

Question: On Long Shoals Road, there’s a piece of property next to Ingles that has a lot of old trees on it. At one point, a developer from Florida was going to do something with it, preserving a lot of the trees. Now I see it’s listed as a Pulliam Properties site? What do they plan to do with it? And will they keep the trees?

My answer: Are you familiar with how commercial development works? It usually does not involve a large tree inside every business. 

Real answer: So, this property is heavily wooded, and it does have a Pulliam Properties sign on it now.

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"We originally sold it to a group out of Florida, but that group had some issues that came up between the partners, said Rusty Pulliam, president of Pulliam Properties. "They dissolved that partnership. The partner who got that property decided he didn't want to develop it, so we've got it under contract to a local group."

Pulliam Properties and the local group have not closed on the deal yet, and Pulliam said he hasn't seen any plans for the site yet. It likely will be some kind of retail and/or commercial development.

In taking pictures last week, I noticed a fair number of trees have pink tape marked around them, which suggests the site may be logged.

I wrote about the site back in December 2015, noting that a developer named Rusty Atlas, who split his time between Florida and Asheville, had closed on the 7.7-acre tract, with Pulliam Properties serving as the broker.


Atlas described himself as a "tree hugger" and said he'd hired a land planner, an architect and an arborist to help develop the site, which has some trees that are over a hundred years old.

"The bottom line is we're going to work with as much of the existing landscaping and topography as possible," Atlas said in 2015. "We're going to preserve as many trees as possible. We're hoping to build smaller retail buildings where possible. It'll be a very environmentally friendly development that respects the landscape, the mountains and the surroundings."

He also planned to emphasize local retailers.

Pulliam said the reality of developing such sites is that a lot of trees will have to go to make way for buildings. 

"You're not going to develop that 7-acre site without getting rid of a lot of those trees," Pulliam said, stressing that trees will be kept where possible.

Pulliam doesn't foresee development taking place until "some time in 2020."

Question: I’ve heard that the reason the Town of Fletcher doesn’t have any fast food restaurants and you have to drive up to Airport Road or down toward the interstate to find any is because the town has an ordinance prohibiting them. Is this true? How can they do that?          

My answer: This certainly goes against the American credo of, "A chicken in every pot, and a Taco Bell on every street corner."       

Real answer: We'll have to rate this question as "untrue."

"No, the town does not have an ordinance prohibiting fast food restaurants," Fletcher Town Manager Mark Biberdorf told me. "The McDonald’s at the corner of Rockwood Road and Airport Road is in the Town limits as well as the nearby Arby’s on Airport Road. The McDonald’s on Hendersonville Road near the I-26 overpass and the adjacent Bojangles, Burger King and Dominos are all in Fletcher."

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The Airport Road properties are on the edge of the Town of Fletcher's incorporated area, while the ones by Interstate 26 "are satellite parcels that were annexed into the town years ago," Biberdorf said.  


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