Combined Neighborhoods Inputs to the Connect … Combined...2008/04/11 · Chastain Park’s...

Combined Neighborhoods Inputs to the Connect Atlanta Team

Contents Buckhead Forest ……………….. 3 Chastain Park ……………….. 5 North Buckhead ……………….. 11 Tuxedo Park ……………….. 17 Proposed Outline ……………….. 19

April 11, 2008

Authors Buckhead Forest

Buckhead Forest Civic Association Kim Kahwach [email protected] 404-814-1938 Chastain Park

Chastain Park Civic Association Kirk Oppenlander [email protected] North Buckhead

North Buckhead Civic Association Gordon Certain [email protected] 404-231-1192 Tuxedo Park

Tuxedo Park Civic Association Sally Morgens [email protected]

Combined document prepared by Gordon Certain

Combined Neighborhoods DraftConnect Atlanta Plan

April 11, 2008Page 2 of 20

Buckhead Forest’s Connect Atlanta Recommendations Draft #1

Buckhead Forest – Page 1 of 2

New Street Grid at Piedmont and Habersham Moving Piedmont and adding a grid-like intersection will ultimately move traffic better once it is completed. It will also welcome more cars into the area as it becomes easier to maneuver. Homes along Roswell will be impacted: Buckhead Forest has two single family homes adjacent to Roswell Road (on Alberta Drive) that currently experience intolerable traffic noise and unsafe conditions. The added traffic to the area will effect the property values of these two homes. A brick/ stone wall and tree buffer is required between these two single family dwellings and the added noise of speeding vehicles. The process of improving Piedmont and Habersham needs prior Traffic Calming: During construction Buckhead Forest will experience a rise in cut-through traffic. The neighborhood already experiences an unusual amount of traffic cutting through to arrive at Peachtree Road. When the construction begins for Habersham and Piedmont traffic will increasingly use Alberta Drive to get to Peachtree Road. As a result of a recently organized traffic calming committee the neighborhood suggests adding sidewalks to narrow the streets of Alberta Drive and Mathieson Drive. Narrowing the streets will calm traffic along two streets that have consistently failed traffic studies. The narrowing of these two streets must be completed before work begins on the Habersham intersection. Exiting Alberta Drive When drivers exit Alberta Drive it is very dangerous and many accidents, some fatal, have occurred at this opening. Adding traffic to this particular area will require special attention to this intersection. Traffic traveling north on Roswell is difficult to see from the exit point of Alberta Drive and for anyone turning onto Alberta drive from southbound Roswell. A caution light/ red light/ or no left turn sign are some suggestions the Connect Atlanta group should consider. Buckhead Forest recommends that Connect Atlanta observe the restrictions of residents to the area. Residents have few options if they decide to walk. More side walking and safe pedestrian access will allow more residents to walk rather than drive. Focusing on moving cars and not feet will result in more of the same. Those two efforts need to work in sync with one another. For example, for every lane added to the area a certain amount of sidewalks need to be added too. March 19, 2008 Buckhead Forest Civic Association Ka Jensen [[email protected]]



Buckhead Forest’s Connect Atlanta Recommendations Draft #1

Buckhead Forest – Page 2 of 2



Chastain Park’s Connect Atlanta Recommendations Draft #1

Chastain Park ‐ Page 1 of 6

The Problem Buckhead suffers from overdevelopment of its Business District and underdevelopment of infrastructure assets to accommodate that development. Traditional “solutions” are either incomplete or dated before they are implemented, creating reactive solutions and entropy—disorganization and degradation of the original vision. These “solutions” have favored developers and commuters at the expense of local residents. A more dynamic management plan could serve all, not perfectly but better than the patchwork we have today.

The Buckhead Commercial District, in part, owes its attractiveness as a work destination and speculator’s paradise to the unique residential neighborhoods that surround the Buckhead Business District. I suggest caring for, not killing, the “golden goose”.

Chastain Park is the largest park in the city of Atlanta and one of two parks on the north side of the city. Bobby Jones/Atlanta Memorial Park is the only other park. Northwest Atlanta, surrounding Buckhead to the north and west, is the only part of Atlanta with R-1 and R-2 residential zoning. These park and zoning classifications make up a large part of the dwindling green space and tree canopy in within the city limits.

Commuters from all points on the compass, particularly North Fulton and Cobb, are trying to co-exist with local residential and commercial traffic. Peak demand periods reveal a dysfunctional approach to moving people.

