What makes this all the more interesting is the CCCP’s self proclaimed mission, taken directly from their website:

Charlotte Center City Partners facilitates and promotes the economic and cultural development of the urban core.

Furman’s email and Trafk’s response is below:

_____________

Wow! Thanks for letting us know how you feel. And I appreciate the threats and foul language.

I’m sorry you feel the way you do. We went out of our way to mark public property with temporary chalk that washes away with water and minor foot traffic. The chalk would have been gone by this afternoon.

This is a common practice by multinational corporations in larger cities that simply adds to a diverse and interesting urban landscape. Something that Charlotte purportedly aspires to become.

Best Regards
Todd Trimakas
Partner – Trafk Media
Todd@trafkmedia.com
www.trafkmedia.com
704.944.0554

______
On 11/1/2010 10:47 AM, david furman wrote:
> From: david furman<david@centrocityworks.com>
> Subject: downtown tagging
>
> Message Body:
> guys…your guerrilla tactics are very effective in helping me remember the name of your company…so that i will remember to NEVER do any fucking business with you. i live downtown, and find the tagging you did this sat nite totally offensive. i hope that you have to pay for the city workers who had to work overtime to remove your graffitti by sunday afternoon. as a board member for center city partners, i will pass your name to everyone i know, with the request that your business be boucotted. i respond to creative marketing, and i have respect for those who produce it; but just like i have respect for the passion of skateboarders, i have no respect for vandalism as a message means.
>
> –

> This mail is sent via contact form on Trafk Media http://trafkmedia.com>

Gallis’ passion for exploring history, his ability to see beyond boundaries and identify spacial relationships has made him an expert in his field. He has helped shape the vision for U.S. transportation in the 21st century. His uptown Charlotte firm paved the way for how people commute from New York to Orlando, Fla., to Detroit and Memphis, Tenn., which also has a new economic development strategy thanks to him.

But he is also a writer, working on a book about friends who went to Vietnam and returned very different people. He is a historian, able to quote Bible verses and war battles.  And he is passionate about the environment and the impact of global warming.

“It’s apparent to all of us we have a daunting challenge ahead of us,” he says.

Gallis, 66, was born in San Francisco to a Chinese-born Russian father who operated a general goods and timber company that expanded to Oregon.  When the company collapsed during the Great Depression, Gallis’ father moved to the United States and enrolled in the University of Oregon. His mother was Swedish. Her family operated timber companies as well. The two had met at International House at the University of California at Berkley and married a short time later.

Gallis, who crewed on a rowing team when he was young, also developed an appreciation for history and art, courtesy of his parents who had their own Chinese art collection. He bought his first piece – a pair of African figurines – from an L.A. art dealer he discovered while buying supplies for a freshman architecture project at a lumberyard next door.

“The importance of collecting art from different parts of the world to me is that it was created as a result of different kinds of ideas,” Gallis says.

Today his first floor office in the Boxer Building uptown resembles a gallery, with hundreds of pieces of Tribal and African art displayed on shelves and whitewashed walls. Feathered masks with shells, carved wooden shapes and masks with cutout eyes fill the library.  But the collection doesn’t stop there. Metal statues tucked between floor plants fill the hallways and decorate desks along with a chair hand carved from a single tree. One of Gallis’ favorite pieces of art is a colorful painting of Chinese letters that hangs in the conference room.

“If you only stick to your own culture, you never expand your mind,” he says. “By collecting different art you get a better understanding of your own history and a deeper appreciation for your perceptions and values.”

Gallis studied art history and earned his architecture degree from the University of California at Berkley and a master’s in architecture and planning from the University of Pennsylvania. He went on to teach at the University of Miami and came here in the early 1970s when a college friend asked him to teach at the newly formed college of architecture at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.

He was an associate professor there for 20 years before starting his own company, which he called Noah Studios – a name he chose after reading the Bible and recalling Jesus’ first prophet, Noah.

“That little company was our arc,” he recalls. “Noah put trust in God to guide the arc and we left it up to God to get our little company off the ground.”
Decades later, Gallis has been recognized nationally for motivating governments to integrate regional, national and global strategies. His firm’s latest study – the first of its kind – provides insight into coping with nature’s evolution and how man-made systems can evolve efficiently so the two can co-exist.

The framework for his most recent study and those before it stem from lessons learned while watching Charlotte transform from a tiny city into the country’s 21st largest.
Gallis began studying Charlotte in depth in the mid-1980s.  It was transforming quickly from a city to a metropolitan area and people were confused over how to deal with planning as political coalitions emerged and development patterns changed.

“When I arrived here, Charlotte was just a small city with a lot of country roads around it,” Gallis says. “In the course of the next three decades it transformed into a major metro area – it was a great urban learning laboratory.”

His staff crafted a development plan for Rock Hill, S.C. And it was during that research when growth patterns began to emerge.

Using a pen on old hand drawings, Gallis circles little yellow blobs on a map that represents Gastonia, Concord and others. They were getting bigger. And a grid of highways and superhighways was beginning to develop, he says.

The cities were not just growing but they were merging as one big unit or urban network, and the future of any city is related to where it sits inside the network.
This would require new theories and approaches, Gallis says.

