Tag: Atlanta BeltLine

Georgia State University and the CDC have teamed up on a two-year research project to evaluate how the Atlanta BeltLine is affecting the quality of life of people who live near it.

The BeltLine is the nation’s largest urban renewal project. As such, there’s a great deal of interest in the degree to which the BeltLine can improve the physical and mental well being of people who live near it or use it regularly.

Atlanta low-balled the event, but the city on Thursday hosted an industry forum that is an early step in the process of building a major park along the Atlanta BeltLine, at the old Bellwood rock quarry.

At the forum, Atlanta presented information to vendors who may want to help establish a water reservoir at the old quarry. While the reservoir is immensely important, the public’s attention has been more attracted to the prospect of a huge new park to be built on the same site on Atlanta’s west side.

Southwest Atlanta has received less than 6 percent of the $126.8 million invested in parks and trails by the Atlanta BeltLine, according to a little known report that’s now one year old.

The BeltLine has provided public amenities, such as trails and parks, in the north and has provided most of its affordable housing in south Atlanta, according to the report commissioned by the Atlanta BeltLine Partnership.

The report was not distributed to the general public following its submission in September 2013. The report’s title is, “An Atlanta BeltLine for All: Equitable Development Assessment.”

In hard-pressed neighborhoods south of Turner Field, Atlanta is quietly installing a sustainable storm water management system.

The planned system is based on a premise similar to the one that resulted in the water feature at the Old Fourth Ward Park, along the Atlanta BeltLine. As with the park pond fed by Clear Creek, the idea is to detain and filter runoff rather than direct it into the city’s sewage system.

In Peoplestown, one of three neighborhoods in progress, the city’s plan envisions a storm water management system that will use permeable pavers, bio-swales, detention ponds and storage vaults to capture from 10 million to 30 million gallons of storm water.

A new report by PEDS calls on transportation planners to make pedestrian safety as important a goal as congestion relief, particularly near transit stops. The report also includes a toolkit for improving pedestrian safety near transit stops.

“We want safety to be a top priority, or as important as congestion relief,” Sally Flocks, PEDS president and CEO, said Sunday.

Flocks is slated to present the report Thursday to the ARC’s Transportation and Air Quality Committee. PEDS will ask ARC to conduct a pedestrian safety study. The Atlanta Regional Commission already is sensitive to the issue of pedestrian safety and now provides funding for last-mile connectivity efforts, Flocks said.

The Atlanta BeltLine has created the position of director of economic development and filled it with a former director of the Savannah Economic Development Authority. Terms were not disclosed.

Jerald Mitchell is to devise and implement a strategy for economic development around the BeltLine, according to a statement the BeltLine released Thursday.

Mitchell’s hiring was announced 11 weeks after Mayor Kasim Reed announced he intends to develop the BeltLine as a public private partership. Reed said he is looking for an investor to put in $3 billion to $4 billion, nearly double the 2005 estimate of the BeltLine’s development costs.