The local neighborhoods in North Buckhead, Brookhaven, Tuxedo Park, and Chastain Park bear the brunt of poor planning as commuters speed through local Buckhead neighborhoods, at times endangering our families, as they hurry home to their outlying suburbs and families, lower taxes and more affordable homes.

Local Buckhead neighborhoods have paid a steep price over the last thirty-five years to accommodate suburban growth and their commuters. GA-400 has divided communities and eliminated several neighborhood schools. Buckhead neighborhoods appear to have less connectivity than in 1973.

Current Routings

The bulk of commuters are trying to find their way to GA-400 (Roswell and Alpharetta) and I-75 (Cobb and East Cobb) anyway they can. That routing may change on a daily basis depending on accidents or stacking problems on Piedmont/Habersham and Piedmont Roswell intersections. Local residents find main thoroughfares such as Roswell, Piedmont, and Peachtree impassable for their local commutes or any East/West routings.

Buckhead to Emory is highly problematic at rush hour, with an interesting mix of Piedmont, Lindbergh, GA-400, Lenox, North Druid Hills, Roxboro, La Vista, and Briarcliff. Buckhead to South Atlanta typically utilizes Lenox to GA-400.

North Fulton commuters typically use a Piedmont/Lenox, Peachtree/Lenox, Piedmont/Roswell/Glenridge, or Piedmont/Roswell/I-285, Piedmont/Roswell/Windsor Parkway, Peachtree Dunwoody, or Peachtree/Peachtree Dunwoody, routing to GA-400.





Cobb commuters typically use a combination of various residential, east/west connector streets in Chastain Park/Tuxedo Park (Habersham, Valley, Putnam, Blackland, Broadland, West Conway, Hillside, Jett, West Wieuca) and north/south, commuter/residential arteries (Roswell, Lake Forrest, Powers Ferry, Northside, Northside Parkway) to get to I-75 or Riverside Drive.

Traffic Management and Development Options

The historic “solutions” approach should be displaced by a more comprehensive regional approach using a common planning platform and traffic management toolbox to develop customized, flexible traffic management and development models that won’t destroy unique, vibrant local neighborhoods like Chastain Park, Tuxedo Park and North Buckhead.

Local Buckhead neighborhoods could develop customized plans that accommodate local needs that could be combined to make up the Buckhead Traffic Management and Development district, which is then coordinated with the City of Atlanta and Sandy Springs to arrive at a North Atlanta sector plan, and finally folded into an Atlanta regional plan. In summary, vertical integration and coordination utilizing a common planning platform—probably ASAP. Traffic management and development are coordinated efforts, not after-thoughts.

For example, Chastain Park could use tools and approaches to create development and traffic management plans that complement its unique park character but also fit into a larger Buckhead/Sandy Springs and Atlanta regional plan. Development and traffic management are inextricably intertwined. A plan for Piedmont at Roswell Road will be a failure without coordination with Sandy Springs, specifically the bottleneck at I-285 and Roswell Rd., and the City of Atlanta, specifically the bottleneck at Sydney Marcus and GA-400.

Commercial development should be confined to major arteries--Roswell, Piedmont, Northside Parkway, and Peachtree.

Short Term Fixes

Limit use of rent-a-cops and curb cuts on Piedmont Rd during rush hour.

Add cutout for bus stops and remove them from traffic bottlenecks such as left hand, northbound stacking problems at Piedmont/Habersham, Piedmont/Roswell, and Roswell/Powers Ferry.

Connect Atlanta Plan Conceptual Strengths

Develop a core people transportation system connected to schools, parks, neighborhoods:

1. Long Trips = Modal Balance 2. Short Trips = Connectivity 3. All Trips = Walkability Emphasis:





• Move more people not cars • Improve quality of travel. • Move less people fewer miles. • Manage not solve traffic problems. • Focus on alternative modes of transportation: bicycles, walking, transit. • Context sensitive designs. • Traffic calming. • Personal security. • Pedestrian environment. • Compact development. • Local connector road and sidewalk networks to facilitate local residential traffic • Lane limits and change standards • Assure MARTA access and flexibility, bicycle lanes, nodal parking, traffic

calming, bicycle boulevards, wider rights of way.

Chastain Park: General Development Observations and Recommendations

• Development and traffic management are interrelated. • All solutions are local and build from there. • When modeling, use realistic assumptions. • Any connectivity plan should respect the Land Use and Zoning Policy of Chastain

Park the surrounding neighborhoods, NPU-A and the City of Atlanta. Use these policies as building blocks for a more dynamic Traffic Management and Development Plan. Much consideration should also be given to the Chastain Park Master Plan in developing any Connect Atlanta plan. The Connect Atlanta plan should not be in conflict with these local planning documents.

