Charlotte, NC Public Conduct: Loitering Rules (2026)

Section 14-282, rewritten by Ordinance No. 720 on February 12, 2024, replaced an older version that had only targeted soliciting from the street or median strip. The current text has two overlapping prohibitions: subsection (a) bars standing, sitting, lying, or loitering in a roadway or median strip for any purpose other than crossing it, and subsection (b) repeats the ban across any street or highway, including its shoulders or median strip, again carving out sidewalks entirely. Read together, the section reaches drivers' medians, shoulders, and travel lanes citywide, not just Uptown, and applies to pedestrians who stop to panhandle from traffic, wait in the roadway, or linger between lanes.

S. S. 14-4 (misdemeanor violation of local ordinances). Because the ban only reaches the road surface, shoulder, and median, standing or sitting on a sidewalk adjacent to a street is not a violation of this section; that conduct is instead addressed, if at all, under Chapter 15's separate public-solicitation and camping provisions. The section's history matters for research purposes: the pre-2024 version of 14-282 specifically criminalized soliciting from the street or median, and the 2024 rewrite broadened it to loitering generally while moving the solicitation-specific language into Section 15-15.