Hearings planned on potential Atlanta-Charlotte rail line (Alpharetta, Washington: home, neighborhood)

[Psykomonkee]

At this point, I don't even care which line gets done... Can we see some action? Can we just see SOMETHING get done?

There's absolutley no possible way to make it perfect anyway. Or even near perfect. That's an impossibility.
So, no matter what, there are going to be thousands saying "it doesn't go where I need it to go..." That's the inevitable... BUT, it WILL work for somebody. Just pick whichever line sees the most traffic between the cities serviced, and get it done. I'll vote yes...

[arjay57]

Originally Posted by Zanarkand A East

The difference was Birmingham and Atlanta were comparable at the time. Charlotte would need to do more than host an Olympics to bypass today's Atlanta, and we were nice enough to give them a banking industry

If Charlotte becomes part of the east coast HSR system and we don't, that will a significant feather in their cap.

And we didn't give them a banking industry. They went after it and got it on their own.

[cqholt]

Please explain how Charlotte got the SE banking industry from Atlanta? I have never heard this story.

[arjay57]

Charlotte has deep roots in banking and some of their megabanks gobbled up the smaller Atlanta banks.

[AnsleyPark]

The State of Georgia had laws that restricted the banks headquartered in one county from expanding into other counties. This kept First National Bank of Atlanta from gobbling up banks based in rural communities. North Carolina did away with this type of parochial law long before Georgia did, thus, allowing their banks to grow. By the time Georgia disbanned their law it was too late. Citizen and Southern and other local institutions could hardly compete. Good thing the folks at the Trust Company were able to form Suntrust... If I recall, our law was changed in the early 80s by the George Busby administration.

[cqholt]

We have a more diverse economy.

[atler8]

Ansley has shared some good information on the background of how a Charlotte-based bank came to own the largest bank in Atlanta. I hope to complement that info briefly with a bit of colorful material.
I recall when Hugh McColl, the ambitious, growth-oriented CEO of what was then NCNB (now B of A), had his eye on the prospect of grabbing a big piece of the Atlanta banking market for a long time. Nevertheless he couldn't keep from slipping & giving away what he really thought of Georgia when he made a pr gaffe & said, regarding a possible banking move into the state via a hostile acquisition, "We're not going to go down every pig path in Georgia."
Hoping to become large enough to remain independent & ward off NCNB's attentions, Citizens & Southern Bank arranged a merger with Sovran Bank of Richmond that was designed to keep NCNB at bay.
However, the merger turned sour when the mid Atlantic real estate market temporarily went down hill & saddled the newly-merged bank with a serious enough bad loan problem such that the stock fell far enough to allow Hugh to "..launch his missiles..." at C & S/Sovran, as he actually phrased his hostile attack.
It was a sad day for banking in Atlanta & Georgia when C & S/Sovran bank succumbed 20 years ago this year.
My friends in Charlotte were ecstatic & I didn't hear the end of that debacle for years.

[Born 2 Roll]

Originally Posted by arjay57

If Charlotte becomes part of the east coast HSR system and we don't, that will a significant feather in their cap.

...Don't despair. Due to simple logistics Charlotte is likely to become apart of the East Coast high-speed rail system before us anyways as the line is being extended down the East Coast from Washington D.C. and the State of North Carolina appears to already have a mechanism setup to fund the service before Georgia does.

Also, something that has gotten completely lost in this conversation about extending high-speed rail down from Charlotte to Atlanta is that the line would have to run through the state of South Carolina before reaching into Georgia and it seems to be unclear at this time if the State of SC even has a solid funding mechanism setup to extend the line south from Charlotte.

But even if Charlotte gets the East Coast HSR first (an event which I guarantee will light a fire under the a**es of many a Georgia politician) we would have put everything in perspective as far as where the two cities REALLY stand in relation to each other.

That's because even though Charlotte might get high-speed rail first, Atlanta will still have the world's busiest passenger airport, Atlanta (6.1 million greater metro population) will still have about 3 times the population of Charlotte (2.3 million greater metro pop.), Atlanta will still have a legendary history (Cradle of the Civil Rights Movement, host of 1996 Olympic games) that Charlotte will never have, Atlanta will still have a convention industry that is much-bigger than Charlotte's (NCAA Final Fours, Super Bowls, SEC Football Championship Game, College Football National Semifinal Game, Chick-Fil-A Peach Bowl, the 4th-largest convention center in North America, etc), Atlanta will still have an entertainment industry (music & film) that Charlotte can only dream of, and Atlanta will still have a much more diversified economy than Charlotte.

The more that one thinks about it, comparing Charlotte to Atlanta is like comparing Phoenix to Los Angeles...Charlotte is a good town, but Charlotte is absolutely NO MATCH for Atlanta.

That doesn't mean that Atlanta should just rest on its laurels and be fat, happy and overcontented.

But it does mean that Charlotte has a heckuva lot of work to do before it can even think of trying to catch up to or pass Atlanta.

Originally Posted by arjay57

And we didn't give them a banking industry. They went after it and got it on their own.

...If Georgia didn't give North Carolina its banking industry then Georgia must have left it right in the front hallway of the house directly in front of an unlocked open door with the alarm off because North Carolina barely had to lift a finger to get it because otherwise we wouldn't have so many NC-based Bank of America, Wells Fargo (formerly NC-based Wachovia) and NC-based BB&T branches all over the state of Georgia.

[BajanYankee]

Originally Posted by Born 2 Roll

...Don't despair. Due to simple logistics Charlotte is likely to become apart of the East Coast high-speed rail system before us anyways as the line is being extended down the East Coast from Washington D.C. and the State of North Carolina appears to already have a mechanism setup to fund the service before Georgia does.

I think the real question is whether Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Washington, DC will become a part of the East Coast high speed rail system.

Who will get high-speed rail first: California or the Northeast?

I'll probably have grandchildren by the time this project starts (if ever).

[MathmanMathman]

Originally Posted by BajanYankee

I think the real question is whether Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Washington, DC will become a part of the East Coast high speed rail system.

Who will get high-speed rail first: California or the Northeast?

I'll probably have grandchildren by the time this project starts (if ever).

It can be argued that the NE has it already with Acela. But if we are still waiting on a NE HSR train, and it is projected for 2040, then we might as well forget about a Charlotte-Atlanta train unless we can somehow finance it ourselves. Boston-DC would be a priority over CLT-ATL.