How Brookhill Village could start to attract Millennials from South End

Brookhill Village is like the land that South End development forgot. You’ve glimpsed it if you’ve climbed at the new Inner Peaks, if you’ve swung onto the Remount Road exit from I-77 to get to South End, or if you’ve ever visited the Humane Society of Charlotte on Toomey Avenue.

But have you ever actually turned onto Remus Road from Remount and driven around? The 36-acre neighborhood is a hilly stretch of land. A black-and-white sign greets you: “Brookhill Village (Est. 1951).” It long featured more than 100 wooden buildings holding two to five units each.

In fall of 2016, the federal government filed a complaint to begin the process of seizing the Brookhill Village apartments on South Tryon Street, due to allegations of repeated drug activity — marijuana, heroin, ecstasy and crack cocaine. Before the end of the year, the federal government reached a settlement with the owners of Brookhill Village. Part of the agreement called for Brookhill Village Two to demolish or “substantially” renovate the run-down apartments on the property. The settlement also called for a system to screen tenants, provide on-site patrols and monitoring to eliminate crime, improve lighting and communicate often with Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police about crime-fighting measures.

The effects of demolition are there now. To the right of that welcome sign on Remus Road is a vast abyss of rubble. If you take a closer look, you’ll see cement steps leading nowhere, blue floral mattresses, an overturned, off-white couch, green, empty soda bottles, plastic orange fencing and a sign that reads: “No trespassing, no loitering, no consumption of alcohol.”

Of the housing that does remain, many of the windows are boarded up. The buildings have a sense of faded cheerfulness, the pastel blue, lime, yellow and pink paint having lost its luster. Small porches sag, bordered by banisters of peeling paint. Overturned trash cans and cars line the streets. Laundry dangles on lines in backyards, offset by black heating oil tanks.

But there’s still life here. As I drove by last weekend, a little girl in a floppy pink hat skidded along a sidewalk on a scooter. A couple of kids with adults hustled toward an ice cream truck, music jangling, that had pulled over. A group of teens scuffled and laughed in one of the many courtyards, near bright yellow slides and a dilapidated swing set. Cars passed. A man sat on a drooping porch, watching the world.

Recently a resident described the aesthetics of the development, of when it was new, to Observer reporter Ely Portillo: “It was beautiful.”

And while the affordability of the rent costs may appear beautiful now — think $350 to $515 a month — the terrain feels like a fatigued wasteland. The lack of overall redevelopment here has been attributed to the tricky ownership situation of the development: The company Brookhill Land owns the land, while another company, Brookhill Village Two, owns the buildings.

That state of stagnancy could be on the cusp of changing. Portillo reported that the apartment community’s owners are considering how to turn the land into a mixed-income community. According to Terry Shook, an architect with Shook Kelley and a partner in the ownership group, one option is donating interest in the property to a non-profit that can redevelop the site through an initiative called ONEBrookhill.

One vision in this brainstorm process is adding “tiny houses” for rent, to keep prices down and attract Millennials (yes, the M word) from the apartment-booming South End.

I see potential there. Renters would still be within walking distance of the Rail Trail, a couple blocks from Remus Road. Not to mention HEX Coffee, Good Bottle Co. and Mac’s Speed Shop.

Give it time.

Photos: Katie Toussaint

This story was originally published February 6, 2017 at 12:00 AM with the headline "How Brookhill Village could start to attract Millennials from South End."