Steeleberry Acres residents urge protections as Charlotte Future 2040 policies reshape development near the airport
A small neighborhood enters a citywide planning debate
Steeleberry Acres, a residential area in southwest Charlotte near Charlotte Douglas International Airport, has intensified its public engagement around the Charlotte Future 2040 Comprehensive Plan and the policy documents that implement it. The neighborhood’s concerns sit at the intersection of long-range planning, airport-adjacent industrial growth and the city’s evolving approach to land use.
What Charlotte Future 2040 does—and how it is being implemented
Charlotte Future 2040, adopted by City Council in June 2021, sets a long-term framework for growth and establishes place-based guidance used in rezoning, capital projects and other development decisions. The city’s implementation work includes the Future 2040 Policy Map and a series of Community Area Plans that add more detailed direction for specific geographies.
On November 24, 2025, City Council adopted seven Community Area Plans—along with a revised Policy Map for those areas—including the Southwest Middle plan, which covers a geography near Steele Creek and sits adjacent to airport-influenced development areas.
Why Steeleberry Acres is focused on the plan
Residents’ attention has been shaped by recent zoning actions and proposals in the airport area, including efforts tied to industrial and logistics uses. In February 2025, the city withdrew a rezoning request affecting 49 acres of forested land associated with Steeleberry Acres. The site had been targeted for a change from ML-1 to ML-2, a more intensive manufacturing and logistics zoning category. City communications at the time cited a lack of capacity as the reason for withdrawal and stated there were no future plans for the site.
That episode followed years of heightened sensitivity in the area about how airport growth strategies could translate into land-use changes and property impacts for nearby residents.
How Community Area Plans can affect what comes next
Community Area Plans do not rezone parcels on their own, but they can influence how staff evaluate rezoning petitions and how policymakers weigh consistency with the city’s long-term goals. In practice, the plans provide additional guidance on place types, transportation networks, open space priorities and the appropriate intensity and form of development across a geography.
Key issues residents have raised in the public record
Compatibility between residential streets and nearby manufacturing or logistics activity.
How revised place-type guidance and policy mapping may set expectations for future development around established neighborhoods.
The potential for long-range airport-area strategies to create recurring rezoning pressure near existing homes.
Citywide planning and area-specific policies are increasingly becoming the arena where airport-adjacent neighborhoods test what “predictability” and “compatibility” mean in day-to-day land-use decisions.
What to watch
Future rezoning petitions near the airport and within the broader southwest corridor will likely be assessed against the Future 2040 framework and the adopted Community Area Plan guidance. For Steeleberry Acres, the next major signal will be whether new petitions seek industrial intensification near residential blocks—and how city staff and elected officials apply adopted policy direction when those requests come forward.