The streetcar extension from Downtown to the Atlanta Beltline Eastside Trail and Ponce City Market is happening despite concerns raised by some residents who say their neighborhoods and businesses will be damaged by construction of the light rail route.
Bryan Hobbs, MARTA project manager of the streetcar, told a group of dozens of people at a recent “Streetcar Impact Town Hall” that the estimated $230 million project was moving forward. Construction is expected to begin next year and be finished by 2027.
“This project is happening unless we’re told otherwise,” Hobbs told the crowd at the Feb. 23 town hall held at the historic Haugabrooks Funeral Home on Auburn Avenue in Old Fourth Ward. A portion of the existing streetcar runs in front of the venue.
“We’ve heard from the mayor’s office this is a project that they want to see go forward. This is a project MARTA wants to go forward with,” he said.
The MARTA board recently voted to approve putting out a bid for engineer to take the streetcar extension’s design from 30% to 100%, although some members and community members are questioning if this is the best use of money.
The extension would run nearly a mile down Edgewood Avenue, up to Randolph Street, along Auburn Avenue to Irwin Street where it will connect with the Eastside Trail. From Irwin Street the streetcar route would continue north to Ponce City Market. Five stop locations are planned.
The alignment is not going to change, Hobbs said, but there will be time for more community engagement to try to alleviate concerns about construction and traffic impact.
Fred Duncan, who lives near the Beltline, represents about 350 homeowners who live along the proposed route who oppose the project. The streetcar extension would cut through a historic area with narrow streets and disrupt the quality of life of these hundreds of homeowners, he said.
“Atlanta is a car city,” he said. “The streetcar causes traffic backups now. Spending $230 million for 2.3 miles is a total waste of money. This project has been a huge albatross since its inception.”
Julia Neighbors, a member of the Historic District Development Corporation, which owns Haugabrooks Funeral Home, said she lives on Randolph Street. She said MARTA’s community outreach has been “performative” to only reach a broad spectrum of the community impressed by the “sexy, vanity project.”
Property owners along the route — those in the community directly impacted by the extension — have been largely left out of the conversation, she said.
Devon Woodson, president of Fourth & SAND neighborhood association and owner of Pals Lounge on Auburn Avenue, said his business was able to survive when the Atlanta Streetcar was first built because he owns his building. Other businesses around him were forced to shut down because construction kept customers away. He predicted the same would happen to Auburn Avenue’s existing small businesses when the extension project gets underway.
Plus, the current streetcar is mostly empty and is not bringing any money to existing businesses, Woodson said. He said MARTA and the city should set aside some of the project’s funding to compensate the Auburn Avenue community that would suffer from years of construction.
Matthew Rao is chair of Beltline Rail Now, an advocacy group pushing for light rail on the Atlanta Beltline. He said at the town hall the streetcar extension is critical in alleviating gridlock building up along the Beltline corridor.
He also said it is important to remember history. When Ryan Gravel envisioned the Beltline and a grassroots movement pushed political leaders to approve it, light rail was always part of that Beltline’s DNA, he said. In 2016, voters overwhelmingly approved the More MARTA half-cent sales tax to pay for numerous projects, including Beltline rail.
“The extension will bring equity and mobility in a green way,” he said. “The longer we wait, the more expensive the project will get and the harder it will be for our leaders to build what we voted for.”
Councilmember Amir Farokhi, whose district includes the streetcar, said this area of Old Fourth Ward is the “most transit rich” part of Atlanta. Extending the streetcar to destinations and job centers is “reflective of equity” that the city wants to establish, he said.
Mike Greene, senior vice president of Portman Holdings, said his company has invested about $220 million to build the mixed-use office building Junction Krog District at 667 Auburn Ave. on the Eastside Trail and the purchase of about an acre of property across the street. The streetcar route is planned to run between the two sites.
“What attracted us to the Beltline, like other developers, is the pedestrian activity and not necessarily that there would be transit there,” Greene said.
“Most of us [developers] believed transit was pie in the sky,” he added, to audible gasps from some in the audience.
Portman Holdings, like any other developer, wants to make sure the streetcar does not disturb pedestrian activity, he said. Millions of people use the Eastside Trail annually and spend money at restaurants and other businesses along the Beltline, including Ponce City Market.
Without pedestrians, Portman’s investments on the Eastside Trail could suffer by not being able to attract ground floor retail tenants, Greene said. The company is also concerned about how the streetcar route would impact this development’s direct access to the Atlanta Beltline, he said.
Old Fourth Ward and Inman Park homeowners along the route have formed the Streetcar Impact Team urging MARTA to consider alternative routes and modes of transit besides the streetcar. More than 600 homeowners in the area have signed a petition calling for MARTA to consider other options.
Homeowner Jennifer Bentson said in an interview the group consists of those who live on Edgewood Avenue, Randolph Street, Auburn Avenue, Studioplex, Irwin Avenue and along the BeltLine itself.
“There are other alternatives to the streetcar,” Bentson said. “Why are we ripping up streets and installing overhead wires when the streetcar we have has been out of service for months?”
The Atlanta Streetcar was shut down late last year for $400,000 in repairs and is slated to begin carrying passengers again this week.
One alternative the group proposed is Beep, an autonomous shuttle service currently being used in Peachtree Corners, Jacksonville, FL, Yellowstone, WY, and other locations. Bentson said MARTA’s response was that it didn’t make sense for the project.
“We’re not against public transportation or even having it on the BeltLine, but it doesn’t make sense to spend this much money without any proof streetcar usage will grow,” Bentson said.
Last fall, MARTA closed a portion of Irwin Street at the BeltLine to study the impact of making part of the corridor pedestrian only and rerouting traffice. “We understand that it didn’t go well, but we couldn’t get any data from MARTA,” Bentson stated.
Rough Draft reached out to MARTA about the Irwin Street study but did not receive a response.