A decade later city leaders formed committees to study growth in the region. Rather than build more highways, the Gallis research suggested Charlotte choose building a transportation system along its centers and corridors, which became the transit lines the city has today.

“The key to the future was understanding how these urban networks grew and changed and then how we could affect their future through different policies, regulations and investments,” Gallis says.

He retired from teaching in 1997 to work full time at the newly formed Michael Gallis & Associates, which suddenly began getting nationwide attention for its innovative and efficient strategies.

The firm began studying connections between Connecticut, New York and Boston and discovered relationships between politics, urban economics and geography.  Soon, Gallis and his staff were traveling the country compiling research on numerous regions.

Through this work the firm developed what Gallis calls a systems approach to networks such as transportation, tourism and the environment. The concept is similar to the systems within the human body, each with a purpose and function.

It was through this lens that Gallis and his people determined that the environment was so unique that it should be treated separately.

“We discovered that we knew less about the environment than we did about any other system,” Gallis says. “And it occurred to me that we needed to study the interaction of (the environment and manmade systems), which had never been done before.”

What had been done before simply was man’s impact on the environment such as air pollution and water runoff. But no one had studied how people were building urban ecosystems, Gallis says.

Wearing a crisp white button-down and gray paisley tie, Gallis pops up out of his chair to fetch a book to illustrate his point. He glances pensively through his collection of topics from painting to ocean liners and railroads.  At 6-foot-4, he towers over some of the highest shelves, which include the 1929 plans for New York City, a collection of 19th century atlases and the book that created the Federal Aviation Administration.

In the mash of books, Gallis can’t find what he’s after, but it’s hardly needed. He recalls most of the details he’d hoped and explains how his firm began researching the way cities were growing compared to the patterns of nature. First his staff looked at the Southeast, from Birmingham, Ala., to southern Virginia as well as Atlanta, Columbia, S.C., Charlotte, Raleigh and the Tennessee Valley. On a global scale, Gallis & Associates took the research to another level looking at the relationship between natural and human systems.
“You could see where – as we built human networks such as roads and buildings – we never built either to fit the natural system. We took the environment for granted,” Gallis says. “It is only now we are able to fully appreciate our relationship with nature.”

Currently nature and man-made systems are in conflict with each other, he says.

“We have to move toward co-evolving.”

By identifying effects of growth on the environment such as erosion, depletion, extinction and pollution, Gallis & Associates has identified strategies for action to include new policies, incentives and regulatory procedures up to the federal level.

“The bottom line is we have to rethink the way we manage the growth of our cities,” Gallis says. “We have two systems in conflict and we are facing problems people haven’t grasped.”
Based on its global research and findings, Gallis & Associates is one of several organizations working with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to study the physical, socioeconomic and ecosystem impact of significant changes in sea levels along the Eastern seaboard.

“We are looking at some of the potentials of dramatic changes that people think will happen in small increments but could be of significant size,” Gallis says. “If we don’t try to understand them we won’t be prepared for them.”

~ Victoria Cherrie

For a unique place that has amazing accessories for both men and women, look no further than Revolution. Located on the second floor of the Epicentre, the sprawling shop is home to a plethora of designer clothing and accessories. They’ve got a great atmosphere, and their fun and down-to-earth staff will make you feel right at home and help you find whatever it is that you are looking for. You can score big here no matter what your personal style is, and they are always running great sales. Ladies, check out the jewelry line here from Diana Warner. Her pieces seem as though they’ve been hand-crafted just for you, and she’s got everything–funky earrings, beautiful necklaces, and gorgeous bracelets. My favorites were these cuffs (shown), that have sayings such as “future” and “hope,” for $45. While you’re browsing, make sure you check out the pieces from Mark Edge. I fell in love with this antique gold and silver lariat, complete with a gorgeous purple gem (shown), for $129.

Guys, listen up: you’ll want to check out Revolution too. Accessorizing is just as important for you–I know several of you realize this already, but many of you don’t. Having three older brothers, I understand. Something as simple as the right belt, like this worn-in brown leather option by J. Lindenberg for $110, can take your run-of-the-mill button-down-and-jeans outfit and kick it up ten notches to a trendy ensemble that will set you apart from the crowd. Not too much, but just enough. Chicks notice this. I’m just saying. Make sure you take a peek at the line of masculine cuffs from Cynthia Desser (shown), ranging from $99 – $155.

Back to the ladies: another great place for show-stopping pieces is Butterfly, located in the Bank of America building. Here you will find stunning necklaces, striking earrings, and elegant cocktail rings, to name a few, all at great price points. Most of their jewelry is handmade, which means you are finding unique pieces that you won’t see anywhere else. I scored big with a sterling silver cocktail ring with mother-of-pearl stone for $35, and also found a one-of-a-kind two-tone lariat necklace that goes great with a formal dress for $39. If you are shopping for a gift, make sure you ask to have it gift-wrapped–their fun ribbon and colors will make you happy you did. While you are in the Bank of America building, head up to the second floor and browse around Ivy & Leo. Among their adorable dresses, you can find some great necklaces here as well.

I’m always intrigued when people tell me they don’t know how to accessorize. Of course they do. I think that the real problem is that they just haven’t found the right places. Hopefully the above will inspire you. Happy shopping!

~ Alessandra Salvatore