Vote for your favorite N.C. Great Place

April 30, 2014
Categories: General News Tags: Downtown Revitalization, ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT, GET INVOLVED, PLANNING, Quality of Life, Urban Design

For another 10 days the public can vote to choose North Carolina’s best Main Street and best public place, part of a statewide awards program. Four Charlotte-area places are among the contestants: Main Streets in Belmont and Mooresville, and North Davidson Street in Charlotte’s NoDa neighborhood are among the contestants for Great Main Street. Charlottes Little Sugar Creek Greenway is among nominees for Great Public Place.

NoDa and downtown Mooresville are competing against Morganton, Benson and Boone. The Little Sugar Creek Greenway is competing against Raleigh’s Pullen Park and the Tarboro Town Common, among other nominees (list is below).

Through May 9, the N.C. Chapter of the American Planning Association is taking votes for People’s Choice awards in those two categories. The nominees were selected in March from places nominated by the public.

Want to know more?

Vote here

Concord and Davidson Main Streets named ‘Great Places’ in 2013

Download presentation on 2012 Great Places contest.

See list of this year’s nominees.

The awards celebrate great places “and the planners, business leaders, elected officials and everyone else who creates and sustains them,” the APA-NC website says. Winning communities can use their Great Place status in grant applications and economic development efforts. Finally, the group says, the communities receive statewide publicity, get to speak at the APA-NC state conference, receive a special public relations event “and of course get bragging rights.”

Previous Great Place award winners include Asheville, Blowing Rock, Concord, Charlotte, Davidson and Gastonia.

Members of the APA-NC can also nominate great Main Streets and a “great place in the making.” An expert panel selects the winners on those categories. (Disclosure: PlanCharlotte.org director Mary Newsom was a member of that panel.)

To vote for your favorite place, click here (see list of nominees below).

People’s Choice Great Main Street nominees

  • Main Street, Benson
  • Main Street, Belmont
  • East and West Union Street, Morganton
  • King Street, Boone
  • Main Street, Mooresville
  • North Davidson Street, Charlotte

People’s Choice Great Public Place nominees

  • Town Common, Tarboro
  • Town Square, Burnsville
  • Bridge Park, Sylva
  • Little Sugar Creek Greenway, Charlotte
  • Pullen Park, Raleigh
  • Wrenn Miller Park, Jamestown
  • Manteo’s Downtown Waterfront