The town of Matthews appears to be dead-set against Charlotte's proposed transportation and transit plan, and commissioners voted unanimously Monday night to oppose designs that call for the town to get a bus line instead of a new light rail.
The city of Charlotte is launching an effort to build support for a new transit authority to run the region's public transportation system, and a new one-cent sales tax referendum to pay for transportation improvements. They unveiled a proposed bill to do so last week.
For years, Charlotte had said it would build the Silver Line light rail from uptown to Matthews.
But to please Republican lawmakers in Raleigh, Charlotte agreed this spring to only spend 40% of new tax money on rail transit.
With less money for trains, Charlotte quietly told Matthews officials in May it would build bus rapid transit to connect Matthews to uptown instead.
Matthews commissioners are livid.
Ken McCool said he had been to "countless" public meetings on the Silver Line light rail over the last decade.
"How many public meetings have they hosted when they decided they wanted to change it to bus rapid transit? Zero. Not a single constituent has been heard," he said. "Not a single person has been into a public building and talked about this and been able to voice their opinions. Not a single one."
Charlotte Mayor Vi Lyles and City Manager Marcus Jones have not publicly said the Silver Line's eastern leg is out. Other officials have widely discussed that it's not viable, from the city's perspective at least.
Matthews Mayor John Higdon said he's skeptical that true bus rapid transit would be built.
In theory, BRT gives buses their own special lane. They don't have to stop at traffic lights and they can avoid traffic.
But that's more expensive and requires more space.
"I would bet my house — and you can come get it if I’m wrong — that if BRT is built in Mecklenburg it won’t be true BRT, and we won’t have true 100% dedicated lines," he said.
Matthews commissioners voted three days after Charlotte officials unveiled a bill written for lawmakers in Raleigh that would create a new countywide transit authority. The bill would also let Mecklenburg County place a sales tax increase referendum on the ballot in November 2025.
If voters approved, Mecklenburg residents would pay an additional one cent atop the current half-cent transit sales tax, funding billions of dollars in new roads, light rail and commuter lines, greenways and other transportation infrastructure over the coming decades.
The Charlotte Regional Business Alliance and the Charlotte Executive Leadership Council quickly said they support the plan, indicating they would help lobby lawmakers in Raleigh. Mecklenburg County, Cornelius, Huntersville, Pineville, Davidson and Mint Hill also appear to support the plan.
Charlotte still plans to build the Red Line to Lake Norman; to extend the Blue Line to Ballantyne; and to build light rail from uptown to the airport. The streetcar also might be extended.
Matthews commissioners instead have proposed either a higher sales tax increase to fund the whole Silver Line — or that all new proposed train lines be swapped out for better bus service.
Matthews is the fourth-largest municipality in Mecklenburg County, with about 31,000 residents out of more than 1.1 million total. But the town's opposition could still be significant, especially if the referendum is ultimately up for a vote in a low-turnout, odd-year municipal election.
