Groundbreaking and `homecoming’: Civic Center redevelopment finally underway
City officials broke ground at the Boisfeuillet Jones Atlanta Civic Center Tuesday, kick-starting a massive, $1 billion mixed-use redevelopment that’s been years in the making but plagued by delays.
Atlanta Housing CEO Terri Lee said the first phase of construction in the heart of the city’s Old Fourth Ward would include 148 affordable one-bedroom apartments for senior low-income residents in a six-story building, at a cost of $60 million.
The apartments are expected to open in 2027 and are a partnership between Atlanta Housing, The Michaels Organization, Sophy Capital and Republic Properties.
Ultimately, the city plans to open 1,500 mixed-income apartments with retail, offices, a hotel and a grocery store over 19 acres of city land that’s close to MARTA’s Civic Center station and Renaissance and Central parks near downtown.
Atlanta’s plan for redevelopment will also include restoration of the center’s public plaza, Lee said at the groundbreaking ceremony, attended by Mayor Andre Dickens, former Mayor Kasim Reed, Fulton County Commission Chairman Robb Pitts and other officials.
Atlanta Housing acquired the land in 2017, but over the years there has been little sign of life at the dormant site, despite promises for 1,500 units of housing.
Lee seemed eager to draw a line under that at the ceremony, harkening back to the history of the land — from the Great Atlanta Fire in 1917, to urban renewal that displaced Black residents in Buttermilk Bottom neighborhood that once stood on the land, and the birth of the Civic Center, home to high school graduations and concerts, and its eventual closure.
“This moment today is more than a groundbreaking. This is a homecoming,” Lee said. “This land tells a story: who we’ve been as a city and who we’re determined to become.”
Lee said the development would eventually include hundreds of new units, and about one-third of them would be affordable. The entire plan for the site includes a $1 billion investment, she said.
Atlanta Housing spokesperson Joe Henke said that means more than 500 units will eventually be affordable. In the senior apartment building, 118 units will be at 60% of the area median income, or an income limit of $68,500 for a family of four, and 30 units at 50%, or about $57,000 for a family of four.
Dickens remembered coming to the center for his high school graduation and coming to the venue to watch Outkast and Lauryn Hill. He also talked about the neighborhood’s troubled but rich history and said the project would be about making “room for them as they have paved the way for us.”
“We made a promise to the people of Atlanta to make this a city where everyone can live, grow and retire with dignity,” Dickens said.
About the Author
Matt Reynolds is a housing reporter for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution's local government team.
