Michael Andrews, an attorney who works in Midtown, leaves his office between 5 p.m. and 7 p.m. every night. He zigzags his way across Midtown, down Peachtree Street to 8th Street trying to work around roads that are blocked by safe street construction.
“I avoid Juniper Street at all costs,” Andrews said.
Six transportation projects are currently under construction in Midtown, including building bike lanes on three parallel streets: Spring, Juniper, and Piedmont. Five more street projects are in the planning stages. While the city’s goal is to increase pedestrian safety, bike lanes, and green space, critics say the construction is congesting streets and affecting access to businesses. Car-free advocates are patiently awaiting the improvements.
Prioritizing pedestrian, cycling safety
Midtown is one of the fastest growing urban centers with 65 buildings delivered in the last 10 years across the 1.2 square-mile district. Home to world-class arts and culture events, restaurants, and historic sites, Midtown is the hub of Atlanta.
Biking advocate Eric Phillips, a resident of Reynoldstown, has been spending more time and money in Midtown lately, exploring the city by bike, making pit stops at local restaurants along the way.
“Midtown has never been more accessible by bike, and I am looking forward to the projects being delivered,” Phillips said. “It is imperative we provide safe, reliable, and continuous bike infrastructure connecting Midtown and Downtown to all quadrants of the city, such as to the Beltline and beyond.”
Phillips has been monitoring and engaging with the City of Atlanta’s transportation and land use departments for about 15 years. His job as a director of data, analytics, and AI – with a background in geospatial analysis and support of construction management – gives Phillips a unique perspective on the projects to deprioritize vehicles in Midtown.
Improvements will allow for kids, families, and constituents to be able to access various key destinations around the city without relying on owning a vehicle, parent availability, or financial commitment, Phillips said.
Reid Davis typically rides 100 to 150 miles per week – miles he said would be otherwise spent in a car. Recalling past rides on Juniper Street, Davis said he “constantly needed to switch lanes due to construction or parked cars, and it felt quite dangerous.” Davis is looking forward to a consistent, safe route running north to south.
“When I’m driving, I always remember that I’m not just in traffic, I am traffic. And I hate being part of the problem,” Davis said. “People who live [in Midtown] should come first. By Atlanta standards, they are pretty well served by walkability and transit with three MARTA rail stations, and we are getting there with cycling.”
Laid end-to-end, Midtown has over 70 miles of travel lanes for vehicles. A High Injury Network map reveals that over a period of three to five years, about 73 percent of fatal and serious injury crashes have occurred on fewer than 10 percent of the surface streets in the city of Atlanta. There were 100 traffic fatalities in 2021, the city’s highest number in a decade.
In 2020, the Atlanta Department of Transportation passed an ordinance to eliminate traffic fatalities and serious injuries through safer street design and speed management. The Vision Zero Atlanta plan echoes what Atlantans want. According to a survey rolled out by Midtown Alliance every three years, 98 percent of respondents believe investment in walkability should be a priority. The survey clocked the same response in 2022.
Infrastructure challenges
Midtown Alliance President Kevin Green said the organization, in coordination with the city, is “working to achieve an exceptional urban experience for people who live here, work here, visit here, and go to school here.”
Approved and conceptualized a decade ago, construction is “below pace for comparable projects per mile, and we need to increase delivery speeds,” Phillips said.
Involved in the complicated project is Atlanta Regional Commission, Midtown Alliance, Midtown Improvement District, Atlanta Department of Transportation, and local and federal funding sources.
Each project involves digging into city streets, and that means lots of unknowns: unmapped water and sewer utility lines dating back a century, as well as prior street excavations by numerous entities that weren’t properly fixed before being covered with blacktop. Uncovering blocks of 100-year-old trolley tracks in Midtown required federal and state processes and historic documentation before being extracted, according to Green.
Other utility providers are trying to work in the same project locations, like the Department of Watershed Management and fiber broadband infrastructure providers. It’s simply taking too long, critics say.
