Discover some neighborhoods
HAYMOUNT
The sign-maker for Haymont Grill did not quite get the spelling of "Haymount" right, but the restaurant on Haymount Hill is an institution nonetheless.
So much so, that when owner Pete Skenteris tried to change his sign in 1999 to the correct spelling for one of Fayetteville's oldest communities, the Historic Resources Commission told him no.
Much of Fayetteville's political power has concentrated in the Haymount area and the VanStory neighborhood, off Morganton Road, and a number of Fayette- ville mayors have come from there. Over the years, many of the city's movers and shakers have huddled for meals at the Haymont Grill.
The neighborhoods are among the most sought-after living spaces in the county.
At the top of the hill sit the Cape Fear Regional Theatre, the anchor for several small shops, and Highland Presbyterian Church, established in 1911.
WEST FAYETTEVILLE
For decades, two forces drove development in west Fayetteville - Fort Bragg and farming.
A close look reveals echoes of the farm days: A small pasture off Morganton Road, near Reilly Road. A long expanse of greenery from Reilly Road to old Raeford Road.
The farms are mostly gone, but the location near the military base means west Fayetteville neighborhoods continue to attract an ethnic diversity not as evident in older sections of the city. Subdivisions such as Devonwood and Murray Fork off Morganton Road and LaGrange off Reilly Road have long been as racially mixed as the military that drove their populations. Newer neighborhoods off Cliffdale Road, toward Hoke County, show the same diversity.
These neighbors were county residents until the city began annexing in earnest beginning in the early 1990s. More than 43,000 west Fayetteville residents came into the city with the 2005 annexation, nicknamed "The Big Bang."
NORTH FAYETTEVILLE
There was a time when the landmarks were Methodist University, the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Plant, Reid Ross and Pine Forest high schools and the Hillendale, Kinwood and College Lakes neighborhoods.
Times have changed.
Today, North Fayetteville is bursting at the seams with shopping plazas, strip malls, restaurants, service stations, an expansive public library, the College Lakes Recreation Center and King's Grants Country Club, replete with lavish homes, condominiums and townhouses.
And then there is the Interstate 295 corridor that connects to I-95, with plans for 8.1 more miles that will extend from Ramsey Street to the All American Freeway with interchanges at McArthur Road, Murchison Road and Bragg Boulevard.
MURCHISON ROAD
For decades, Murchison Road has run through the heart of Fayetteville's black community.
From downtown, the road travels past Fayetteville State University, a historically black university founded in 1867 that is part of the University of North Carolina system. Just past the university, Murchison runs by Broadell and other neighborhoods that are home to many long-standing institutions, including Seabrook Recreation Center, which contains the city's only pool; and E.E. Smith High School. The Golden Bulls of the high school and the Broncos of the university share many mutual alumni, and both schools' high-stepping marching bands have received national recognition.
Further down and rising up on the left stands one of the city's largest churches, Parks Chapel Freewill Baptist Church.
Around the mall: 'neighborhood of retail'
Cross Creek Mall changed everything when it opened in 1975. Developers J.P. Riddle Jr. and Thomas Wood had cleared 600 acres of woods to make way. The mall's most immediate effect was to empty downtown of its big anchor retail stores and pull shopping out into what were the former woods west of the city. Today, a map of Fayetteville shows that the mall and surrounding stores are a "neighborhood of retail" located very near the city's center, after the 2005 annexation. Particularly as applies to the city's east-west axis, Cross Creek Mall has become central in every way, completing its migration from the western woods outside city limits. Fayetteville's busiest most commercial road, Skibo, feeds into the mall stores. Restaurant Row lies just off it. A Wal-Mart Supercenter, once the nation's busiest, is down the street. And still the retail comes. Glensford Commons - located on mall feeder Glensford Avenue - is fully occupied, with a last stand of trees across the street beckoning for development.