The hugely popular eastern stretch of the Beltline not only is drawing walkers, runners and bikers, but also a criminal element that finds easy targets in people who are more focused on their cellphones or MP3 players than on their surroundings.
It’s a problem not seen on other sections that have opened in the planned 22-mile loop around the city.
“We’re … asking them to be vigilant. We need people to make sure they do their due diligence,” Atlanta Police Department Maj. Valerie Dalton said of the hundreds of people who visit the Beltline daily.
But there is only so much the police or the Atlanta Beltline Inc. can do to make people safe, officials say.
Since the 2.25-mile stretch on the eastern side of the loop officially opened Oct. 15, three armed robberies have been reported. Yet, two stretches that opened two years ago — 2.4 miles in southwest Atlanta and a mile west of lower Buckhead — have not had any reported crimes.
Michael Folks said he now leaves his iPhone at home when he runs, and he no longer goes onto the Beltline at times when there are few people out, like in the middle of a workday. He stays away once the sun sets.
“I just don’t go up there,” said Folks, who takes his three dogs to a park adjacent to the Beltline daily.
The first reported armed robbery was on Nov. 19 in the middle of the afternoon.
David Jones and Caitlin Bates told police two men, one of them with a silver and black semi-automatic pistol, confronted them near the skate park. The two escaped with two iPhones and $6 and have not been caught.
Ten days later, Kohl Manh Nguyen drove to the skate park almost two hours after sundown to meet Michael Lee Willis, who had allegedly advertised an iPhone 5 on Craigslist for $550, according to the police report. Willis pulled out a .380-caliber handgun as Nguyen got out of his car and, according to the police report, the 18-year-old demanded Nguyen’s cash and keys. But Nguyen found his own weapon, a Kimber .45-caliber pistol he had in his car, and fired two shots into the ground. Moments later a police officer found Nguyen ordering Willis to keep his hands up and Willis on his knees, “crying and upset,” the report said. Willis was arrested but Nguyen was not because, the officer wrote, he “had been defending himself and simply detaining Willis until police arrived.”
It was around 7 p.m. on Dec. 6 when Justin Bruns, while jogging, came up on three men. One hit him in the back of his head and another pulled out a gun, taking Bruns’ iPhone 4S before running off toward the skate park.
John Wolfinger, neighborhood watch commander for the Virginia-Highland area, said three armed robberies are not necessarily significant. “We’ve had more people robbed on the streets than on the Beltline,” he said.
But he worries about the perception.
“The perception that it’s dangerous is probably more dangerous than the danger itself,” Wolfinger said.
Greg Scott, the vice president for public safety in the Inman Park Neighborhood Association, said there are places along the Beltline that are easy to access from the street.
“It’s on the border of two neighborhoods. There are a lot of getaway possibilities,” he said.
Atlanta Beltline Chief Operating Officer Lisa Gordon said the organization on Thursday put numbered markers every quarter of a mile on the Beltline, and there are plans to install extra lights soon, then cameras.
APD will receive federal grant money in the spring to hire 15 officers to provide foot and bike patrols along the Beltline and in adjoining parks and neighborhoods.
“There is safety in numbers,” Wolfinger said. “If somebody uses the Beltline at night, they’re tempting fate. … So many people run with their cellphones visible. That’s why God made pockets. … Keep it hidden.”
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