• Chastain Park is a unique single-family residential and historical area, as well as the only significant green space in North Atlanta. Zoning classifications with higher residential building densities or commercial uses are inappropriate for Chastain Park, and create uses that are incompatible with the City of Atlanta’s Comprehensive Development Plan (CDP) and its replacement, the Atlanta Strategic Action Plan (ASAP), and should be rejected.

• Current CDP/ASAP protections for Chastain Park and surrounding neighborhoods from higher density development should be maintained. 1. Maintain recognized natural, historical, and CDP/ASAP mandated

development buffers in the Roswell Road corridor. For example, Sardis Church and Georgia Power substation.

2. Continue strict adherence to current maximum R-3 development densities for Chastain Park.

3. Confine commercial development to current commercially zoned commercial property fronting Roswell Road.

• The Atlanta Tree Ordinance should be respected and enforced. • Implement I-285 and Roswell Road as well as Sidney Marcus grid/loop solution

or changes at Piedmont and Roswell won’t work. A four-way GA-400/I-85 interchange must be completed. Intermediate surface street routes, including use of Sidney Marcus/Lenox, to go north on I-85 from GA-400 South and north on GA-400 from I-85 South are wasteful and unnecessary.





Chastain Park: Specific Development Observations and Recommendations

• Discourage use of Northside Dr., Powers Ferry Rd., or Lake Forrest Rd. as commuter roads. Discourage use of Chastain Park’s east west connector roads for commuters. These uses conflict with the primary purpose of Chastain Park. Confine commuting to Northside Parkway, Roswell Road and highways.

• Encourage development of the grid-approach--particularly slide 29 of the Connect Atlanta presentation (artist rendition). It would ease many of the current peak-demand problems.

• Explore duplicating the Roswell/Piedmont/Habersham/Blackland/Powers Ferry/Ivy redevelopment and traffic management grid at the intersection at Wieuca Road, West Wieuca Road and the City of Atlanta line—another traffic bottleneck. CPCA has talked to several developers who are interested in developing mixed use and townhome, as well as establishing conservation easements near R-3 neighborhoods south of West Wieuca. This might involve consolidating a patchwork of commercial and semi-commercial zoning districts at the West Wieuca/Wieuca at Roswell intersections.

• Create a consistent streetscape on Roswell Road that connects the two proposed grids, similar to Peachtree and Piedmont to Brookhaven, with bus cutouts and more limited strip mall access. Consideration should be given to a Peachtree Road type median.

• Use the Chastain Park Master Plan (recently adopted by City Council) as a model for what Chastain Park community would like to see--streetscapes, pedestrian access, and traffic calming. The Chastain Park Civic Association and Chastain Park Conservancy worked closely to develop the Master Plan priorities that residents and park venue users require.

• Improve sidewalk connectivity to City’s core system. • Create bike boulevards north south corridors through residential

neighborhoods—Lake Forrest, Powers Ferry—that parallel Roswell Road. • Include a height plane step-down to existing single-family residential areas in

East Chastain Park. Consider a scaled-down version of Peachtree Road streetscape.

• Improve accessibility. Assure safe bicycle and pedestrian crossing at several of the following intersections with Roswell Road: West Wieuca, Wieuca, Interlochen, Chastain Drive, Le Brun, Laurel, Powers Ferry, Blackland, Ivy, and Habersham. Hopefully the grid development approach will make crossing Roswell Road as a pedestrian safer and easier. Consider use of tunnels and bridges. Because of speed Roswell Road is becoming a no-man’s land, neighborhoods are separated, and parks within walking or sight distance can’t be accessed.

• Allow another crossing of Roswell Road (e.g. at Chastain Drive/Post Apartments or Interlochen) so West side of Roswell Road can access Blue Heron preserve.

• Use off business hours parking capacity on Roswell Road for Chastain Park concert overflow. Use smaller city buses to transport.





• Enforce speed limits and implement traffic calming on Roswell, Lake Forrest, Powers Ferry, Northside, and Mt. Paran Roads. Average speeds exceed posted speeds by 20 miles per hour, and this is in residential areas! Roswell Road is particularly bad with very limited sight/distance.

• Clearly mark places where children are regular pedestrians with speed reduction signs and traffic calming—schools (Sutton, Galloway, Warren T. Jackson) and most park venues (reference Chastain Park Master Plan). Add sidewalks for students to walk to nearby neighborhoods.

• Implement traffic calming within Chastain Park neighborhood. • Install granite block monuments, consistent with Park walls, at entrances to

Chastain Park neighborhood as a visual cue to commuters that they are in a Park area.

