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Some dining neighborhoods develop over time as diverse restaurants cluster around an intersection. Think about how Virginia-Highland derives as much of its character from Moe’s & Joe’s as it does from Murphy’s, La Tavola or the more recent Yeah! Burger.
Others spring up wholesale on a fresh slab of concrete. Think Atlantic Station.
It can be harder to retrofit a dining neighborhood, but that’s precisely what’s happening around the periphery of Centennial Olympic Park. Recently dubbed the Luckie Marietta District, the area comprises 23 restaurants and lounges. The diverse offerings include Der Biergarten (Atlanta’s one German restaurant), Legal Sea Foods (a branch of the Boston behemoth), Glenn’s Kitchen (a swank dining room inside the Glenn Hotel), Game X (food, liquor and skee ball), Max’s Coal Oven Pizzeria (self-explanatory) and the CNN Center food court.
The trick is getting people to think of this hodgepodge of retail storefronts along a helter-skelter tangle of downtown streets as an actual district. Legacy Restaurant Partners, which operates many of the core restaurants, has been leading the effort to say to tourists, hotel concierges and native Atlantans, “Hey, we’re a neighborhood!” They’ve worked hard on branding and promotions, printing walking maps and developing an online presence.
To see this up and comer at its best, stand at the corner of Marietta and Baker Streets and look at the lineup of restaurants spread out before you. To your left is Stats, a sports bar with draught beers you tap at the table. Ahead are Rise Sushi, Max’s and Der Biergarten. Across the street, Legal Sea Foods serves the best cup of clam chowder in the city.
It might be nice to have a chef-driven restaurant in the mix, but at least there are some decent options beyond the food court. Enough, in fact, to make you stay put and enjoy the neighborhood.
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