Atlanta: abandoned railroad tracks to be 22-mile necklace of parks and paths

Picayne Item ^ | December 3, 2005

[Lorianne]

The sprawling metropolis always has given park proponents a headache. Founded as a railroad hub, the city has no ocean, no mountains and no major body of water to serve as a built-in foundation for a park system.

One of the only opportunities for adding green space is manmade - the mostly unused railroad tracks that ring the city, dotted with rundown warehouses and abandoned depots.

It is precisely those tracks that city planners and green groups propose to use in an ambitious $2.1 billion plan to build a 22-mile verdant loop of parks, paths and transit around the city that would link 45 neighborhoods.

“Atlanta, which was for many years known as the poster-child for sprawl, is becoming a national leader in demonstrating there are cost-effective, profitable alternatives,” said Ed McMahon, a senior resident fellow of the Urban Land Institute.

Dubbed the Beltline Project, the plan could propel Atlanta from the bottom of the pack of major cities in green space to square in the middle, while at the same time generating economic development by linking together affluent and struggling, isolated neighborhoods.

Urban planning experts are closely watching how the project plays out, saying it could serve as a blueprint for so-called smart growth developments across the country.

The Atlanta project comes as other urban centers champion efforts to turn out-of-use railway lines into parks.

New York's High Line project would turn an abandoned 1.45-mile stretch of elevated rail line in Manhattan into a towering trail. A similar proposal in Chicago would convert a 20-foot-high freight railroad line into an oasis for walkers and bike riders. Both projects seem to be inspired by a world-renowned project in Paris in the 1990s that turned a rail viaduct into a lush 3-mile pedestrian walkway.

More than 13,000 miles of rail-trails dot the nation and 14,000 miles of additional lines are in the works, said Katie Magers, spokeswoman for the Rails to Trails Conservancy, a Washington-based nonprofit.

“They're everywhere,” she said. “We're seeing a lot more creative use of rail lines.”

To raise most of the $2.1 billion needed to pay for the project, the City Council this month approved a special tax district this month that could raise $1.7 billion to fund the project's infrastructure.

The Fulton County Commission and Atlanta school board also are expected in the coming weeks to cast crucial votes on whether to help fund the project.

Even before the City Council's vote, the national conservation group Trust for Public Land began working to secure about 70 acres of land along the route, preserving at least some space as developers eagerly snatch up other open tracts. The private group has spent as much as $1 million an acre to lock up the land.

Jim Langford, director for the state chapter of the conservation group, said it is essential to build a “green infrastructure” for a region that is home to about 4.7 million people and that expects 2.3 million more in the next 20 years.

For months, the project enjoyed glowing praise around the city, but some critics have made headway.

A panel of transportation experts raised concerns when it found that isolated parts of the loop would not have the riders to support trains, trolleys or whatever transit options are proposed.

Neighborhood groups in the well-to-do northeastern portion of the loop have criticized high-rise apartment proposals that would be a dramatic change in a landscape of mostly single-family homes.

In other neighborhoods, some residents worry the Beltline project is a development tool aimed at building housing near the rich but ignoring the poor.

However, these fears could be put to rest if the city provides investors tax incentives to encourage development, said Michael Meyer, a transportation consultant professor at Georgia Tech.

Meyer is among a group of academics who argue that the project is a once-in-a-generation chance to drive Atlanta's growth for decades and provide a blueprint for the revitalization of cities across the globe.

“It's almost as important as Hartsfield Airport and the freeway system,” Meyer said, referring to the city's airport - the busiest in the world. “It could have that big of an impact.”

[dsc]

"It is precisely those tracks that city planners and green groups propose to use in an ambitious $2.1 billion plan to build a 22-mile verdant loop of parks, paths and transit around the city that would link 45 neighborhoods. "

Hey, a hunting preserve for muggers. Just what Atlanta needs.

[denydenydeny]

Who on earth would use such a "park" system? Other than for body disposal, I mean.

[sageb1]

The entire state of Georgia is already a delightful park. Let's keep it that way.

[WideGlide]

Aggravated Assault Park. No thanks. Use the money to secure your friggin Courthouses Atlanta!

[demsux]

I don't know how that will work in an urban environment, but we go to the "Cheese County Trail" in SW Wisconsin a few times a year for ATV'ing and snowmobiling.

It's an old rail line where they pulled the tracks, graded,etc. and created a great place for ATV's and snowmobiles...the views are incredible and you can pack coolers and make a day of it/weekend of it.

[RegulatorCountry]

"... while at the same time generating economic development by linking together affluent and struggling, isolated neighborhoods."

... or, conversely, creating easy foot access for homeless, drug dealers and criminals petty and not-so-petty. It's always pie-in-the-sky with these urban "planners."