• Install clearly noticeable crosswalk inserts (brick) and pedestrian signs and mid-crosswalk bollards at all intersections of connector roads to Powers Ferry and Lake Forrest Roads at the Park. For example: Interlochen, Laurel, Putnam, Lake Forrest Lane, West Wieuca at Lake Forrest; Cochran, Stella, Jett, Blanton, West Wieuca, Hillside, Pineland, Tuxedo, West Park Court, Tuxedo Terrace, Putnam, Putnam Circle, and Lake Forrest at Powers Ferry; Dudley at West Wieuca.

• Study signalization of Powers Ferry and Roswell in context of grid plan. • Encourage small businesses and entrepreneurs in redevelopment of grids---more

consistent with Chastain Park and a gateway to Buckhead. Don’t price them out of market. Discourage big-box stores that are more appropriate for major highway intersections (e.g., Prado area near I-285 and Roswell Rd.)

• Coordinate Roswell Corridor development and traffic management with City of Sandy Springs.

• Plan pocket parks wherever possible. • Consider pedestrian/bicycle bridges/tunnels to traverse the Piedmont extension

and Roswell, currently a no-man's land. Proposed grid breaks up that no-man's land and might allow pedestrians to get to proposed commercial area between Piedmont and Roswell Roads.

• Wider rights of way. • More shared lanes for bicycles

Agree with North Buckhead on the following items:

• Adaptive sensing and signaling technology needed to unsnarl our traffic. • The “Habersham” bottleneck may be improved with a new street grid. • Fixing “Habersham” has consequences to neighborhood areas. • A guaranteed “Residential Buffer” is required for success of a “New Piedmont”

plan • Sidewalks and Traffic Calming for Old Ivy. • Improved school drop-off required for Sarah Smith. • Traffic signals need to be considered for Old Ivy’s “feeder” streets. • Roswell Corridor Project required. • Accessibility of North Buckhead diminished by GA 400 &Buckhead Loop. • Funding the entire Roswell/Piedmont/Habersham/neighborhood streets solution

as a complete package. • Traffic volumes destined to grow.





• I-85/GA 400 Interchange must be completed. • West Paces Ferry/Peachtree Road intersection must be reworked.



North Buckhead’s Connect Atlanta Recommendations Draft #4

North Buckhead - Page 1 of 6

Connect Atlanta artist’s concept of another possible configuration for Roswell-Habersham-Piedmont area. We would prefer the road grid to be shifted slightly to the west to buffer for existing condominiums better.

The “Habersham” bottleneck may be improved with a new street grid – Extending Piedmont to parallel Roswell Road and adding new cross streets may significantly improve the traffic problems which haunt the Roswell-Piedmont-Blackland-Habersham-Powers Ferry intersections. This solution would require the voluntary cooperation of commercial property owners, neighborhoods, the City and the State. This is not a short-term plan and may take ten years or more to accomplish. With new, medium-density development and greenspace, this new street grid could become a gateway to urban Buckhead. The ultimate configuration, and, in particular, the path of Piedmont, will need to be worked out by the participants and may differ significantly from these diagrams. Fixing “Habersham” has consequences to neighborhood areas – Relocating Piedmont, adding a grid, and fixing the Habersham bottleneck has consequences beyond those intended: Old Ivy Road traffic will become heavier. Drivers who now go miles out of their way to avoid a 15-minute wait on Habersham will adjust their behavior once the problems are fixed. The Connect Atlanta Plan should have built-in improvements for the interiors of the neighborhoods to make this a win-win result, not a win-lose result. A guaranteed “Residential Buffer” is required for success of a “New Piedmont” plan – The board of the North Buckhead Civic Association finds the idea of a new grid structure for streets in the Piedmont, Roswell, Habersham, Powers Ferry area appealing, but only if certain neighborhood protections are guaranteed.

• If Piedmont is moved east, the residents in existing condominiums need to be guaranteed a buffer. Preferably, the buffer would be one of commercial buildings with acceptable rear yard buffers, as required by ordinances. However, if the street is put next to the condos, we are concerned because there is no ordinance requiring a buffer from the street to the nearby residences – the road can be put immediately adjacent to the residential property lines. So, if relocating Piedmont is to be the premise of the Connect Atlanta Plan, we need legal guarantees to establish a buffer (a distance where the road will not be located) to protect the condo values. If that buffer is invaded, then the City should buy out the condo owners at a

Existing intersections (left) and an optional configuration (right)





fair (non-distress) price. Such a deal protecting existing residents should be part of the Connect Atlanta Plan just as much as relocating Piedmont is part of that plan.

