Atlanta’s Westside Shows Clear Vision

Recognizable to all of ‘The Walking Dead’ fans, the Bellwood Quarry made an appearance on the first season and has since become an Atlanta landmark.  On track to become Atlanta’s largest park, Westside Park at Bellwood Quarry has filed to kick off the first initial phase of the construction process. The applied permit is for tree removal, grading and erosion control which all in all encompasses around 280 acres, Piedmont Park is only 185. This first phase will include a gateway entrance at Johnson Road and Grove Park Place on the park’s north side. There will be lighting and signage installed to encourage pedestrian bicycle and traffic. Connecting the trails to the Proctor Creek Greenway also falls under the first phase umbrella. Atlanta BeltLine, Inc. recently announced their acquisition of a major piece of property near the Atlanta BeltLine Westside corridor. Three quarter-miles of unused railroad stretching from Joseph E. Boone to Donald Lee Hollowell completes the necessary connection of the BeltLine corridor on this side of the city.

Hopes are already high that this park will positively impact the surrounding area. Multiple large projects around the area are already in the works such as the Quarry Yards. Amazon supposedly was pitched this same area when Atlanta was in the running for their HQ2 headquarters. This substantial two-part development in the Grove Park neighborhood will consume 70 acres backed by a former Atlanta Braves and New York Yankees star, Mark Teixeira. Off Marietta Blvd. Westside Village is currently under construction as well, headed by developer Eden Rock.  The Works on Chatahoochee Avenue is up and coming with a leasing office now open, located in an old factory with plans calling for 1.5 million square feet of transformed space. You can read more about the booming Westside here. 

With development roaring it only makes sense that residential real estate would follow. Grove Park is a great example of a neighborhood quickly resurrecting. A comparison of 2017 and 2018 shows the average sales price in one year more than doubled. The homes in this area are modest but have great bones for remodeling. The City of Atlanta is also putting forth a $45 million effort to renovate a 16-acre neighborhood park (Rodney Cook Sr. Park) located in nearby Vine City between the new Westside Quarry Park and Mercedes Benz Stadium with a planned completion sometime this summer. Near the park, on Sunset Avenue, the home of Martin Luther King Jr. at the time of his death and his wife until her death in 2006 is a sentimental, historical and cultural landmark. The National Park Service purchased the King home and plans to restore it and open it to the public.

Westside Atlanta is considered to be the most under-served restaurant and retail area of Atlanta. Historically, this part of the city has always been industrial and surrounded by lower income residential homes. Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms has hailed this park as a new attraction that will become an ‘economic engine for long-forgotten neighborhoods west of Georgia Tech’.  The future park is currently camouflaged among dense kudzu and and pine trees but will slowly emerge as Atlanta’s biggest green space in the coming months.