Cousins Vision Better for Atlanta Than ARCs
Will Atlanta Re-boom? That’s the question defining one of the big, upcoming battles about the city. Cousins Properties thinks Atlanta will have over 800,000 residents by 2020 and wants to build housing to suit them. They also want the infrastructure to support that.
The Atlanta Regional Commission thinks that even by 2030, Atlanta’s population will only be a little beyond 600,000. By contrast, they believe Gwinnett County will have nearly a million residents.
The question comes directly into where to invest resources, and where you invest resources ultimately determines what life will be like for people who live in the region. Regrettably, given the nature of the current government structure the ARCs vision is more likely to come to pass, but it’s not a foregone conclusion.
If the ARC is assumed to be correct, then we’ll need to build a ton of roads, lots more subdivisions, our traffic will be hell and if we have any chance of ever facing the EPA with a straight face, we’d better start building regional rail at a record pace. We better also completely rewrite our water use plans because small growth in the city, but huge suburban growth means more water usage. What will happen is that our growth will be limited not by our own planning but by smog and water limits that the Federal Government will have to enforce to preserve people’s safety.
If, however, we take the Cousins estimate and build it, we’ll have our own urban ‘Field of Dreams‘. Develop the infrastructure for 800,000 people with the housing, the services, and transportation needed, and they will come. Even if they don’t come by 2020, the city will gain a reputation as being well built and ready for growth. That attracts business, which is what is needed to keep attracting able people to the region. With new businesses moving to Atlanta, everyone will benefit. Even the outlying counties will see a stronger region with a larger tax base and demand for housing and services in their restaurants.
The question is really one of vision. Do we want our governments to follow the trends they see and try to keep playing catch up? Or do we want them to seize this opportunity and weave an urban fabric with a strong central core that works? Really. Would you rather live in Detroit? Or Chicago?
October 14th, 2006 at 12:29 pm
A million Gwinnetians…as if driving through Gwinnett isn’t scary enough.
October 15th, 2006 at 9:18 am
Why anyone would want to live in Gwinnett is beyond me. If there’s another county in the US that has a worse growth plan, I’d like to see it. What an awful, awful, place to live.
October 15th, 2006 at 9:42 am
Gosh, think this might have anything to do with the fact that there is only 1 mayor (but 60 cities) and a whole bunch of county commissioners on ARC’s executive committee?
October 16th, 2006 at 9:39 am
While the northeast part of Columbia continues to sprawl (though it has not yet reached Gwinnettian proportions), there’s a conscious effort right now to invest in the downtown area to bring people and business there. A lot of people have criticized the mayor for all the construction going on, but I agree that a revitalized downtown is preferable to suburban sprawl. Those efforts are already bearing some fruit: http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/business/15744152.htm
I am still jealous of MARTA, though. People here think public transportation equals welfare.
October 17th, 2006 at 12:32 pm
This means, as an exercise in influence peddling, the ARC’s vision is self-fulfilling. Blah. It’s a bad day when an Atlanta real estate developer looks like a good guy.
November 18th, 2006 at 5:07 pm
Personally, I’d prefer that everyone move to Gwinnett. Then, they won’t be in my way when I want to get to the damn grocery store. All the condos on Peachtree Street and in Atlantic Station are ruining Midtown. When I moved here six years ago, traffic was tolerable, but now I might as well live in East Cobb.
@Susanna - MARTA is welfare.