EDITOR’S NOTE: An original version of this story only identified Caroline Dwyer in her current role as transit manager for the Town of Chapel Hill, but at the time of the quoted article, she was not in that position. The ECHO regrets the error.
“TOWN COUNCIL VOTES ON FUTURE OF LEGION PARK TONIGHT!!” read the Dec. 7 newsletter from the Chapel Hill Alliance for a Livable Town (CHALT). “Tonight the town council will vote on the proposal, drain the beautiful pond and make only the remaining 20 acres available for park and recreation activities.”
Throughout the past seven years, the Town of Chapel Hill has been discussing the development of the American Legion Property. While the plans for the area evolved over time and development has been delayed, the basic idea involves merging the 36-acre American Legion property with the 10-acre Ephesus park into one approximately 46-acre property. The Town Council plans on reserving nine acres for affordable housing, turning the remaining 37 acres into a “world-class park” and preserving the remaining nine acres of river and forest.
What is CHALT? — CHALT is a group that advocates for more green space and trees in lieu of apartments and industry, as well as “affordable housing, jobs and shopping for all residents,” which has certainly proved to be an interesting combination. CHALT is notorious for inhibiting progress on housing and urban development in the name of the trees and protecting Chapel Hill’s “character.”
However, CHALT is not the only group opposing the Town Council’s plans. “Save Legion Park” is a self-proclaimed grassroots work group that sprouted to “save” the “Legion Community Park.” The group holds similar beliefs to CHALT, to the extent that Save Legion Park seems to have copied some of CHALT’s points regarding housing and park land in Chapel Hill.
So what’s going on? — The Town Council is trying to address the housing shortage in Chapel Hill by using nine acres of the empty space that is the American Legion property, not the “Legion Community Park.” There is, in fact, no such thing as “Legion Community Park.” That name was coined by people opposed to the property’s development. Calling the land a park makes it seem like the Town Council is tearing down an already established area, which is far from the truth.
Calling it the American Legion property is important because how we refer to land matters. We saw a similar tactic used back in 2021 with the proposed development of the Greene Tract, an area near the historic Rogers Road Neighborhood. People in opposition of the development started calling the area “the Greene Tract Forest.”
In 2021 Caroline Dwyer, who at the time worked for a private consulting group but now is the transit planning manager for the Town of Chapel Hill, wrote an article dissecting the situation, stating that the “Greene Tract Forest” does not exist.
“This misnomer has been foisted on the public by opponents to the development vision… it is being used as another way to attempt to “protect” unsanctioned uses of publicly-owned land,” Dywer wrote. “It [makes it] seem like the Tract is protected, public land” (Dywer, 2021, para. 10).
The American Legion property, as it stands, is an undeveloped piece of land that CHALT and Save Legion Park refer to as a park for the same reasons people called Greene Tract a forest, to make it seem protected.
CHALT and Save Legion Park have constructed a narrative that the town is threatening to destroy their “park” and the surrounding environment. They claim that adding housing on the American Legion property would lead to “The destruction of [the] open space [which] will be felt for generations to come.” (Richard Mitchell, the Save Legion Park website). CHALT is fighting against the construction of the housing, saying that improving their “park” would be beneficial for the environment and everyone in Chapel Hill. In reality building more housing in Chapel Hill would be more beneficial for the environment. Thousands of people commute to Chapel Hill everyday for work, by supplying affordable housing for the workers in Chapel Hill we can easily cut back on carbon emissions.
Just as CHALT has in the past, they continue to use environmental justice as their main argument against further housing development. In a post on the CHALT website titled, “A New Park for Chapel Hill? Continued,” former Chapel Hill Town Council member Julie McClintock and other CHALT coordinators argue that Chapel Hill needs a large park on its eastside to accommodate the growth of residential development.
“Thousands of new residents in new apartments deserve a place to recreate. The new apartments located in ‘Blue Hill’ [and the] additional apartments under construction on Ephesus Church Road or under contract on Fordham Blvd… total 2858 new housing units… [R]esidents of the entire town deserve a place to recreate and connect with nature” (CHALT, 2022, para. 20).
CHALT has a point here – having a large park would be very beneficial to all residents, new or old. As someone who’s lived on the eastside of Chapel Hill for a majority of his life, good recreational spaces are hard to come by. I, as well as many others, would agree that everyone deserves a place to relax and spend time outdoors, something that the eastside is severely lacking in. But more importantly, people also need a place to live, it’s no secret that Chapel Hill can be expensive and the national rent inflation on rent does nothing to help. The Town Council’s plan for combining housing and recreation in the American Legion property will help alleviate both of the town’s problems.
