The Coffee Cup

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this sucks. fucking Charlotte, has to slap condos up everywhere. no old buildings left anywhere down(not up)-town. coffee cup has some slap-your-momma good food. even if they open a new one, it wont be the same.

 

I thought they saved it a while back.

 

they did for a while. heres the story

http://www.charlotte.com/mld/charlotte/business/15337552.htm

An Atlanta homebuilder announced plans Tuesday for a 400-unit residential and retail complex in a long-ignored corner of uptown Charlotte.

Beazer Homes' project would fill a mostly barren area city officials and others have wanted to see developed for years. But the company confirmed it also would demolish the Coffee Cup, one of the city's iconic and most culturally significant restaurants.

The Cup is 60 years old, known for its soul food, original signs and status as one of the only Southern restaurants in the age of Jim Crow that allowed black and white diners to eat in the same space.

The diverse crowd occupies its booths and counter stools to this day, and its proprietors think the restaurant is important enough to merit a historic designation that might save it from the wrecking ball.

But Beazer, which owns about 20 acres along West Morehead Street near Bank of America Stadium, made its intentions clear Tuesday: It plans to raze the restaurant building to make way for a mix of townhomes, low-rise condominiums and a small office and retail component on the complex's west side. It hopes to break ground in January.

The complex will aim for a neighborhood feel, incorporating alleys and green space and keeping its buildings low, said Jade Eastridge, Beazer's director of urban operations. Beazer hopes the development will mesh with the city's revitalization efforts and reinvigorate the West Morehead corridor, formerly home to several factories but now mostly a succession of vacant lots.

"We see a unique opportunity to help with revitalization efforts in uptown Charlotte," Eastridge said. "We have been looking at development opportunities in the uptown area, and this one really seemed to hit the mark."

The complex would be the largest yet in a section of uptown that, oddly for the booming business district, has been slow to develop. Since the mid-1990s, several industrial buildings have been renovated as offices, boosted by the nearby stadium. But housing hasn't taken hold.

Planners, though, say it's prime land for residential development because of its relatively low cost and proximity to the rest of uptown and Interstates 77, 85 and 277.

Hundreds of units on West Morehead would help extend the booming residential rebirth in Third Ward and Wesley Heights eastward toward South Tryon Street and South End.

The West Morehead area has greenway and sidewalk connections to Third Ward, where a public park is planned and a minor league baseball stadium is a possibility.

Yet the erection of the new would herald the destruction of the old, unless the city intervenes.

The Coffee Cup's proprietors have applied to the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historic Landmarks Commission for designation of the building as a historic landmark, which would stave off or even prevent demolition. Its co-proprietor, Gardine Wilson, said Tuesday that he and his business partner, Anthony McCarver, would concentrate on trying to win the designation.

"I've still got faith," Wilson said, adding that demolition "would be devastating." He and McCarver began running the restaurant in 2003, when rumors flew that the eatery would close.

Beazer will let Wilson and McCarver run the Cup rent-free until Dec. 15, when the company has asked them to leave. Beazer plans to talk to them about opening a restaurant as part of the new development's commercial wing, Eastridge said. Wilson said he'd consider that if tearing down the old restaurant is unavoidable.

It might not be. A Landmarks Commission subcommittee will consider a study of the property Thursday. The study would take about two months. If the full commission then decides to recommend historic status to the City Council, demolition would be delayed for 180 days or until council members could vote on it, whichever came first, said Dan Morrill, the commission's consulting director.

If council members voted for the designation, it would delay demolition for a year. During that time, the city could acquire the property through eminent domain and sell it with the stipulation that the building remain, Morrill said.

Without that, though, "the power of determining what happens to the property rests with Beazer," he said, "and they're pretty sharp operators. We're not dealing with Mom and Pop here." -- staff writer doug smith contributed.

 

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Why can't they incorporate it into the plan for development? If not, 21.

 

Historic status to save Cup?

The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Historic Landmarks Commission will study the possibility of designating the Coffee Cup a historic landmark -- starting a process that may save the 60-year-old Charlotte diner from being torn down.

The commission's survey committee voted unanimously this morning to begin the study, which commission director Dan Morrill said would take about two months. The full commission likely will hear and vote on the results in November, Morrill said; if they vote to recommend the historic designation to the City Council, it would protect the building from demolition for 180 days or until council members vote on it, whichever comes first.

Beazer Homes of Atlanta, which owns the restaurant property and about 20 acres around it, announced plans this week to develop a complex of townhomes, condominiums and offices on their land, in the process razing the Coffee Cup.

The Cup, off West Morehead Street on the fringe of uptown, has served soul food across racial and economic lines for decades. The building, which retains its original counter stools, booths and signs, dates back to 1946, and it began serving black and white customers alike years before most Southern restaurants were integrated.

The issue drew a group of about 20 people to the commission's cramped meeting room, itself housed within an 82-year-old home. Terri Joelle, a self-employed Charlotte tour guide, said the Cup is one of the few places in town that fills a natural tourist need -- to see an eatery with some history.

"Any time you go into any city -- New York, Detroit, Chicago -- there's always a little place where you can go grab something to eat that's been there for years, and the Coffee Cup is that kind of place," Joelle said. "Right now, we have very little to show for that."

 

as overrated as Chicken Coop

somehow charlotte has come to value cafeteria quality food

 

Well aren't you just a little Anthony Bourdain. Bless it.

 

Charlotte does love some crap food. I mean the Penguin is alright but it ain't heaven.