By David Pendered
Fuqua Development plans to build a short length of the Atlanta BeltLine trail near its Glenwood Place project and the owner of the property, which isn’t Fuqua, is to deed the trail to the city of Atlanta.
The trail project also calls for Fuqua to extend Faith Avenue across Bill Kennedy Way and connect Faith Avenue to Chester Avenue. The road is to be deeded over to the city, as well. The project involves about 0.4 acres of property.
The proposal is outlined in legislation the Atlanta City Council has referred to the council’s Utilities Committee. The paper was co-sponsored by councilmembers Kwanza Hall and Carla Smith.
This project was planed in 2011, when the city signed an access easement agreement that was first contemplated before the site of Glenwood Place was rezoned to allow for the development.
According to the legislation, the easement provides for:
- “[V]ehicular and pedestrian access across its property, as more particularly described in the Easement Agreement, but only at such time as Bill Kennedy Way is connected by uninterrupted paved access to Chester Avenue (said access easement commonly known as “Faith Avenue Extension”)….”
The trail and road are to be built on property owned by Bel Enso, LLC and its cousin, Bel Enso Parcel B LLC. The company is based in Delaware. The property now is home to apartments.
An amendment to the easement agreement explains the relation between Bel Enso, which was incorporated in Georgia in 2014, and the company that formerly owned the property where the trail and road are to be built:
“Bel Enso (successor-in-interest to 880 Glenwood LLC, a Delaware limited liability company) is the owner of certain property located in Fulton County, Georgia (the “Apartment Property”) …, and Bel Enso B (successor-in-interest to COA 10, LLC, a Delaware limited liability company) is the owner of certain property adjacent to the Apartment Property located in Fulton County, Georgia (the “Parcel B Property”)….”
Glenwood Place is adjacent to this parcel, along its borders to the north and the west. Bill Kennedy Way is adjacent to east of both the Bel Enso property and Glenwood Place.
Glenwood Place is to be anchored by a Kroger grocery store and provide a total of 175,000 square feet of retail area. At 118,000 square feet, the Kroger is to be about twice the size of other intown Kroger stores.
This site was the subject of intense debate when Walmart was considered to be the anchor tenant. Negotiations between the city and Fuqua continued for a year and ended with the city council’s approval of a plan to rezone the site from industrial to mixed use high density.
Construction of the retail portion began in April and is to be complete in autumn 2016. Trammell Crow Residential is developing the apartments approved for the site.
A disconnected trail portion is just as bad if not more dangerous for cyclists than no trail.
The way this reads, it’s a huge win. But with the history of Fuqua and this site, I want to know more. Did they really abandon the big box with crazy surface parking for high density mixed use???
Explain.
AlanHodges have you ever ridden a bike on/off a small designated trail like that? cars have no idea what you’re doing there nor do they expect you when you get dumped off at trail exit.
bigjonslay AlanHodges gotcha!
Every little bit helps!
No. The centerpiece of the development will be a big-box 100,000+ square foot Kroger, with requisite massive parking lot. There will also be a fast-food restaurant with drive-thru directly adjacent to the Beltline. Kroger also plans to add a gas station in the future. The neighborhood was successful in getting a portion of the development dedicated to multifamily housing, a small win. They also succeeded in scaring away Walmart in favor of Kroger, which is mostly a lateral move, I think.