When travelers use Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport’s soon-to-open international terminal, they'll pass through a new “front door” -- a multimillion dollar makeover on the airport's east side.
But it will be more than a visually appealing entrance. Clayton County will get a vital economic boost that local business and development experts say should extend well into the next two decades.
The new $1.4 billion terminal will provide a second entrance for the estimated 90 million travelers annually who pass through the world’s busiest airport. The stretch of road from I-75 leading to the new terminal will feature manicured landscapes, new directional signs, a luxury hotel and aviation museum, and road improvements linking motorists to I-75 and I-285.
The flurry of development under way on the east side of the airport is not just an opportunity to make a good first impression on the estimated 9 million international travelers. It also gives Clayton a chance to finally tackle plans in the works for more than a decade for a swath of prime land between I-75 and I-285 bordered by the airport to the west, the Fulton County line to the north and Mountain View to the east.
"It's going to revolutionize what is occurring on the east side of the airport," Clayton County Commission Chairman Eldrin Bell said.
Most noticeably, it will transform the Mountain View area into an industrial center of logistics firms, freight-forwarders and government agencies such as Homeland Security.
The long-overlooked community about a mile east of the airport ironically was once known as the "Gateway of Clayton County" until the state revoked its city charter years ago after uncovering corruption.
"This is the last great green, developable area inside the perimeter. Almost 150 to 200 acres," Clayton Economic Development Director Grant Wainscott said earlier this week as he pulled his Ford over to a clearing in the thick trees and overgrowth that abuts the Fulton County line.
"The beauty here is the amount of acres and proximity to the airport and interstate," he said. "It's unprecedented. This is 20 years of redevelopment for us. This is the type of key redevelopment project that attracts international attention and investment. This is our economic future."
Clayton recently received $300,000 from the Georgia Department of Transportation to help with landscaping and to add more signs and better accessibility at the Charles Grant Parkway exit. Those improvements are in conjunction with the road improvements the airport is doing on the terminal side of I-75.
All told, the county will spend more than $50 million in public infrastructure improvements during the next five years, Wainscott said. In addition to state transportation funds, the county will use SPLOST money to cover the costs. That initial spending should generate another $200 million of improvements done by hotels, restaurants and retailers as well as domestic and global businesses that move to the area, officials say.
A lot has been happening in Clayton lately. Automaker Porsche soon will join the activity and Gulf Coast Pre-Stress Concrete came to Clayton in April 2009 from Pass Christian, Miss., to make parts for the bridges and elevated roadways leading to the international terminal. It ended up opening an Atlanta operation that is now a $10 million-plus a year business employing about 70 people.
"This gave us a project that would sustain us" through the recession, Gulf Coast's Harold Bush said.
Luring companies like Porsche and Gulf Coast is the key for future development, said Michael Hightower, managing partner at the Collaborative Firm, an urban planning and development company that holds a yearly conference on issues affecting the Southside.
"Clayton County stands to gain a lot from the new [international terminal] opening next spring," Hightower said. "I'm hoping to see some better days in our economy and see opportunities for developers and public-private successes."
When Highwood Properties moved to the Mountain View area 13 years ago, it was pretty isolated. But the announcement of the new international terminal has generated lots of interest in the area, said Jim Bacchetta, vice president of the company, which owns about 7 million square feet of commercial and industrial real estate in metro Atlanta.
About a million square feet of it is in the Tradeport, a certified foreign trade zone less than a mile from the entrance of the new terminal. One of Highwood Properties' projects was the the Federal Aviation Administration's four-story brick office building just off I-75 to the east of the airport.
In the past year alone, Bacchetta said the company has received dozens of calls from hotel developers and international firms interested in leasing space at the Tradeport or in the area.
"The international terminal is going to bring a lot more activity, a lot more economic life to the immediate vicinity," Bacchetta said. "The area is going to be really transformed over the next several years."
In the past, he said, the west side of the airport has had most of the development. "The east side has been sort of ignored. Now with the international terminal, the dynamics for growth will change considerably for the east side."
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