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East Charlotte Arts, Parks, and Culture
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This is a contributing entry for East Charlotte Arts, Parks, and Culture and only appears as part of that tour.Learn More.

Eastway Crossing

Introduction

Text-to-speech Audio

Let’s head on over to the Eastway Crossing Shopping Center and meet some of the small independent shop owners that are seeing opportunity and potential in this newly reinvigorated shopping center. You will be surprised to find an array of art and culture that is sure to delight visitors! Continue your walk on Norland Road to Dresden Drive West. There is a sidewalk on the right hand side of Dresden Drive, a street in the Eastway/Sheffield Park neighborhood. Take a right on Woodland Drive to Eastway Drive and cross Eastway Drive at the traffic light and head north on the sidewalk along Eastway Drive. You will quickly notice the fast paced impact of vehicle traffic on Eastway Drive. Eastway Drive is not pedestrian or bicyclist friendly although you will frequently see pedestrians, motorized wheel chairs and bicyclists. The sidewalk is narrow and not well maintained. There are no bicycle lanes on Eastway Drive. There is frequent bus access around Eastway Drive and Central Avenue. Bus route #9 on Central Avenue has the highest ridership in the City. The future CityLynx Gold Line will run from Rosa Parks in West Charlotte, through Center City and down Central Avenue past Eastway Drive to the Eastland Community Transportation Center. This area is ripe for a strategic mobility plan for multi-modal transportation to support this dense, diverse urban community. The first attached photo is the main entrance to the shopping center on Eastway Drive. The second photo is the entrance on Central Avenue.

Images

Main Entrance to the Eastway Crossing Shopping Center from Eastway Drive

Property, Sky, Tree, Billboard

Entrance to Eastway Crossing Shopping Center from Central Avenue

Plant, Sky, Cloud, Property

Backstory and Context

Text-to-speech Audio

East Charlotte was home to a generation of baby boomers during the 1950s and ’60s when families flocked to the sprawling new neighborhoods in the area. This migration from center city brought about the development of large shopping centers which were closer to home and more convenient than downtown retailers.

Eastway Shopping Center was built in 1960 in the heart of East Charlotte, providing food, medicine, fashion and fun to the surrounding neighborhoods. Colonial was the original grocery store, and it was rebranded as Big Star grocery in 1969. Winn-Dixie joined the shopping center during the late 1960s, beginning a forty year run there until the chain exited Charlotte in 2005. The Atlantic Farmers Market is a large international grocery store currently located at Eastway Crossing.

Kiser Drug Store provided the first pharmacy and served delicious burgers at their lunch counter. Kiser later became King Drugs in the early years, and a local doctor practiced family medicine at the current site of EastSide Local Eatery.

Ruth’s Fashion Shop was a lovely dress shop for women in the 1960s, and clothing stores such as Cato’s have always been part of the Eastway lineup. Other small local businesses have included boutiques, pet shops, restaurants, beauty salons, video stores, and family-owned Eastway Paint, a Charlotte treasure in the shopping center since 1988.

In the late 1980s Walmart moved into the shopping center where Chef’'Store now resides. There have been many changes throughout the years, but Eastway Crossing Shopping Center today is exploding with excitement and possibilities for the future.

There are 11 brief videos below. The first is an introduction to the sampling tour of the center with CharlotteEAST board member Michael Haithcock. In the next 9 videos meet the store owners or managers:

1-Tommy's Pub

2-TAJ Essentials

3-Portofino's

4-VisArt Video

5-EastSide Local Eatery

6-Dairy Queen

7-Armada Skate Shop

8-Bart's Mart

9-Skrimp Shack

Michael ends the tour with the wall murals in the final video.

Additional Information