Underground Atlanta remake ‘not for faint-hearted’

Smith believes WRS can accomplish what has eluded previous owners: making the 12-acre property a destination for both visitors and year-round residents.

“We think that we can change a part of downtown Atlanta that badly needs to be changed, and we’re putting a lot of pressure on ourselves to be successful,” Smith told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution early last week.

But Underground’s redevelopment is burdened not only by the weight of its history, but the complexity of its multi-tiered structure.

“It’s not a project for the faint-hearted,” said Georgia Tech architecture professor Michael Dobbins, a former Atlanta planning commissioner.

New start

In many ways, Smith’s plans for Underground are the tamest yet for the site: Put people where the shops are.

“Underground has always depended on people to come to it,” Smith said. “Our goal is to put people right there.”

Smith said his group plans to keep the historical facade — and name — of the Underground below street level, but give the mall a makeover. The developer said the existing shops will look dramatically different in its next incarnation, and that current vendors will have the option to remain.

Smith hasn’t yet said the number of residential units that will be built, pending studies of the area.

The firm specializes in large-scale suburban shopping centers in the Southeast and has produced a number of Walmart-anchored developments in Chamblee, Lovejoy, Stockbridge, Lilburn and other areas. Despite his experience in large retail centers, Smith doesn’t plan a big-box development such as Walmart at Underground, he said. He’s now in talks with grocers to come to the site.

Underground represents the firm’s most ambitious urban redevelopment project yet, a deal that Smith said was a no-brainer because of the property’s proximity to public transit, Georgia State University and a host of government buildings.

The sale of Underground fits into another plan entirely: helping the city’s bottom line.

Shedding the property, with its $8 million annual financial burden on the city, is critical to Reed’s plans to free up millions to help fund the debt service on an anticipated infrastructure bond worth up to $250 million. The proceeds of the sale will pay off the $8.8 million the Atlanta City Council approved in March to buy out CV Underground, which has long-managed the site and still had 72 years left on its lease, and pay off the remaining two years of bond debt.

Why is this different

City leaders and boosters say the project will succeed when others have failed for a variety of reasons.

For starters, the land will return to private hands. When Underground was a hub for nightlife in the 1970s, it suffered from fragmented ownership and lacked singular vision. The Downtown Development Authority took over the property in the late 1980s for a dramatic and initially popular rebirth as a mall. But the popularity didn’t last.

In an attempt to revive the site in the late 1990s under former Mayor Bill Campbell’s administration, the city signed an 88-year lease with CV Underground to operate the site. But the site has failed to thrive as development and foot traffic moved north and suffered the departure of the World of Coca-Cola in 2007.

Still, Reed said the attraction still receives about 12 million visitors a year. He hopes Smith’s project will result in far greater numbers and include locals.

“I want it to feel like a place you can spend time in every day, comfortably,” Reed said.

Under WRS’ plan, residents will be living at Underground for the first time. Dobbins, the Georgia Tech professor, said the same idea was tossed around by CV Underground’s Dan O’Leary in years past, but never realized.

Dobbins said he wants to see site plans to better understand what Smith has in store. But he applauded news that a grocery store will come to the site, noting the area saw what few grocers it had leave in recent years for denser areas.

District 3 Councilman Ivory Young said a grocer in the area is “critical.”

“There are none downtown, yet we have families and people who live there,” he said. “Urban centers need to respond to the needs of people … let’s bring more residents downtown. And lets bring good and services that address (their needs).”

The sale comes amid a spike in development in a once-forgotten part of town, which many leaders believe will help ignite interest from Atlantans eager to relocate to re-emerging parts of Atlanta.

The National Center for Civil and Human Rights and the College Football Hall of Fame opened in 2014. A new, $1.4 billion Atlanta Falcons stadium is set to open in coming years. Post Properties recently announced plans to build a 407-unit apartment complex north of Underground at Centennial Olympic Park, the first major residential development in this area in two decades, according to Invest Atlanta, the city’s economic development agency.

Reed said he believes the revamped Underground will add to a stronger downtown corridor and lead to additional development.

Joseph Martin, Jr., who in the late 1980s had a leading role in redeveloping Underground, believes that given other development around the area, the project has a chance if it successfully appeals to a variety of residents and tourists.

“Having a city center at a historic location can benefit all of us, and the prospects are enhanced by the other development now occurring in and around downtown,” he said in a statement.

Challenges remain

But several challenges remain in executing the plan.

Dobbins said remaking Underground is daunting on many levels, with technical considerations that must be made for how to connect the land more seamlessly with MARTA and adjacent amenities, and how to physically support above-ground apartments given the cavernous hallways underneath.

“None are deal breakers, but it’s complicated,” Dobbins said.

Smith said he feels confident all structural engineering issues can be resolved. He will focus on connectivity.

“The challenges that we need to address are the flow of the entire development once these towers are placed at Underground,” he said. “We need everything to be open and very welcoming into the retail.”

There’s another big challenge, as well: changing public perception. Reed said is committing greater policing resources to the site and he’s doubling-down on panhandling in the area.

A.J. Robinson, who heads Central Atlanta Progress and the Atlanta Downtown Improvement District, points to revitalization projects in Atlanta such as Centennial Olympic Park, Ponce City Market and Atlantic Station as evidence negative perceptions can be changed.

“I think you change people’s minds with a new product, new capital and creativity,” he said.

Smith said he’s heard from many business leaders in Atlanta eager for the project to begin.

“One of the favorite things that I have seen was an email forwarded to me from a business owner,” Smith said. “It read: ‘Finally, a plan that makes sense at Underground.’”