Juniper Street is a one-way, south-bound street leading traffic out of Midtown from 14th Street to Ponce de Leon Avenue. Due to be completed in December, the Juniper Complete Street Project has been in the works since 2010. Construction started in 2023.
Juniper is getting a buffered cycle track, sidewalk, and streetscape improvements, ADA compliant crosswalks, landscaping, and dedicated on‐street parking.
One block east, Piedmont Road is being resurfaced, adding sidewalk and curb improvements, a protected bicycle lane, and landscaping from Ponce De Leon Avenue to 15th Street.
West of Juniper is Spring Street, where the formerly four-lane thoroughfare is down to one lane for bikes, two lanes for cars, and one lane for parking.
| 5th Street | Bike lane, sidewalks, curbs, crosswalks, and lighting | Complete |
| 10th Street Bridge | Bike lane, sidewalks, crosswalks, way finding | Under construction |
| 15th Street extension | New roadway, bike lane, sidewalks | Under construction |
| Juniper Street | Bike lane, sidewalks, curbs, crosswalks, and lighting | Under construction |
| Piedmont Avenue | Bike lane, parking, crosswalks, sidewalks | Under construction |
| Spring Street | Wider sidewalks, lighting, bike facilities | Under construction |
| West Peachtree Street | Bike lane, parking, | Under construction |
Projects in the design and engineering stage include 3rd Street multimodal enhancements, building an 11th Street parklet, a green space on 14th Street, and the 15th Street extension.
Ongoing construction and traffic congestion
A tenant at Colony Square for nearly a decade, K5 Hospitality Group CEO Ayman Kamel has seen the first mixed-use development in the southeast transform from an outdated commercial building to a bustling destination in the heart of Midtown.
On a neighborhood social media page, Midtown Alliance posted: “The projects were not intended to overlap. Juniper should have been completed years ago. But we ran into myriad challenges over time. Everything from staff turnover at the city during the permitting process to delays with procurement. Federal oversight requirements tied to funding.”
Kamel has been loudly protesting the city’s management of the projects through social media.
“We always make jokes about Atlanta traffic, but it has become excessive lately,” Kamel said. “In the last four or five months, [traffic] has become just unbearable.”
Kamel contends that his Midtown restaurant 5Church has lost business due to ongoing street construction.
“We went through so many painful moments since we opened in 2017. Colony Square announced a major revamp. And there was a time back in 2018 and 2019 when if you wanted to get to the restaurant, you’d have to walk on a plywood pathway. When construction finished, boom, we got hit with COVID in 2020,” Kamel said.
Kamel, who said Colony Square parking remains an issue, describes the changes at the property as something he “survived.” He claims that 5Church patrons have told him that traffic is impeding their route to the restaurant. They cancel, take food to go, or shorten their dining experience at the restaurant to make it on time to a show or concert.
Kamel said he’s seen a five to seven percent drop in reservations.
“I’m seeing it directly in the bottom line and the cover count [the number of guests served per shift]. I’m directly seeing it from our guests’ feedback and the reviews as well,” Kamel said.
Midtown Alliance met with Kamel, who started a petition “in solidarity with hundreds of workers, tens of thousands of guests, and dozens of neighboring businesses who are now directly suffering financial loss because Midtown has become functionally inaccessible due to overlapping lane closures, uncoordinated construction, and traffic gridlock.” As of publication, fewer than 200 people have signed the petition.
Rough Draft reached out to several Midtown restaurants for comment. None were willing to speak on the record, fearing backlash.
Midtown Alliance maintains that the street grid offers many alternate routes to avoid lane closures for work that extends after 4 p.m. The neighborhood organization recommends reading about project updates on social media, the website, and regularly published newsletters.
Phillips maintains a map of all existing, under construction, funded, and proposed bike-friendly infrastructure. “It is imperative we provide safe, reliable, and continuous bike infrastructure connecting Midtown and Downtown to all quadrants of the city, such as to the Beltline and beyond,” he said.
Juniper Street and Spring Street projects are estimated to be complete by late 2025.