build a new high school somewhere in south Charlotte to help relieve South Meck and Ardrey Kell, and possibly Myers Park. Voters approved bond money for school construction in 2017, and the district earmarked $110M for a high school in the area.
CMS had been mum about possible sites until last week, when residents of Olde Providence heard a bulldozer knocking down trees in the woods to test the soil there. District officials confessed that yes, they are considering Olde Providence as a high-school site, but they denied any decisions have been made. Residents there like the woods and would prefer not to have a high school right behind them.
Why it matters: The location is important to just about everybody with kids or a house in south Charlotte – because the location will help determine attendance boundaries of all public school children in the area. School boundaries have been shown to have an effect on property values.
But where else might CMS build a high school?
Article continues below
—
If you like this article, you might like to sign up for the Charlotte Ledger, a 3x/week e-newsletter that delivers interesting and informative local business news straight to your inbox. Sign up now:
—
Here’s what we know: CMS has stayed mostly tight-lipped. Strain told the Ledger last week there are four sites that are possibilities: Olde Providence, a county-owned site and two that are privately owned. Olde Providence is the northernmost of the four, he said.
To deduce where the others might be, the Ledger turned to commercial real-estate brokers. Real-estate brokers are to land development what CSI is to murder scenes. But instead of using Luminol, brokers use computers with land databases and property records.
We asked Forde Britt of Land Advisors for a list of parcels that are more than 20 acres and are south of Pineville-Matthews road. Even that size is pretty small — CMS high schools in south Charlotte range between 52 acres (South Meck) and 70 acres (Myers Park). Olde Providence is 40 acres and includes an elementary school.
How hard is it to find a good site for a high school in south Charlotte? “It’s essentially a unicorn,” Britt said.
Britt came up with a list of five privately owned parcels — the most logical of which, he said, is a 37-acre wooded tract off Blakeney Heath Road behind Community House Middle School. Real-estate scuttlebutt indicates the owner has been open to selling in the past.
Here are the five:
1. Elm/Rea near Four Mile Creek Greenway
Location: Piper Glen area, south of the greenway by the shopping center with Trader Joe’s and Starbucks, between Elm Lane and Rea Road.
Size: 44.6 acres + 5.6 acres (in middle)
Owner: The Gillespie Family Partnership. (Smaller center parcel owned by Richard & Mary Gillespie)
Land value: $6.1M for the two parcels
Pros: Location is in between South Meck and Ardrey Kell.
Cons: High-traffic area close to Stonecrest. Elm Lane is a two-lane road.
2. 9118 Blakeney Heath Road
Location: Off Blakeney Heath Road, behind Community House Middle School and the Morrison Family YMCA
Size: 37.1 acres
Owner: Margaret Blakeney Bullock
Land value: $1.5M
Pros: Adjacent to eight parcels totaling 93 acres owned by Mecklenburg County (some are ball fields) and close to an existing CMS school, which makes site planning easier; relatively inexpensive.
Cons: Just 2 miles from Ardrey Kell High. Only access is to Blakeney Heath. Maps show stream running through middle of property.
3. 11315 Tom Short Road
Location: On the east side of Tom Short Road, north of Ardrey Kell Road and opposite Coral Rose Road
Size: 114.6 acres, plus 5-acre parcel in the middle
Owner: WFC LLC. (Smaller center parcel owned by HPC Investments)
Land value: $11.8M for the two parcels
Pros: Plenty of land, surrounded by neighborhoods, could be connected to back side of Rea Farms.
Cons: Main access is to Tom Short Road, which is two lanes.
4. Providence Road at I-485
Location: Southeast corner of Providence at I-485, behind northern part of Waverly
Size: 18 acres, plus adjacent 9.6-acre parcel
Owner: Marsh Mortgage Co.
Land value: $4.9M for the two parcels
Pros: Good accessibility and nearby infrastructure.
Cons: Small site, possibly too far from South Meck and Myers Park
5. Providence Road at Union County line
Location: East of Providence Road and north of Union County line, across from Providence Crossing subdivision
Size: 206 acres plus 5-acre parcel in center
Owner: Shiloh I LLC (smaller center parcel owned by RP Shiloh LLC)
Land value: $38.4M
Pros: Plenty of land, accessible from Providence Road, very expensive.
Cons: Location couldn’t be farther south and is far from South Meck and Myers Park
Other possibilities might include:
- Acquiring county-owned land: Mecklenburg County owns parks, a nature preserve and land beside the Foxhole, the county landfill.
- Assembling parcels. This is tough to do and requires a lot of coordination.
- Hoping for a church to leave. If, say, Calvary Church were to abandon its location, that could work. Unlikely.
- Horn in on a big development. Northwood Office has announced plans to redevelop its golf course at Ballantyne. Could it put a school there? That might not work. Northwood told the Ledger: “We have explored the option of using some land for a school site but don’t believe that is optimal because of the urban residential nature of this redevelopment.”
In related high school/land development news:
- Ace WSOC reporter Joe Bruno filmed additional soil testing at Olde Providence this week, and the South Charlotte Recreation Association told him that it would have to close if the site’s athletic fields were eliminated.
- A south Charlotte parent told the Ledger that former CMS Superintendent Clayton Wilcox told a meeting on school overcrowding in April that the district was likely to build a high school at Olde Providence.
Where do you think CMS should build a new high school? Share your ideas at editor@cltledger.com, and we will run the responses soon. Bonus points for creativity.
Subscribe to the Ledger here.