[Robert A Cook PE]

Biggest problem we have is corrupt Atlanta political system (taxes) and travel (congestion.)

So they're gonna turn flat, prepared, ready-to-use railroad tracks linkning large areas into "green spaces" that will make the professors happy.

Great.

[Fierce Allegiance]

The rails-to-trails parks I see are usually heavily utilized, but the cost is staggering due to handicap access requirements and idiot landscape designers who have to specify the biggest plants and trees commercially available. Plant grass and let the native stuff fill in.

[rawhide]

This has worked out very well up in the DC-VA area. Used a lot by the locals.

[no-to-illegals]

smart growth developments

Atlantans may wish to note the above partial statement and the next statement to follow. The enviro-Nazis use this term to extract greater taxes from the public whenever and where-ever this term is employed. The tax money extracted from the public normally goes toward useless programs that intend to pack people closer together in smaller and smaller areas restricting freedom of movement while dicating to businesses and the removing rights from those businesses. Be very, very careful Atlanta, smart growth isn't freedom sensitive.

[Welsh Rabbit]

They put a new park with a nature trail next to my uncle's golf course in College Park a couple of years ago. He calls it the Ho Chi Minh Trail. Nobody in their right mind would go in there alone (it's real close to a couple of housing projects). I enjoyed using the Silver Comet Trail (also a former rail track) when I lived in Cobb county, but Atlanta is another matter.

[ZOOKER]

Don't know what the law reads in Atlanta, but a similar idea was proposed in my area. There was stiff opposition.

Farmers were up in arms because the land was supposed to be returned to the original owners (them) if the RR no longer needed it.

Many other objections were raised: Too remote to be practical for most hikers, lack of transportation, lack of facilities, disruption of wildlife, crime and littering.

Don't know what the status of the right-of-way is --- it's not a park, and not a railroad either (track, ties and anything else of value were taken out and sold).

[dr huer]

Kenneth Deffeyes predicts Hubbert's Peak for World Oil production to be at Thanksgiving 2005. Automobile dependence will diminish and ten years from now Atlanta will wish it had those tracks for local transportion of people and goods by trains.

[PAR35]

no major body of water to serve as a built-in foundation for a park system.

The Feds found enough water to build a national park at taxpayer expense.

[PAR35]

Kenneth Deffeyes predicts Hubbert's Peak for World Oil production to be at Thanksgiving 2005.

I predict he is wrong.

[Turbopilot]

Everything north of I-20 should be freeways, as wide as can be built in the available land. Sort of an "Inner Loop" as a counterpart to the long-delayed "Outer Loop." Everything south should be sold to the highest bidder.

The transit idea seems like a good idea, considering MARTA's current woeful inadequacy for any purpose other than airport transportation for those who happen to live next to one of the few rail stations. But it would take much more than 22 miles of track to make MARTA a modern urban rail system like the NY or DC subways, and it would take tens of billions of dollars to do so, most of which could never possibly be recouped. Atlanta needs to recognize that it is a city designed around the automobile, and plan and expand accordingly.

[Turbopilot]

I predict "Peak Oil" will occur exactly 20 years from now. Since around 1870, "Peak Oil" has always been 20 years away, so that's where I put it today. It's also where I'll put it 20 years from now. But I bet global cooling warming is right around the corner.

[Ostlandr]

Let's see. We let overregulation, excessive taxation and foreign competition ruin our manufacturing sector, leaving empty factories and abandoned railroad track.
Now, let's rip up all the railroad tracks, so when the country finally comes to its senses we can't rebuild the factories.
Sounds like a plan for success.

Two problems with "rails to trails" here in NY:
One, the right-of-way is often supposed to return to the original owner when no longer required for railroad purposes. Good old NY has ignored this and simply taken the land for parks.
Two, in NY "parkland" is sacred and may never, never be used for anything else ever again. Once the rails are gone and a "park" is there, we'll never be able to rebuild the railroad.
As a sidebar, land around Stewart airport (Northwest of NYC) was set aside for possible airport expansion and economic development back in the 1950s. Until recently, it was unused and the locals used as parkland/state forest.
Now that the airport wants to expand and bring in development, the enviro-wackos and NIMBYs sued, saying that the reserve land was now parkland and untouchable.
THEY WON!
After a lengthy court fight, the State settled for getting the new access road build and keeping a lousy 100 acres for commercial development. The rest is untouchable forever, and will never generate a cent in tax revenue.

[Ostlandr]

Notice that in almost any city you can locate the "bad" neighborhoods on a map simply by looking for certain names-
MLK, Rosa Parks, Marcus Garvey, etc.