Dozens of Turner Field neighborhood residents rallied at Atlanta City Hall on Tuesday, calling on Mayor Kasim Reed to hold off on potential plans to sell the stadium for at least a year.
The residents, who have organized as the “Turner Field Community Benefits Coalition,” say they want time to first complete a community study that will help guide development on the 77-acre site. Earlier this year, the neighborhoods were awarded a $212,000 grant from the Atlanta Regional Commission, a study which is set to begin later this year.
“This is the biggest development opportunity we’ll likely see in our lifetime, and we have to get this right,” said Richard Quarterone, a Summerhill resident. “We’ve gotten it wrong for the past 60 years and this process will help us get it right for the next 100.”
Though Reed has said he favors a $300 million proposal by Georgia State University and Atlanta real estate firm Carter, no deal has yet been formally announced. The development team has proposed a blend of private student apartments, senior housing, single-family homes, a grocery store, shops and separate college football and baseball stadiums on about 80 acres.
The redevelopment of the land will largely be overseen by the Atlanta Fulton County Recreation Authority, a board on which Atlanta holds the majority of seats.
Reed said on Tuesday that as the vice-chair of the Atlanta Regional Commission board, he supported the ARC’s Livable Centers Initiative study and called suggestions otherwise “a false controversy.” Still, the mayor said the study shouldn’t hold up development.
“I’m not going to have the process cost the community a quarter of a billion (to) a half of a billion dollars worth of development,” he said, referring to the Georgia State proposal.
Atlanta City Councilwoman Keisha Lance Bottoms, the new executive director of the AFCRA, said that conversations with the community and developers must happen concurrently. The Braves are expected to vacate Turner Field by early 2017, leaving the public to shoulder the costs of maintaining the stadium if no other plan is in place. Bottoms said she was not yet able to say the amount of the anticipated carrying costs.
“Community input is most important, but it doesn’t preclude us from having conversations with potential developers,” she said. “If we have an empty stadium …what is the cost associated with that? There will be carrying costs.”
Doristine Samuel, who has lived in the area since the 1950s, said she hopes future development will include grocery stores and shops — businesses the area needs to thrive.
“I know our mayor would like to leave a legacy, but we’d like for him to leave a legacy that we can live with,” she said.
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