Bulldozer on Boulevard at Urban Gardener and other GP happenings
Is someone answering my prayers?
I’m not sure. In fact, I’m going to be really bloggy and just post this photo of dirt moving and bulldozers and activity at the vacant Urban Gardener property on Boulevard near I-20, without being able to share any details.
UPDATE: See comments for details on new garden center slated for the spot.
I’m looking through council agendas right now, but I have to say, the city council appears to post a wealth of documents online without making the information easy to navigate.
Or, I’m a tool.
Anyway, it’s such an important property in Grant Park that I am thrilled to see any movement there at all.
I spoke with someone at the Urban Gardener when the shop moved to East Atlanta, and the woman said the drought did them in. It’s a large property, and as you may know, the Urban Gardener folks had fittingly outfitted it with a ton of flora and fauna.
Boulevard is such a key thoroughfare on the east side of the city, and yet design-wise, it blows. Like so many streets and intersections in Atlanta, it’s just allowed to be ugly, even though for the most part it has good sidewalks, and is a natural conduit between Grant Park, Cabbagetown and development on Memorial.
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The new face of smart growth? It’s you
It started with porch parties.
But, shoot, porch parties can only take you or, in this case, the Poncey-Highland Neighborhood Association, so far.
Jim McMahel, a president of the association, said he realized the neighborhood desperately needed a master plan about five years ago when developers began to buy up parcels of land and propose ambitious new buildings in that part of Atlanta, which is south of Virginia-Highlands.
In an interview earlier this month, McMahel said, “Here is this tiny little neighborhood that didn’t have a lot of volunteers, trying to deal with someone like Wayne Mason who has $25 million to throw around and hire the best lawyers and planners to push through what he wants. We recognized very quickly if we had a master plan that was recorded with the city that we could reference that and send a developer to that,” in order to preserve the neighborhood’s character.
(By way of explanation, Mason bought land in the P-H area that he later sold to the Beltline; developer Trammell Crow expressed interest in building a 20-story building on the site of the North High Ridge Apartments on Highland, seen in the photo above, McMahel said.)
So McMahel and other residents of Poncey-Highland began to raise money to pay for a master plan, which they believed would cost as much as $40,000.
“I kept saying we need to do something,” McMahel recalled. “We did not have a clue as to how we were going to raise the amount of money. We were raising it through porch parties and socials at restaurants. And we managed to raise $1,000 and set it apart. But we were not getting anywhere with that.” Read more
Council OKs streetcar app $, but I couldn’t wait
Possible candidate for Atlanta city council
Instead, I’m tipping my hat to Dave Williams of the Atlanta Business Chronicle for simply having the patience to wait out Atlanta City Council, and file a story last night at 7 p.m. on council approving funds to help Atlanta apply for federal stimulus funds to build a streetcar line.
Several city agencies are working with MARTA to prepare an application to compete for federal stimulus funds. Council gave the approval yesterday for the mayor to broker a deal with MARTA and other agencies with respect to the costs of preparing the application, which is due in September.
I wrote yesterday morning about City Council considering the request for streetcar application funds, and I went to the 1 p.m. City Council meeting yesterday afternoon to follow up on the issue.
Here’s a citizen’s report of what happened:
The meeting began at 1:22 p.m. Yes, the 1 p.m. meeting began at 1:22 p.m.
Council then presented what it calls “proclamations, commendations and other special awards” until about 2:05 p.m.
The proclamations included one for Inman Park Dine Out for Public Safety.
At this point, I had my first clue that I had bought a ticket for Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey.
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Boulevard crosswalk, part two
Wow, this blogging thing appears to work!
District 1 Councilwoman Carla Smith called me this morning at 9 a.m. to follow up on my request for a crosswalk on Boulevard at I-20 in Grant Park.
She said that intersection is actually owned by the D.O.T., so it’s going to take more than a smile to obtain the crosswalk, but I would say we have officially started the process!
As I said yesterday, it would be helpful to install walk/don’t walk signs that provided a dedicated period of time for walkers to cross through the intersection. Right now, the walk/don’t walk signs at that intersection give you about three seconds to cross before they begin to flash, and cars are permitted in the intersection throughout that time.
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Council’s Anne Fauver won’t run for re-election
Anne Fauver, the city councilwoman for much of Midtown, Virginia-Highlands and Candler Park, won’t run for re-election, according to the gay Atlanta news site, Project Q Atlanta.
Atlanta Councilwoman Anne Fauver
That leaves her 2005 opponent, Steve Brodie, as the only announced candidate for the seat. But candidates for this year’s city elections have to early September to qualify to run.
“I believe that eight years is about the right amount of time for public service in the same position,” Project Q quotes Fauver as saying in a letter. “That’s enough time to try out your fresh ideas, figure out how the system works, and expend all that wonderful energy for change that motivated you to run in the first place. After eight years you begin to be part of the system, and you find yourself with less energy to pursue better ideas and, frankly, with less faith in the ability of the system to be responsive to them.”
A common rap against Fauver was that she acted from the start a part of the system. She sided, for example, with Mayor Franklin and against most Neighborhood Planning Units in her district during her first term in the fight over the Piedmont Park parking deck. Propelled by anger over the parking deck and other issues, Brodie — who had virtually no prior civic involvement — lost to her by only five votes in the 2005 election.
Candidates may qualify for Atlanta’s municipal elections Aug. 31-Sept. 4. The election, which includes contests for City Council, Council president and mayor, is scheduled for Nov. 3.
Ethics probe on Borders
From Atlanta Unfiltered:
A state ethics investigation is trying to find out whether Lisa Borders, president of the Atlanta City Council and one of the leading candidates in this year’s Atlanta mayor’s race, lobbied state legislators on behalf of her employer without registering as a lobbyist.
A complaint filed with the State Ethics Commission alleges that Borders, then a vice president of Cousins Properties, lobbied in 2007 for passage of the Georgia Smart Infrastructure Finance Act, commonly known as the “private-cities” bill.
Rest of story here.
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