• Height-plane restrictions also need to be ensured so that high-rises aren’t erected. Unlike current ordinances, these height-plane restrictions should apply whether or not there is an intervening street. Building heights in the new “grid area” should not exceed a plane extending at a 45° from the lot line residential properties in the area. In other words, to ensure the continued quality of life for existing residential areas, the zoning permitted within our new grid should preclude high-rises. These height-plane restrictions need to be a firm promise in the Connect Atlanta Plan and enacted by ordinance.

Sidewalks and Traffic Calming for Old Ivy – When the Habersham bottleneck is fixed, traffic flow will increase on Old Ivy Road. Old Ivy is the site of Sarah Smith Elementary School. Kids and parents walk to school. Sidewalks on both sides (not just one) of Old Ivy Road, from Roswell/Piedmont to Wieuca Road need to be part of the plan. Traffic calming needs to protect the residential nature of Old Ivy – narrower lanes, landscaping, etc. are needed to slow and calm traffic. Improved school drop-off required for Sarah Smith – Improved facilities need to be provided for parents in cars who come to drop off or pick up children. Today, the westbound lane of Old Ivy is blocked twice a day by a line of cars waiting to enter Sarah Smith. This line is inconsistent with the concept of a larger volume of traffic on Old Ivy Road and is an existing safety hazard. Traffic signals need to be considered for Old Ivy’s “feeder” streets – Traffic going eastbound on Old Ivy in front of Sarah Smith School, is either local or it ends up (virtually all the time) on Wieuca at Ivy Road or Wieuca at Old Ivy Road. To avoid introducing new bottlenecks at these intersections, new traffic signals should be considered. Traffic flow analyses should be done to consider where the Old Ivy traffic goes once it reaches Wieuca – no doubt, much reaches Peachtree-Dunwoody Road and beyond. The capacity of those roads beyond Old Ivy should be considered, too. Roswell Corridor Project required – We have a tremendously successful Peachtree Boulevard project. It has made a wonderful improvement to our City and is an investment that will pay for itself many times. A similar project is under way for the Piedmont Road Corridor. It is important for Atlanta and Sandy Springs to jointly undertake a Roswell Corridor Project. Roswell Road is a gateway to Buckhead and a gateway to Atlanta. It is imperative that the City, in concert with Sandy Springs, makes another investment that will pay for itself many times: a beautified Roswell Road. The project should include wider sidewalks, standardized signs, landscaping and lighting, underground utilities, and a uniform development/zoning philosophy. The 25-acre Blue Heron Nature Preserve, on Roswell Road at Nancy Creek, could become a centerpiece of an integrated Roswell Corridor Plan.





1973 Map of North Buckhead shows the signalized access points for the neighborhood. Southern access to Peachtree and Piedmont was lost in 1993 with GA 400’s construction.

Wieuca Road and Peachtree-Dunwoody Roads – Attention need to be paid to North Buckhead’s two main, purely residential roads. The residential character of these roads and adjoining property needs to be protected – more than 250 single family homes and low-density condominiums front on Wieuca or have their sole access to the outside world through Wieuca Road. Further, it is extremely likely that a new elementary school will be built on Wieuca Road. School children (and parents) will need a calm environment with sidewalks along both sides of Wieuca Road – narrower traffic lanes, landscaping, etc. are needed to slow and calm traffic. A turn lane(s) may be appropriate at the new school. Both North Buckhead and Brookhaven have some of their limited number of outlets to the outside world at the few intersections on Peachtree-Dunwoody. The City has purchased a new five-acre park on Peachtree-Dunwoody Road and plans are under way to determine how it will be developed – a playground is one of the highest priorities for this park. Traffic calming and pedestrian access to the park are needed for the safety of park users. Some new traffic signals, sidewalks and probably other amenities will become appropriate on both Wieuca and Peachtree-Dunwoody to enable residents to safely use the new park and elementary school. Accessessibility of North Buckhead diminished by GA 400 & Buckhead Loop – Before the construction of GA 400 and the Buckhead Loop, North Buckhead had freer access points to the “outside world”. The map

to the left shows the signalized entrances/exits to and from the neighborhood that existed up until the early 1990s. This reduced accessibility affects both North Buckhead and surrounding neighborhoods. The Buckhead Loop construction was related to the GA 400 project and added a major interchange which services Buckhead and southern Sandy Springs. The Loop added two new access points but they do not connect to the interior neighborhood street grid – thus, the Loop can be considered to be a limited access extension of Lenox Road. The access points on Wieuca and West Wieuca, while providing redundant capacity, serve the same part of the neighborhood and can be regarded as one entrance/exit. Accordingly, the loss of the two major access points on the southern part of the neighborhood has had a profound impact on neighborhood traffic patterns and the intensity of usage of the remaining entry points. For many, what used to be a quick trip to Lenox Square is now, a more time consuming and much less friendly trip. Any road or signalization handling changes in the area should be done carefully to retain the functionality of the remaining points of entry and exit.





