A city built around rail
David Emory was practically born with rail on his mind.
His father, Bruce Emory, was one of the planners who designed MARTA, and as a toddler, Dave visited MARTA stations as the system opened.
Fast forward to now, and David is a planner at the Atlanta Regional Commission and one of the folks behind a map that shows what our transit system could look like (there are two versions, one released by Citizens for Progressive Transit, in photo below, and another under the guise of Concept 3).
Both maps are awesome! Both are so far from where we are now.
But here’s a little bit of hope. According to David, it’s a misnomer to say Atlanta grew up around the car.
“We expanded the city by building additional streetcar lines,” said David at a talk Thursday at Parish that was sponsored by the Sierra Club and CPT.
He added, “We had quite a railroad culture.”
Of course he’s talking about back before people thought riding or expanding MARTA was a surefire way to catch the Bubonic Plague.
Through an interesting slide show that included the photos here, David provided us with a sense that at one time Atlanta was a rail city.
Sure, we all know Atlanta was once called Terminus because it was the end of the line for one of the early rail routes.
But we may not be thinking every day about how rail was once a thriving industry in our city and a conduit for everyone to get everywhere.
Or how it shaped the city we see today. Literally.
You know why the stately building at the corner of Ponce and Peachtree curves with the street?
Because the building was built to accommodate one of the streetcar lines, which went north up Peachtree and then turned right at Ponce, and started to head east.
Oh shoot I got goosebumps when David said that!
(It’s the building just south of the Georgian Terrace hotel that seems to have been born with scaffolding on it).
Much of the talk was pessimistic. Maybe you’ve seen projections for how much MARTA will cost versus how much money it will take in over the next decade. It ain’t pretty.
But on the other hand, I feel like it’s always possible to revisit things you’ve done before.
You may not be able to replicate, you may have to scale back your vision but if something that once thrived is still alive, it can be vibrant again.
Different, but still vibrant.
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Comments
6 Comments on A city built around rail
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Grace T on
Fri, 11th Sep 2009 3:16 pm
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Lee Biola on
Fri, 11th Sep 2009 4:37 pm
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Ken Edelstein on
Sat, 12th Sep 2009 8:39 pm
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Jonathan Peterson on
Mon, 14th Sep 2009 10:13 am
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Jeanne Bonner on
Mon, 14th Sep 2009 10:26 am
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alston dutton on
Sat, 3rd Apr 2010 10:12 am
For more confirmation of David’s assertion that Atlanta grew up around transit, take a tour of the Beltline. Heather, the terrific tour guide, is a font of knowledge about Atlanta’s old streetcar suburbs. She gives you a fascinating look at our older neighborhoods and helps you believe that we can again (actually maybe for the first time, since that old system was largely a radial system to get to downtown) connect our neighborhoods.
Great piece Jeanne! Dave did a terrific job last night.
FYI – that rail line that began/ended at Terminus? Completely state funded. Back in 1837, private railroads were trying to link into Georgia’s interior from Coastal and river cities Macon, Augusta, and Savannah.
The private railroads couldn’t financially justify building rail any further inland than Decatur. There were not enough people in NW Georgia, Northern Alabama or Tennessee.
So in 1837, Georgia legislators in Augusta created and funded the Western & Atlantic Railroad. They used tax dollars to build the line from Terminus to where Chattanooga is today. It was the best investment the state ever made, leading to the creation of Atlanta, the biggest economic engine in the State.
It is a good thing the people calling government funded transit a “money loser” weren’t around back then. There would be a lot less money in Georgia today.
I love that photo: “Building Atlanta, One line at a time … ” Can we REbuild Atlanta, one line at a time? Starting with the Peachtree Trolley, and moving on to the Beltline?
I live on Virginia Ave, had my house for 5 or more years before finding out the reason that Virginia winds around between lanier and boulevard and that all the corners are rounded off in the area is the street car that used to run right in front of my house.
How cool would it have been to catch a street car downtown to work, over to the baseball field that was where City Hall east is now or to the big lake and dances held at Ponce De Leon Springs a generation earlier.
Oh Jonathan it would be very cool!
I know so many other cities also tore up their streetcar lines, but, I don’t know. It just feels like we are always so behind! And I guess what rankles me is all the glad-handing sloganeering like ‘world-class city’ and ‘Every day is opening day.’ It just feels so false.
As for the photos, Ken, my fave is the top one that shows the CROWDS of people in the streets! I think that’s one of the big differentiators between Atlanta and other cities, including New York. Where are the crowds?
We draw energy from other people, and there’s nothing like coming up out of the subway or train station in one of the world’s great cities, and breathing in the vibe of the streets. It’s sudden and immediate and it’s like you’ve just boarded a roller coaster or jumped into a moving current. You’re transported!
Of course that brings us back to density…..
Those crowded sidewalks and the large streetcar system (with interurban lines to Stone Mountain and Marietta) was successful sans high-rise density. I often traverse narrow streets today that when I was a kid were “streetcar only” right-of-ways, such as the one that diverted off Memorial Drive at Cabbagetown/Reynoldstown to go under the railroad tracks and on up to Flat Shoals (which was a busy transfer point for suburban feeder buses traversing Bouldercrest) even though the streetcars continued on the (now closed but still there) diagonal streetcar right-of-way to Moreland (where the motel sits by I-20). Sadly dismantled by design, by buffoons, such as the corrupt Mayor Hartsfield and his business partner (in the bus business) Steinmetz, who profited on the systematic de-railing of the now lost Atlanta. +++Mule to Marta Vol.2 provides all those teeth-gritting details.
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