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Posted inLatest News

Lord, Aeck & Sargent and Urban Collage merging into one firm

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By Maria Saporta

Two well-known Atlanta-based design firms are merging as of today.

The architectural firm of Lord, Aeck & Sargent and the urban, planning and design firm — Urban Collage, are now one company, according to LAS Chairman Tony Aeck. The combination of the planning and architecture expertise into one firm will provide an added benefit to their clients, he said.

Urban Collage, which has an expertise in campus planning and has offices in Lexington, Ky. in addition to its headquarters in Atlanta, also will broaden the footprint of LAS, which has offices in Ann Arbor, Mi.; Austin, Texas; and Chapel Hill, N.C. Urban Collage plans to continue operating under its name, at least for now.

Posted inEleanor Ringel Cater

Eleanor goes to the movies —top four at the box office — not top four to see

Avatar photo by Eleanor Ringel Cater

When the top four movies at the box office are (in descending order) “G.I. Joe: Retaliation,” “The Croods,” “Tyler Perry’s Temptation: Confessions of a Marriage Counselor” and “Olympus Has Fallen,” which do you choose to write about?

Why not take a stab at all four?

“G.I Joe” is based on a doll — I mean, action figure — first popularized in 1964. He has gone through several incarnations since then, including movies, comics and video games. He has even, like Alice and her mushroom, changed sizes: 12 inches originally, then shrunk to 3 ¾ inches, then released in both sizes.

Posted inLatest News

StoryCorps celebrates new ‘flagship’ home at the Atlanta History Center

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By Maria Saporta

The founder of StoryCorps came to Atlanta Wednesday evening to celebrate the opening of the “flagship” home for the ambitious oral storytelling initiative.

“We are here to launch StoryCorps Atlanta 2.0,” said Dave Isay, founder and president of StoryCorps.

StoryCorps, which has been taping stories of Atlantans out of StoryBooth at Public Broadcasting Atlanta’s WABE since October, 2009, has relocated to the Atlanta History Center. The StoryBooth studio is now based in the Franklin Miller Garrett library, named after the infamous Atlanta historian.

Posted inDavid Pendered

BeltLine’s Eastside Trail: Replacement bridge to improve access, safety

by David Pendered

Construction started Wednesday on a replacement bridge above the Atlanta BeltLine, one that is to improve safety for users of the bridge and to provide better access to the Eastside Trail and the BeltLine’s proposed transit line.

The $4.5 million, yearlong project was delayed from a planned start date of March 18. The cause was utility work that had to be done before crews started to demolish the existing bridge.

As with many public construction efforts in Atlanta, this one is presented as a BeltLine project. Atlanta BeltLine, Inc. is involved and funding comes from a federal program that provides bonds for projects in economically distressed areas, which were provided in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

Posted inATL Business Chronicle, Maria's Metro

Column: Tough economy hurts United Way of Greater Atlanta campaign

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By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on Friday, March 29, 2013

The economic recovery has not yet trickled down to United Way of Greater Atlanta.

When United Way holds its campaign celebration April 1 on the center court at Philips Arena from 2:30 to 4:30 p.m., it will announce an expected shortfall of $2.7 million from its$80.7 million goal for 2012.

“The campaign is hard,” said Milton Little, president of United Way of Greater Atlanta. “The economy may have some positive signs for some, but for those of us raising money, it’s still a very difficult environment.”

Posted inMichelle Hiskey, Michelle Hiskey & Ben Smith

A vision and volunteers turn a toxic dump into Zonolite Park

by Michelle Hiskey

A raccoon’s muddy tracks are a small shining symbol of the transformation of an asbestos-laden wetland in northeast Atlanta into an Atlanta public park, and the perseverance of volunteers who envisioned that nature could trump industrial pollution.

Zonolite Park is 12 acres near Briarcliff and Clifton Roads, where for two decades beginning in 1950, freight trains stopped at the W.R. Grace Co. plant and dumped as much as 1,225 tons of raw material for attic insulation marketed as Zonolite. The park’s reinvention also shows how a supply chain can bring in business and killer byproducts. Reversing that damage took a chain of volunteers willing to help restore the ecosystem.

Posted inSaba Long

Invest Atlanta hoping to attract energy of young entrepreneurs to town

by Saba Long

For the past few years, many corporate and city leaders believed the Atlanta Development Authority (ADA), headquartered in a drab brick building, did not properly reflect the energy of the city.

What the research and development team is to a company, a development authority is to a city or state.

Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed is pushing the city to sharpen its competitive edge, starting with the rebranding of the Atlanta Development Authority, now known as Invest Atlanta.

Posted inDavid Pendered

Airport expanding concession space to make money, serve passengers

by David Pendered

Atlanta airport officials are adding retail and restaurant space in a move that will generate more money for the facility through concessions contracts.

The airport is adding an unspecified amount of concessions space through expansion projects on Concourse C and Concourse D. In addition, other existing space is to be converted to concession use as it becomes available, according to airport General Manager Louis Miller.

The process of selecting prime vendors to operate some of the new space is to begin closer to the time space becomes available, Miller said. The FAA’s review of the airport’s last round of concessions contracts ended last month, when the agency dismissed its probe into the certification of disadvantaged businesses that won contracts in 2012.

Posted inTom Baxter

In Tennessee boundary dispute, a river of lawyers’ fees

Avatar photo by Tom Baxter

Here’s one way to estimate the chances of getting Tennessee to change its mind and give up a thin strip of its existing territory so Georgia can gain access to the water in the Tennessee River.

Right now, the Tennessee legislature is considering a bill that would end party primaries for U.S. Senate nominees, and give the Republican and Democratic legislative delegations the power to choose their respective nominees.

