(A) In addition to any authority which is now or may hereafter be granted by general law to the City for making street improvements, the City Council is hereby authorized to make street improvements and to assess the cost thereof against abutting property owners in accordance with the provisions of this section.
(B) The City Council may order street improvements and assess the cost thereof against the abutting property owners, exclusive of the costs incurred at street intersections, according to one (1) or more of the assessment bases set forth in Article 10 of Chapter 160A of the North Carolina General Statutes without the necessity of a petition, upon the finding by the City Council as a fact:
(1) That the street improvement project does not exceed one thousand two hundred (1,200) linear feet; and
(2) That such street or part thereof is unsafe for vehicular traffic, and it is in the public interest to make such improvement; or
(3) That it is in the public interest to connect two (2) streets, or portions of a street already improved; or
(4) That it is in the public interest to widen a street, or part thereof, which is already improved; provided, that assessments for widening any street, or portion of the street, without a petition shall be limited to the cost of widening and otherwise improving such street in accordance with the street classification and improvement standards established by the City's thoroughfare or major street plan for the particular street or part thereof to be widened and improved under the authority granted by this section.
(C) For the purposes of this section, the term "street improvement" shall include grading, regrading, surfacing, resurfacing, widening, paving, repaying, the acquisition of rights-of-way and the construction or reconstruction of curbs, gutters and street drainage facilities.
(D) In addition to any authority which is now or may hereafter be granted by general law to the City for making sidewalk improvements, the City Council is hereby authorized without the necessity of a petition, to make or to order to be made sidewalk improvements or repairs according to standards and specifications of the City, and to assess the total cost thereof against abutting property owners, according to one (1) or more of the assessment bases set forth in Article 10 of Chapter 160A of the North Carolina General Statutes; provided, however, that regardless of the assessment basis or bases employed, the Council may order the cost of sidewalk improvements made only on one (1) side of a street to be assessed against property owners abutting both sides of such street.
(E) In ordering street and sidewalk improvements without a petition and assessing the cost thereof under authority of this section, the City Council shall comply with the procedure provided by Article 10, Chapter 160 A of the General Statutes, except those provisions relating to the petition of property owners and the sufficiency thereof.
(F) The effect of the act of levying assessments under the authority of this section shall for all purposes be the same as if the assessments were levied under authority of Article 10 of Chapter 160A of the General Statutes.