Southwest Atlanta Beltline trail gets green light
October 19, 2009 at 1:09 pm by Thomas Wheatley in News
On Oct. 14, Westview and West End residents received good news about the long-overlooked L&N railroad tracks in Southwest Atlanta: the Georgia Department of Transportation finally voted to allow the PATH Foundation to move ahead with a proposed Beltline jogging and biking trail.
For more than a year, Patrick Berry and other neighborhood residents waited for glimmers of progress on the abandoned tracks.
Unfortunately, all they saw were dumped mattresses, shopping carts, and blankets of kudzu piling up.
“When people came to the neighborhood, they’d see garbage and overgrowth,” Berry, vice president of the Westview Community Organization, says. “It gives the impression that nobody cares.”
Beltline officials say they’ve inked a deal with Trees Atlanta to begin a five-year kudzu removal process. Ed McBrayer of the PATH Foundation, which will oversee construction of the the trail, says he plans to meet with GDOT officials this week to discuss the project.
Once completed, the 1.4-mile trail will connect with the West End trail along White Street.
October 19th, 2009 at 1:33 pm
We gotta thank people like Lisa Borders for making this a reality in SWATS. The first step to development in Southwest Atlanta is the Beltline.
October 19th, 2009 at 2:47 pm
@Pete It’s your money that Lisa and Co are using to overpay for that land. Pat yourself on the back for the forced contributions when you pay your property and sales taxes.
And check back with us in 20 years about how a mile of trail that the city has no money to maintain and keep safe transforms a neighborhood.
October 19th, 2009 at 4:14 pm
Do you have any more details on this 5 year kudzu removal process? Will the development of the trails proceed immediately, or will that have to wait for the kudzu removal to finish?
October 19th, 2009 at 10:23 pm
The Beltline has promised us “equitable development” throughout the City. It’s great that within 5 years the SW will no longer have kudzu on its Beltline trail. During this same time period, parks, trails, transit, development, and tens of millions of dollars will be invested in the NE. What am I missing?
October 20th, 2009 at 9:24 pm
beltline bozo- the name says it all.
October 20th, 2009 at 10:38 pm
a major city buying new park land is NEVER a bad idea.
October 21st, 2009 at 9:54 am
@wesley, a major city overpaying for parkland when it cannot even fund basic public safety and sewers is a whopping exception to your rule.
Uncritical, unthinking ParksareGooders have been coned into supporting massive tax-funded payoffs to Wayne Mason and the Vulcan guys, and Norfolk Southern has done very nicely too, along with ADA and ABI bureaucrats, consultants and hangers-on. Any user benefits are minuscule to date, and even questionable in the future, given little local problems of location, maintenance and safety.