The idea of giving up some of their existing territory for our convenience has so far met with overwhelming resistance in Tennessee. But you figure, if they’re fools enough to go for the idea of giving up the voters’ right to select their U.S. Senate nominees, we just might be able to talk them out of that land without a fight.

Posted inLatest News

Woodruff Arts Center hires new vice president for fundraising efforts

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By Maria Saporta

The Woodruff Arts Center has named Janine Musholt, the chief development officer for the U.S. Olympic Committee, as its new vice president of advancement.

Musholt, who will begin her new role on June 1, will succeed Beachamp Carr, who retired last year after leading the Woodruff Arts Center’s advancement efforts for 35 years.

Musholt will be responsible for the Center’s fundraising efforts, including its annual corporate campaign. She also will work closely with the fundraising efforts of the Center’s four divisions — the Alliance Theatre, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, the High Museum of Art and Young Audiences.

Posted inMoments, Moments Season 2

Bill Clarkson’s Moment, battling a patient in a mental ward, propelled his career leading Atlanta’s Westminster

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Bill Clarkson, who recently announced plans to retire after 23 years as President of The Westminster Schools, remembers the Moment that prompted and propelled his career as a chaplain, educator and administrator. It wasn’t in the hallway of a school or a church – it was in the hallway of a psychiatric ward.

Bill was an 18-year-old freshman at Duke University and, as a financial aid student, needed a part-time job to help pay for his ungraduate degree. He found the job at the University psychiatric hospital – a line of work that seemed to align nicely with his interest in pursuing a psychology major. He worked four-hour shifts as a psychiatric attendant three days a week.

“You got to wear a white coat and look pretty official, but basically you were there to aid the doctors and assistants,” Bill recalled in our accompanying Moments HD video.

Posted inMaria's Metro

A more walkable Atlanta equals a healthier and more prosperous city

Avatar photo by Maria Saporta

It makes so much sense.

The most walkable cities are the healthiest cities — economically, environmentally and emotionally.

Designing our streets, sidewalks, public spaces and buildings for pedestrians could be the soundest infrastructure investments we could make — on multiple levels.

That’s the overarching message made by Jeff Speck, author of a new book called: Walkable City: How Downtown can save America one step at a time. Speck was in Atlanta last week speaking to a group of the Midtown Alliance and conducting an all-day workshop for the Congress of New Urbanism – Atlanta.

Posted inDavid Pendered

Atlanta, Evander Holyfield, to honor trailblazing firefighters, first black world champ middleweight boxer

by David Pendered

Atlanta on Monday will commemorate its 50th anniversary of the hiring of the city’s first African American firefighters. Their first day of work was April 1, 1963.

There’s more to the event than meets the eye – including a total omission of the department’s integration on the city’s website.

The ceremony actually is to honor three aspects of the city’s history – the integration of the fire department; the city’s first seven African-American female firefighters, hired in 1977; and boxing champion Tiger Flowers (1895-1927), who lived in a 20-room mansion on the site where a fire station was built and where the ceremony will be observed.

Posted inLatest News

Task Force for the Homeless gets another chance to make legal case

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By Maria Saporta

It is the case that will never end.

On Friday, the Georgia Court of Appeals handed the Task Force for the Homeless a legal victory in its battle against the owners of the Peachtree-Pine building in downtown Atlanta.

The Court of Appeals has sent the case back to Fulton County Superior Court Judge Craig Schwall saying that he erred by not allowing the Task Force the opportunity to present evidence.

The Task Force has been occupying the Peachtree-Pine building although it has not owned the building for nearly two years. It was foreclosed upon in May 2010 by a company that purchased the building’s mortgages.

Posted inATL Business Chronicle, Maria's Metro

Former Gov. Roy Barnes: State has made strides versus cancer

Avatar photo by Maria Saporta

By Maria Saporta
Published in the Atlanta Business Chronicle on Friday, March 29, 2013

In February of 2000, then-Gov. Roy Barnes began coalescing a team of leaders to turn Georgia from a “worst to first” leader in the fields of cancer research and treatment.

He envisioned a $1 billion public-private initiative that would lead to the establishment of a comprehensive National Cancer Institute center in the state, to attracting 150 cancer scientists and clinicians, to building cancer care centers across the state, to becoming a leading center for clinical trials, to creating a tissue bank, and to increasing the survivability rates for thousands of Georgians who had been diagnosed with cancer.

Posted inGuest Column

The ‘farm-to-table’ movement — more fundamental than a fashion trend

by Teresa Johnston

By Guest Columnist MERIDITH FORD, editorial director of the Reynolds Group in Atlanta

A recent meal in Providence, R.I., sent my brain on a trip. The journey? Trying to define, once and for all, what the term “farm to table” actually means. I’m not sure, after so many years of overuse, it means anything anymore.

The meal was at a much-talked about restaurant, the Dorrance, where the chef, Ben Sukle, mines the mastery of this lauded movement with the precision of a dental hygienist.

Posted inLatest News

John Knapp, formerly of Atlanta, named new president of Hope College

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By Maria Saporta

Former Atlantan John Knapp has been named president of Hope College, a four-year liberal arts Christian college in Holland, Mi.

When he was in Atlanta, Knapp was founder of the Southern Institute for Business and Professional Ethics in 1993. Later that evolved into the Center for Ethics and Corporate Responsibility at Georgia State University’s J. Mack Robinson College of Business.

Knapp left Atlanta in 2008 to be the founding director of Samford Universities Frances Marlin Mann Center for Ethics and Leadership in Birmingham. He also served as a professor of ethics and leadership.

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