So, Cheshire Bridge Road is closed again after yet another fire under one of its bridges. What else is new?
After a Dec. 20 blaze, the city erected barriers so engineers could check the integrity of concrete under the structure. Hopefully, they won’t have to rebuild.
In August 2021, Cheshire Bridge was closed for 15 months when another bridge burned and had to be torn down and rebuilt. It opened to partial traffic in October 2022 and fully reopened in April. Mayor Andre Dickens hosted a ribbon cutting.
This latest fire has left everyone frustrated — residents who live nearby and must again take detours, businesses who endured large losses when Cheshire Bridge was closed the last time and are gearing for more, and city officials who struggle to rectify the intractable problem.
In fact, the 2021 fiasco was nothing new. In the three years prior, at least five large fires under bridges in the area drew news coverage. But there have been many more, residents and business owners say. (Fittingly, the bridge that was rebuilt had a small fire under it last week, too).
Credit: Courtesy of Buckhead Vacuums
Credit: Courtesy of Buckhead Vacuums
Jeff Cohen’s business, Buckhead Vacuums, overlooks the bridge where the latest blaze occurred. He said the businesses on Cheshire Bridge “are like the red-headed stepchild. We’ve called (the city) 25 to 30 times to tell them about the fires they were setting. They are really fed up with us. I’m like the boy who cried wolf.”
Steven Eads, the store’s manager, showed me security video of the fire that started about 12:44 a.m. on Dec. 20. A person can be seen near it. It is unknown if it was a fire to stay warm or to cook. A minute after it starts, the video shows it grow substantially. Five minutes later, it has become an inferno, erupting out of both sides of the bridge.
City officials aren’t saying what caused the most recent blaze or when the road will reopen. They have also been reluctant to say homeless people have started the fires. I suppose they do not want to demonize a segment of the population living through a hellish existence.
But homelessness is the cause of these fires. Even if they are not being started by people trying to stay warm or cook, the encampments under the bridges, crowded with belongings and debris, fuel the flames.
Last week, I visited the site and found what seemed like a three-bedroom (tent) condo on the opposite side of the bridge that burned. The exterior has a wall, perhaps 50 feet long, constructed out of pallets, sheets of plywood and tarps.
Inside, there were couches, an easy chair, tents, office furniture, coolers, shelving units, a dresser, clothes, shaving cream, shopping carts, a wheelbarrow and a Weber grill. There was also a gallon can of gasoline and a container of lighter fluid. There were no residents inside but I encountered a man named Scott Drotar, who heard about the fire and was looking for a homeless man named Billy, who he sometimes helps out.
Credit: Bill Torpy
Credit: Bill Torpy
Drotar was amazed by what he found.
“Wow, look at all the junk; my God, what an elaborate setup,” he said, before adding, “Is that a credenza?”
On the other side of the bridge, across the railroad tracks, were piles of burned debris from the recent inferno. A homeless advocate told me that about five people lived there.
I encountered a cleanup crew who said the city had hired them to remove the mess, not only the fire debris, but also the durable encampment across the way. The city workers talked about using excavators and dumpsters to clean up both sides of the bridge. (There are also tons of garbage strewn all over, as one can imagine.)
City officials have, however, downplayed news reports, like one from WSB, headlined “Atlanta to clear homeless encampments under bridges.” Officials did not respond to calls from AJC reporters asking about that.
On a visit to the site Monday, I encountered Billy Bittler in the elaborate structure under the bridge. He was in the hospital last week suffering a staph infection when his friend was looking for him.
Bittler, a middle-aged Atlanta native, said he did not know about city efforts to remove the encampment. In fact, he said he and another man who lives there, Ray, were told they could stay. He said Ray works nearby at a flower shop.
Bittler said he is an electrician by trade and lost his job, apartment and car during COVID. “A lot of people don’t recover from that,” he said.
Credit: Bill Torpy
Credit: Bill Torpy
He hopes to soon to be placed in housing by a nonprofit organization, adding that seven people on Cheshire Bridge have been similarly housed in recent weeks. He hopes this will give him the boost he needs.
He figures that 150 to 200 people live in tents or under bridges nearby.
“I refuse to go to shelters,” Bittler said. “Too much drama, too little privacy. Some people are here by choice, by a lack of responsibility. Some people are happy at the bottom. I’m not.”
If he is placed in a home, he said, “it’s the city’s responsibility to come in behind us” and clear out the area under the bridge. Otherwise, he said, “Someone will come in right behind us. This is a nice spot compared to the others.”
