Charlotte Area Cars and Coffee -Cancelled Indefinitely!

The Charlotte meetup was an incredible cross-section of unusual automobiles. Sure, you had the Corvettes, Mustangs, Mazdas, etc. arriving en masse, but sandwiched within those marque clubs were some real oddities - where else are you going to see a BMW 2000 (not 2002,) a Lamborghini LM200, a Datsun 2000? How many Austin Healey Sprites do you see these days? When's the last time you saw two Citroens side by side?

I really enjoyed bonding with my 12 year old daughter - bringing her out to wander among the unusual offerings, popping into the diner for some bacon and eggs. My 5 year old was envious, and we discussed bringing her to a subsequent go-round, then things started getting ugly last year with burnouts and displays of speed. We left one show early because fols started acting up - that turned out to be the Sunday the Cobra spun out, as captured on YouTube. I never felt comfortable bringing the youngest one, and started leaving the older one behind as well.

Michael fought a valient fight to quell the morons who were tainting the meetup. Police presence was required, but it started to take the tone of a classroom with a substitute teacher - "if the cops are looking that way, it means I can do this over here."

I'm sad and mad that the bad behavior grew to the point of attracting national attention. I'm thankful for the great memories of a series of Sundays with my girl, and the chance to show my Ferrari, M3, Abarth and Alfa. I'm indebted to Michael for organizing this and battling the odds for much longer than most would.

Unfortunately, I must agree with the opinion that meetups should be smaller, more mobile, and less publicized. It's clear the masses can't handle this degree of personal responsibility.

 

When I moved to this area about seven years ago, I soon became best friend's with one of my new neighbors who was a car guy. He had a beautiful '38 Chevy street rod and is into attending cruise-in's. We have a cruise-in here in Rockwell every Thursday evening at the local Sonic. I began hanging out with him there and met some of the locals. It was a good time but, having been a PCA member since 1978, my 996 wasn't quite the cruise in car.

So I bought a Camaro and made it into a pro-touring car with a LS1, 6 speed, modified suspension, etc. We went to a bunch of cruise-in's and had a good time. Eventually, I sold that car and last year I did a body off restoration of a '64 Corvette coupe. Did Autofair, Kannapolis and bunch more cruise-in's and had a good time.

However, after awhile, you get tired of seeing the same old '57 Chevy's, '69 Camaro's (my son has a very nice one), etc. So when I discovered Cars & Coffee, I was in seventh heaven. As mentioned above I loved the diversity and found these gatherings to be much more interesting. Below are some pics I took last summer. Where else are you going to see these cars? The last photo is my '67 Porsche next to a more current one.

I am going to miss it. From where I live, Greensboro is about the same distance as Charlotte. May be heading there to see what what is happening there. Also, I see that Winston Salem is holding a C & C at Reynolda.
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When is the next meeting and where has it moved to? I have not been there since it was at Dean and Deluca Southpark.

 

Looking at all of the videos on the internet for Charlotte c/c it appears it is the same idiots every event doing this. Mustangs owners being the worst offenders. The guy that crashed looks like he dodged a crash back in January. I guess it was only a matter of time before he finally crashed. A$$

 

Pat,

TDW just posted an update on the new location for February 16th. Looks like it is at the Tyvola and I-77 area.

Hope to see you there!

Deiger

 

Yeah I saw it then realized I am out of town for the weekend for my wife's birthday at the beach house so I wont make it. Plus I want to wait until all of the brine is washed off the roads.

It is a shame for the C&C it was a great event until the dragsters and brainless owners came to show off on the streets. Just stupid. I was there at the last one and said to everyone this will not last long with the antics of those who chose to ignore the rules.

 

I just pm'd you regarding lake norman cars and coffee on the first Saturday of each month. this will grow into a proper event and the venue is far better than the previous locations.

 

PM me again my subscription ended and I deleted my e-mails to make room.

 

I've realized that when we've had issues with that kind of thing it was because the location was next to a road with slower traffic and more opportunity to view nitwits burning out.

We don't have alot of engine gunning and burnouts because our current location
1) Is in a "town center" and you can't drive fast or gun it in the 50 feet in front of the stores
2) There is a highway that you can't visibly see from C+C location, so if you did gun it nobody would see. it's not spectator friendly
3) On the other side of the shopping area there isn't any place for spectators to watch stupid driving.

In short there are no quiet(er) secondary roads that facilitate onlookers AND allow for burnouts like the Charlotte video shows. In scouting locations, consider this aspect. "Where can the spectators and burnouts happen"

Embarassing that this even has to be considered...

 

Pat,

I will send you the PM he sent me. Let me know your thoughts, before we post it on this forum.

Thanks.

Deiger