Chapel Hill has a lot to improve on and many needs to meet: more housing of all types (particularly affordable housing), more parks, and more forms of alternative transportation are just a few key examples. The Town Council knew when it purchased the American Legion property that it would provide the opportunity to meet some of these needs. Building nine acres of affordable housing and a large park on the property would be a great step in actually making Chapel Hill more livable. Even with the additional nine acres of housing, 37 acres of park space would be more than enough to provide recreational space for the growing eastside of Chapel Hill.
So why is CHALT so opposed to it? — If CHALT is getting their park, why are they still upset? As mentioned previously, CHALT advocates for trees and greenspace in Chapel Hill, with the Town’s current plans for the American Legion property some trees are planned to be cut down to make room for the nine acres of affordable housing. Save Legion Park has also been quite vocal on how important the American Legion property is to them and how the planned development threatens the old hardwood trees there.
CHALT is also arguing allocating acres of the land for residential use will make the planned park space too small and contribute to global warming. Virginia Gray, who served as one of CHALT’s coordinating committee in 2021, wrote a Chapelboro article arguing this very point.
“The Legion property has wooded land, meadows, and a pond; they protect the habitat for more than 80 species of birds, a variety of plants, and animals. The Legion site is essential to meeting our climate action goals,” Gray wrote. “Council members please think ahead [20] years when your grandchildren say to you, ‘I can’t live here. It is too hot. Why didn’t you do something about this when you were on the Town Council?’”
This amount of melodrama is nothing new for CHALT; they have a storied history of using hyperbole and misinformation in regards to developments that threaten “our green leafy college town character.” Despite CHALT claiming to want affordable housing, the group has rarely publicly supported any proposed developments that would add housing to the town. Even when these developments have aligned with CHALT’s other goals such as combating their stated “#1 problem,” global warming. Such as the zero-emissions Bolin Creek greenway that was to be expanded.
Bolin Creek — In 2009, Carrboro was getting ready to extend the Bolin Creek and Morgan Creek greenways, to connect the existing greenways by paving already existing trails to provide an easy and safe path throughout Chapel Hill and Carrboro. Connecting the existing greenways would let people walk or bike instead of driving to locations like Chapel Hill Public Library, several apartments/neighborhoods and several schools. The Town of Carrboro said that the greenways were slated to be finished by the end of 2009, but they met unforeseen delays.
Enter McClintock, the leader of groups who have moved to block development in Chapel Hill. These groups include CHALT, the Booker Creek Alliance, Friends of Bolin Creek, Estes Neighbors and Affordable Transit for All, the organization that advocated against the light rail. McClintock led a group to block and protest the greenway. They claimed that paving through the forest would damage the creek and the wildlife, a statement that holds little merit as the area planned to be paved is an existing, heavily-used foot trail. This trail suffers greatly from a phenomenon called “trail braiding,” which happens when people walk off a trail enough to widen it. This in turn increases runoff and encroaches on nearby trees. By paving the trail, the Town would actually decrease runoff and eliminate trail braiding on the path. Nevertheless, the group successfully stalled development.
Fast forward to 2023, and we still have no greenway connection. The way things are shaking up, it’s not unlikely that we may see another protest from CHALT and Save Legion Park similar to the one in 2009. If CHALT stalls the development at the American Legion property the way they did in Bolin Creek, we may never get the housing or the park.
History repeats itself — CHALT continues to do the same thing time and time again, inhibiting progress under the guise of caring about the town, its environment and its people. The members of CHALT may be well-meaning and want to do right by Chapel Hill, but by stalling development Chapel Hill Alliance for a Livable Town is making Chapel Hill livable for them, and only them. Over 70 percent of Chapel Hill’s 49,700+ workers live outside of Orange County and have to commute to town everyday. This, combined with the lack of alternative transportation like greenways or a light rail, means that hundreds more residents are driving, increasing traffic and carbon emissions. Only four percent of Orange County’s housing was built in the last decade and we are consistently growing. Chapel Hill desperately needs affordable housing AND a park to serve its people. By stalling development, CHALT is actively worsening the problems they seek to fix.
If we keep letting CHALT be the loudest voice in Chapel Hill, we will get nowhere. We need to show up for our town, its people and the change we want to see.
Photo by Andrew Xu/The ECHO
