Here’s a nice a checklist for Atlantans to check out, courtesy of a blog I’d never heard of: Parks, transit, public space, bike lanes, green buildings, recycling, mixed-use/infill development, green leaders, smart energy and “good green fun.” How would you grade Atlanta on these criteria? I wonder how my friend, the incomparable Mandy Schmitt, at the city’s [...]

The AJC’s touting a drive among metro Atlanta community improvement districts to raise enough local money to qualify for stimulus money that would help create more parks in Atlanta. CIDs are districts in which (usually commercial) property owners agree to tax themselves to pay for infrastructure improvements within the districts. They’ve raised $400,000, which could help [...]

The Atlanta Development Authority sold $78 million in Beltline bonds Tuesday, according to an ADA press release, and city officials are particularly pleased that they were able to sell them so quickly. The bonds’ underwriter boasted that the bonds were “oversubscribed” — finance world parlance for having to turn potential buyers away. The sale allowed the authority [...]

Well, that was fast. The controversial $120 million redevelopment of parts of Jekyll Island apparently has been scuttled — one day after Gov. Sonny Perdue and others participated in a groundbreaking on the state component of the project. Critics, led by state Rep. Jeff Chapman, who represents the island’s residents, argued that an agreement between the [...]

A controversial $170 million development project in Jekyll Island state park breaks ground today, Georgia Public Broadcasting reports. The approved project is something of a compromise between the Jekyll Island Authority and developers on one hand, and current residents, good government types and conservationists on the other. While critics were able to trim some parts of the [...]

I took the photo above earlier this month during a tour of the Beltline’s Northeastern section with Angel Poventud, the uber-activist. What do we see in the photo? A high-rise at the corner of 10th and Monroe. As Linda Richman used to say, talk amongst yourselves, and see a personal disclosure below. And while you talk amongst yourselves, [...]

City councilman Kwanza Hall has sponsored an ordinance that would close a portion of Auburn Avenue to create a pedestrian plaza. The snippet of road, between Boulevard and Jackson Street, runs between two parts of the King Center. Hall, with the support of the parks service and the King Center, said in his ordinance that removing traffic [...]

As I was jogging along the Freedom Parkway trail Friday afternoon, I felt a sense of déjà vu. From the path, I peered into the back patio at Across the Street in the Old Fourth Ward. I saw a make-shift skate park, and benches arranged in a shady semi-circle. I caught a glimpse of a beautiful three-story [...]

The High Line in New York; photo by Ed Yourdon via Flickr I’ve avoided posting any links to stories about the High Line, an abandoned elevated trainline in New York that has recently been converted to a public trail and garden. To be honest, I’m just tired of seeing New York do yet another cool thing — [...]