As towering developments reshape their quiet coastal neighborhood, Wrightsville Sound residents are speaking out — fighting to preserve their trees, traditions and sense of place.
At 6:45 am on a humid June day, Andrew Donovan sat down with a cup of tea at his Maccumber Terrace patio home. Starting the morning with a steaming brew helped prepare him for the daily challenges ahead, which typically included a fruitless attempt to make a left turn out of his neighborhood onto Wrightsville Avenue. Except, on this particular Tuesday, a few days before the July 4th weekend, “There were ripples in my teacup.”
He imagined an earthquake, as the kitchen table rattled, then realized it was impact tremors from the heavy equipment at the construction site across the street, the long ago home of the Harris Teeter grocery, CVS pharmacy and local stores at The Galleria Shopping Center. Donovan grabbed his cellphone and began snapping photos of where the walls met the ceiling of his single-story home.
He wanted to capture evidence before the cracks began.
On the site a few weeks earlier, on June 5, 2025, seven mature live oaks (two 15-inch and five 22-inch in diameter) were cut down at 6800 Wrightsville Avenue, next to the ABC store and Craft Hardware, on the way to the beach.
This was a surprise, as The Galleria property had sat vacant for so many years that nearby residents assumed the trees would be part of the new project there…