This map shows various kinds of greenspace in the area. Orange lines show existing sidewalks. Crosswalks and sidewalks on both sides of our busier streets (Wieuca, Peachtree-Dunwoody, and Old Ivy Roads) are needed.

Pedestrian Enigmas must be solved – Parts of North Buckhead are inaccessible to pedestrians – the Buckhead Loop is especially pedestrian-hostile. Residents of some of North Buckhead’s most densely developed areas can’t shop at the nearest stores – residents of the Post Stratford apartments can’t easily shop at stores and restaurants they can see from their windows. To walk the 400’ from the Post apartments to nearby TJ Maxx or Toys-R-US requires a 2/3-mile route, distinguished, in places, by its pedestrian hostility. Park Avenue condominium residents who try to walk to office buildings on Piedmont Road complain they just can’t easily reach the buildings they can see. Many residents of southern North Buckhead live within 2/3-miles of the Buckhead MARTA station, yet there is no practical way for them to reach the MARTA station because of intervening roads and because the city’s largest developed neighborhood has no MARTA service except on two of its borders. MARTA (or equivalent) service needs to be provided if there is to be any expectation that most North Buckhead residents will even occasionally abandon their cars. High-traffic streets pose another instance of being able to see where you want to go but not be able to get there. Sidewalks run the full length of Wieuca, Peachtree Dunwoody and Old Ivy Roads. But that does not make them fully usable; it is often difficult to cross the road to get to the side with sidewalks, especially pushing a baby carriage. To make this problem clear, Peachtree-Dunwoody, carrying 12,000 vehicles a day at about 10 MPH over the posted limit of 35, has a length of 1.4 miles with no stop signs or signalized crosswalks.

Winding Wieuca Road, with 15,000 vehicles a day and a routinely ignored 25 MPH limit, spans two miles with no stop signs or safe crosswalks. The solution is to build more sidewalks and to provide some means for pedestrians to cross our busier roads (stop signs and/or signalized crosswalks.) High-density Buckhead in particular should become as pedestrian friendly as it is automobile friendly. Further, a public “sense of place” should be provided for pedestrians in urban Buckhead – pocket parks/greenspaces/dog runs – places where pedestrians can feel at ease and welcomed in public. Except for the Peachtree Boulevard and a tiny park behind Tower Place, there are very few first-class places for pedestrians that don’t involve being in someone’s building or walking on unfriendly sidewalks and driveways. What are all of the people who move into condo high-rises supposed to do with their kids and their dogs? New York City has set aside 25% of its land for public parks; Atlanta has 6% in total and 0% in urban Buckhead.





