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Worldpay’s economic impact statement shows why civic leaders covet tech firms

by David Pendered

A report by Invest Atlanta on the projected economic impact of Worldpay’s move to Atlantic Station illustrates the reasons city leaders want more tech firms in the city.
The jobs pay well and will add significantly to the city’s tax base. The products these employees create are of a high value, and the work process doesn’t create the environmental challenges of some other industries.

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Sharply-higher profits of local owner of New York Stock Exchange beat analysts’ forecasts

by David Pendered

The local company that purchased the New York Stock Exchange reported profits Thursday that beat analysts’ expectations.

Intercontinental Exchange, Inc. has created ways to capitalize on the shift from personal to electronic trading, putting it at the heart of metro Atlanta’s robust financial technology sector.

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Atlanta plans $200,000 study to help Turner Field neighborhoods

by David Pendered

Atlanta is poised to ask the ARC to help fund a $200,000 study intended to help guide the redevelopment of neighborhoods surrounding Turner Field.

The ARC would provide $160,000 and the city’s match of $40,000 would be provided by the city and by Invest Atlanta, the city’s development arm, according to legislation that’s due to be adopted Monday by the Atlanta City Council.

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BeltLine a player in dense projects near Piedmont, Fourth Ward parks

by David Pendered

The Atlanta BeltLine is involved in two projects that could add 22-story structures next to the Historic Fourth Ward Park, and eight-story apartment buildings a half-mile north of Piedmont Park.

At Historic Fourth Ward Park, the BeltLine is seeking to rezone land to a classification that allows buildings up to 225 feet high. The site includes the Masquerade nightclub, located in a stone structure built in 1900.

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Tech’s analysis of Memorial Drive gains political boost via attention from two Atlanta councilmembers

by David Pendered

Reducing the speed limit on Memorial Drive from 35 mph to 25 mph could improve safety, cut tailpipe emissions, boost the roadway’s capacity, and even reduce trip times because traffic would flow more smoothly.

Another startling discovery associated with the analysis of Memorial Drive, being conducted this autumn by Georgia Tech graduate students, is the high degree of buy-in from Atlanta city councilmembers who represent the area.

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Atlanta “showing signs” of economic recovery, credit outlook improved, says report with regional implications

by David Pendered

The city of Atlanta is “showing signs” that it is rebounding from the recession, according to a new report from Moody’s Investors Service.

Among the signs Moody’s identifies: The tax base is inching up; foreclosures are down to pre-recession levels; the unemployment rate is still stuck above 10 percent, but city officials attributed it to people moving here to look for work rather than to locals unable to find a job.

The report could be a guide in gauging the economy in other parts of the region, though Moody’s did examine only the city of Atlanta in order to rate the credit of a $60 million bond package Atlanta plans to sell Oct. 28.

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ARC board defers decision on seating developers, votes to allow public comment during board meetings

by David Pendered

The issue of whether the ARC board should seat citizen members who are developers who lead self-taxing-and-spending entities called CIDs gained some clarity Wednesday.

The ARC again released at its monthly meeting a response that cites two legal opinions and a ruling from a former state revenue commissioner. The opinions say, essentially, developers are not precluded from serving on the board of the Atlanta Regional Commission even if they serve on a board overseeing a community improvement district.

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A final frontier in Atlanta: West End could grow new homes, shops, while sheltering current residents

by David Pendered

West End may be an ideal candidate for redevelopment in this unusual era of the economy.

The newly released study of West End by Georgia Tech students sees opportunities in situations that would have been clear threats to redevelopment before the great recession. The report suggests that West End is ripe for new investments in retail and residential.

These ventures could both stabilize and benefit from the redevelopment of a stretch of Northside Drive, an historic industrial corridor that begins at the tip of Buckhead, passes Atlantic Station and the future Falcons stadium, and ends in the vicinity of West End and Fort McPherson.

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A final frontier in Atlanta: Northside Drive plans complete – Buckhead to Falcons stadium area, to West End

by David Pendered

The final piece is in place of a framework plan by Georgia Tech students that could guide development along the frontier of an historic Atlanta industrial corridor.