Adaptive sensing and signaling technology needed to unsnarl our traffic – Atlanta is currently using technology circa the 1940s to handle its traffic. If the same “advanced technology” were used by Google and Amazon, we would have no Internet commerce; if it were applied to the telephone system, we wouldn’t have touch-tone phones. Yet, Atlanta and the state have an investment of hundreds of millions of dollars in our streets and intersections and much of the capacity of our roads is lost. Adaptive sensing technology is a proven technology which can and should be used to improve the utilization of our existing roads. After all, we simply don’t have the money or the land to build more and bigger roads. Funding the entire Roswell/Piedmont/Habersham/neighborhood streets solution as a complete package – The Connect Atlanta plan must not allow for a partial implementation of improvements with only business needs addressed and residential needs deferred, perhaps indefinitely. Not only must the high volume roads be fixed, but before their improvements are started, funding for related residential projects should be dedicated and available. A firm allocation of 20% of the overall project budget for the Roswell/Piedmont/Habersham improvements should be earmarked for interior neighborhood needs, shared on both sides of Roswell. Similar projects on other major streets should involve the comparable funding of neighborhood needs. Traffic volumes destined to grow – Buckhead traffic volumes are far from static. Buckhead has grown rapidly and even if no new projects arise there are already enough approved projects and enough approved high-density zoning in the pipeline to possibly swamp the best laid plans. We are concerned that the initial Connect Atlanta solutions for Buckhead address only today’s traffic volumes, not what’s coming. I-85/GA 400 Interchange must be completed – The failure to build a complete I-85 interchange when GA 400 was built causes much excess surface traffic in Buckhead, particularly on Peachtree, Piedmont, the Buckhead Loop, Wieuca, Lenox, and Roxboro Roads. It is absolutely critical to complete this interchange. West Paces Ferry/Peachtree Road intersection – One intersection well outside North Buckhead is worthy of mention: the West Paces Ferry/Peachtree Road intersection. Currently, east-bound traffic on West Paces Ferry Road is prohibited from turning left onto Peachtree Road and Roswell Road. Instead, traffic is forced to proceed onto East Paces Ferry Road. Drivers unfamiliar with the street layout end up on Piedmont, which is often not what they intended. It would be much better to permit left turns. Growth Management and Connect Atlanta’s Successfulness – There is some limit to how much traffic Piedmont and Peachtree can carry. Similar limits exist for other areas of Atlanta. Development of new density should not be permitted unless realistic, near-term transportation/transit capacity is available and/or a funding mechanism and implementation plan are in place to build out new capacity. In other words, impact fees and increased density-related millage rates should be paid by development that requires new transportation infrastructure or that new density should be deferred. We should not take away the landowner’s rights to develop their land, but neither should we let them dump the costs their developments cause on existing residents and existing business owners. Historically, planning in Atlanta and, in particular, traffic planning in Atlanta, parallels the life experiences of a chronically overweight person who is always dieting but never succeeds. People get fat and stay fat because of their lifestyles – the solution is not buying bigger clothes; rather, they need to eat less and exercise more. Cities get traffic gridlock and keep it in spite of transportation spending because of their lifestyles, too – the solution is not building more and bigger roads, since we have already done that; rather, they need to stop growing uncontrollably and start growing smarter. People need to manage their food intake; cities need to





manage their growth. So, if Connect Atlanta is to be a successful plan and not a mere resolution, its key tenet must be “managed growth”. Managed growth means setting realistic traffic volume limits for each area and, within each area, capacity limits for each road. Then, if a developer proposes a development that exceeds those capacity limits, he will not automatically get development permits. If the City comes up with a traffic/transit improvement that promises to expand capacity and permits higher limits, the City should defer permitting any new density until the improvements are ready and the developers seeking permits which require that new capacity should pay for its creation. Inevitably, the analogy of hefty people and traffic-challenged cities breaks down. A person is a single thing. Atlanta is a metro area – a group of autonomous political entities. Atlanta is just part of the metro body – judging by our problems, we’re probably the torso with an enlarged belly and “love handles”; other governments largely control the mouth and the hands stuffing it with food. To a large extent, we don’t control our source of food (sprawl), we are just stuck with processing it. A complete traffic policy must be regional. But, lacking complete control doesn’t mean we should do nothing. If we are about to permit the creation of a “jobs magnet” as we have built many times in Buckhead (Piedmont Center, Atlanta Financial Center, Terminus, etc.) we should ask a basic question: where will the workers come from? In the past, a competent analysis would have forecast that, based on demographic trends and housing stock availability, a large portion of Buckhead workers come from other counties. After the fact, this is confirmed by an informal license tag count in Piedmont Center which indicates that most workers are from Cobb County. So the question is: if we permit new density, would we have enough road/transit capacity to service it? A corollary question: if we don’t have enough road capacity and new infrastructure is required, why shouldn’t the developers and occupants of new density pay every dime of its construction? Why should the existing tenants and existing residents in other buildings subsidize new density, just so the developer gets rich (in part at the expense of bystanders)? Opponents of this approach might argue that land owners have a right to develop their land and that keeping them from doing so is an unconstitutional “taking”. The answer to this objection is that of course the owner can use his land as he see fit, but when he requires the public to pay huge sums or to experience unreasonable traffic congestion as a result, it is no longer merely a private property rights issue – there are other participants who are involved in the decision making, other participants with the right to say no. To date, the city and other local governments have failed to act to the limit new density and the result is continuing and worsening traffic congestion. They have apparently either been indifferent or they have been stymied by the “property rights” arguments. The attitude of our governments has been that of the unsuccessful dieter: we can eat as much as we want and we will not get fat as long as we make some resolutions and “try”. The time has past to just “try”; we need to get down to insisting on serious planning and meaningful governmental discipline. As we have seen above, there are excellent counter arguments to the “property rights trumps all” line of thought and we must now apply discipline to Atlanta’s growth if Connect Atlanta is to be successful and if what remains of our residential and business quality of life is to be preserved. Draft #3 - March 17, 2008 North Buckhead Civic Association [email protected]