Just like Buckhead, the West End neigbhorhood that’s at the heart of the newly released plan developed around a tavern – Charner Humphrie’s two-story White Hall Tavern. West End’s beginnings as a travelers’ rest stop date to 1835, three years before Buckhead was established.

The latest plan provides a method to link the shops, homes, parks and places of worship of West End with the Atlanta University Center – the nation’s largest concentration of historically black colleges and universities.

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MARTA’s proposed Brookhaven Station development offers challenges, report says

by David Pendered

MARTA wants to engage a developer to build a live-work-play community in the 2-year-old city of Brookhaven, where a proposed 30-year plan appears to embrace dense urban development.

MARTA is seeking developers for its Brookhaven Station. MARTA intends to develop homes, offices and shops on almost half the station’s sparsely used lot, and replace those parking spaces in structured parking.

The project may not be easy, according to a MARTA report that states: “The positive involvement of [Brookhaven and DeKalb County] could be a challenge to bring about. It will take careful negotiation and cooperation, of which ARC [Atlanta Regional Commission] could help facilitate. The largest hurdle, however, could be the participation of private money lenders.”

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ARC: Atlanta gains more residents in year than decade; no housing news

by David Pendered

The city of Atlanta added more residents in the past year than it did during the entire first decade of the 2000s, according to an unofficial report from the Atlanta Regional Commission.

Atlanta’s gain of 4,100 residents was part of a 10-county population increase of 52,700, calculated from 2013 to 2014. ARC planners said in a statement the increase is a, “sure sign that the economic recovery is continuing.”

ARC’s latest report does not examine the housing supply or construction industry. The city of Atlanta had a glut of housing after the last decade, with more than 37,000 units added to serve a city population that rose by 3,500 residents, according to an ARC report from April 2011.

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Races for governor, Senate could affect Tyler Perry’s purchase plans

by David Pendered

The implications on the races for Georgia’s governor and U.S. senator of the Tyler Perry proposal to buy most of Fort McPherson may be starting to take shape.

The election is less than three weeks after Perry’s tentatively scheduled closing, on Oct. 15, for 330 acres of the fort. If Gov. Nathan Deal loses to Sen. Jason Carter, or if Michelle Nunn wins a Senate seat, there’s a chance that either victor may intervene to slow Perry’s deal.

At least, that’s the thought among some involved with the growing community protest that’s taking shape with an eye to slowing Perry’s project. And that’s why the size of the crowd that attended a forum last week is relevant.

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Fort McPherson area rich in human rights history, poor in redevelopment

by David Pendered

Juanita Crater knows what she doesn’t want to happen at Fort McPherson – for redevelopment to dawdle so long the federal government decides to use the post to house large numbers of the homeless, or undocumented immigrants.

History both recent and distant underscores the relevance of concerns raised by Crater, a senior citizen of East Point who lives near the fort and is viewed as a local historian. The fort and its surroundings are not thriving; federal law requires the site to house the homeless; the fort has served as a stockade.

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Fort McPherson: No talk yet of whether HUD’s existing approval would allow for Tyler Perry’s studio

by David Pendered

The state authority overseeing the conversion of the shuttered Fort McPherson military base into a civilian use met behind closed doors for two hours Thursday before emerging to say a final deal could be secured in two to three weeks.

“We are in the process of negotiating, at this time, a possible sale,” said authority Chairman Felker Ward. “We hope to be able to conclude those negotiations in the next two to three weeks.”

One issue yet to be discussed in public is how the proposal brought by Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed to sell most of the fort to filmmaker Tyler Perry will affect the existing approval by HUD of a plan to retool the fort into a science center.

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New partnership intends to help develop affordable homes in region

by David Pendered

More money is soon to be available for developers who need loans for projects in metro Atlanta neighborhoods still reeling from the housing crisis and, in some cases, woes that preceded the crisis.

The additional capital is to flow from a new partnership between Atlanta Neighborhood Development Partnership, Inc. and The Reinvestment Fund.

“Some metro Atlanta submarkets are slowly rebounding from the great recession, while others are experiencing considerable growth,” ANDP President/CEO John O’Callaghan said.

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