Tuxedo Park Recommendations for Connect Atlanta Draft #1

Tuxedo Park – Page 1 of 2

First a comment. I just read over the Update on the Livable Centers Initiative. It was interesting. In the list of Fundamentals, they listed the goal to "Reinforce High Density Core. There were several recommendations about transit within the area, several recommendations about increasing density, but I didn't find anything that considered how people would get to or from this Livable Center. Shouldn't that have been part of the original proposal since they were creating a much more dense work community? Another Comment - most of the comments from our group in the Connect Atlanta meetings have been talked about traffic from the north - mostly from Cobb County. Tuxedo Park traffic comes from Vinings along Paces Ferry to West Paces, some from I-75 & Cobb County, but a great deal of it comes from the Moores Mill/Bolton Road route, the south side of Atlanta to I-75 to exit at Moores Mill or West Paces Ferry, the neighborhoods of south & west Buckhead etc. So let’s not just talk about traffic from Cobb County & the north. Tons of is comes from the south & west. We need to talk about commuter traffic so that future solutions look at solving the whole problem, not just the Cobb County problem. Recommendations from Tuxedo Park - * Much of the Buckhead Village area is zoned C-1. Except for Peachtree Road, the only access to this district is by 2 lane streets, many of them are residential. Until there is an adequate system of mass transportation from outlying areas to this district, there should be a building moratorium. * With the density of the future development in mind, Roswell Road needs to remain a four lane street, but steps need to be taken so that future residents can walk comfortably and safely to work or "play" in either the Buckhead Village or the Piedmont/Peachtree area or other areas to be redeveloped along Roswell Road. * The 20 acre plus apartment community of The Paces will be redeveloped in 5 years of so. I believe that it is zoned mid-rise residential. * Traffic Calming on neighborhood streets - including stop signs and cross walks at intersections along Habersham Road. * Appropriate measures for Blackland Road that meet neighborhood approval. * Storm water retention that surpasses that which is currently required to alleviate the storm water issues of Wolf Creek that originates behind the disco Kroger shopping center & enters Nancy Creek in the soccer fields along Broadland Road. Remember that the Purpose of the Connect Atlanta Plan is to look and plan 20 to 30 years into the future. This means more than sidewalks & crosswalks and new buildings & tree lined streets. It means careful planning for new residents in and around the City. It means planning for new businesses. It means planning ways for people to move between



Tuxedo Park Recommendations for Connect Atlanta Draft #1

Tuxedo Park – Page 2 of 2

their homes & jobs in a variety of ways. In the past, many great infrastructure plans have been proposed and ignored for the convenience of the moment. The view of the goal of The City of the Future is too often forgotten. The Connect Atlanta plan is a great idea and very important for the City. Sally Morgens [email protected] Tuesday, March 25, 2008 3:29 PM



Proposed Outline for Combined Neighborhoods Input Draft #1

Proposed Outline – Page 1 of 2

This is an early draft outline which is proposed as a possible method of reorganizing the preceding

materials in a coherent statement of area traffic needs. As proposed, it will introduce much new material. Current assessment No money, much new development, inadequate impact fees New school New park Traffic from outside (Cobb & outside) Infrastructure

Near-term changes Piedmont Road Study recommendations

Traffic Calming and Pedestrian Road striping and marking

Crosswalks Pedestrian signage Traffic signals (timed and demand-activated) Speed indicator smart signs Signal timing

Frequency Inter-government coordination

Long-term changes Grid and redevelopment at Habersham Traffic signals at each node Critical but no sure approach

• East-west connectivity • North-south connectivity • Cobb-to-Buckhead light rail • Pharr to Lenox Road connector

Other opportunities • Improved GA 400 sound walls and Wieuca-Mountain Way-Loridans • Toll Plaza Park

Linear Park Policy Fund regions, not specific roads

• An x% holdback should provide funding for neighborhoods impacted by big projects

Bus bump-outs require means of re-entry Pro-resident orientation

Priorities for spending impact fee money Control development to fit the transportation envelope Rent-a-cops Gridlock prevention Signalize right on red to favor thru traffic Revenue sources and incentives



Proposed Outline for Combined Neighborhoods Input Draft #1

Proposed Outline – Page 2 of 2

Increased impact fees Tax policy – tax parking spaces Reward practices that improve transportation Consider environment when making transportation decisions Provide incentives for: More trees, parks and greenspace Wildlife connectivity Shaded streets and parking lots White/light pavement Gordon Certain 4/11/08



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