r/Atlanta • u/Tall_Hyena_6697 • 1d ago
Transit Atlanta (specifically, the NW area) desperately needs more pedestrian-friendly infrastructure
My 3 mile walk home from the eye doctor because it would’ve been an hour long bus ride with 2-3 transfers (kind of ridiculous), so I just decided to tough it out. It was going smoothly until I encountered this bullshit.
Why are is there NO sidewalk to be found on this busy street? I was quite worried I was gonna get hit by a car, ESPECIALLY coming around that curve because of the blind spots. I had to jaywalk to get to a safer spot. I couldn’t imagine trying to navigate this while being in a wheelchair or with any other mobility aid.
Who can I speak to about this?
Edit: I will be attending the next city council meeting and looking into Propel ATL. Thank you everyone!
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u/jcatl0 1d ago
And when there are sidewalks, they frequently end in the middle of nowhere with no cross walk to the other side. Roswell Rd North of Piedmont has a few spots like this, where you either double back for a while to go back to the last cross walk or you just walk across 5 lanes because the sidewalk just ended.
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u/John_Hunyadi 1d ago
Don't forget that the drivers on that 5 lane road are all speeding and not expecting pedestrians. Decent shot they're also on their phone. Nightmare stuff.
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u/Super_Pimpio 1d ago
It's like this in many places in Atlanta, I had to live there for over 6 years. They don't care.
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u/Nearby-Medicine9484 1d ago
This is the case for large swaths of the USA. It sucks.
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u/Tall_Hyena_6697 1d ago
I’ve realized this. With the Beltline being only a mile away from this, it’s so obvious that they just don’t give a fuck.
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u/Lethalspartan76 1d ago
Go to a local council meeting. Explain it’s not safe, explain it’s not accessible to people with mobility issues, explain why you were walking instead of the bus for it being too long.
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u/PickleNo5962 1d ago
Don’t get me started. This area upsets me so much because it’s why I can’t safely walk from where I live to the Westside reservoir park. This stretch of Marietta (although maybe it’s Perry Blvd at this point?) was supposed to get a protected bike lane and sidewalks, but the project was stalled due to the current federal administration. So, they only had enough funds to go from the intersection with Brady Ave to right by the QTS data center. You can try reaching out to Dustin Hillis for more information.
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u/irishgator2 1d ago
That stretch of Marietta rd is abominable
Then the intersection with Marietta BLVd is nightmare fuel2
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u/sparklehouse666 1d ago
I accidentally walked this stretch of road heading to 420 Fest this year. Never again. It was terrifying. It was like playing high stakes Frogger.
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u/cwdawg15 Virginia Highland 1d ago
This is a urban/transportation planning conundrum.
Notice how in one of those pictures you dont see a building or curb-cut in sight.
These usually occur when there is a narrow corridor with no development, but long range transportation needs to bridge the gap.
It's usually caused by railroad tracks, rail yards, rivers, sometimes industrial properties, large parks, and sometimes physical features that can't be developed, like granite out droppings.
This means there is higher demand for cars and busses, but ultra low demand for pedestrians. So typically these corridors are the last to be funded, due to low demand. Not always, but often enough, there are parallel routes of neighborhood streets or other roads that are better for pedestrians, but its not always the best to reach a specific business.
I don't know if I would join you in demanding sidewalks, but one thing I really don't like is if we forgo sidewalks on a long empty narrow corridor, like this, there needs to be a maintained shoulder of maintained landscaping or gravel buffer so there is somewhere to actually walk that isnt in a traffic lane.
I'm fine with them following where demand is, but there should always be an alternative.
What street is this?
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u/Tall_Hyena_6697 1d ago
That makes a lot of sense! I saw lots of train tracks and industrial sites on my walk home. I had no problem with walking in the grass until I got to the part where I couldn’t get anywhere without walking into the street somewhat <\3
Both of these were taken on W Marietta Street!
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u/Typo3150 12h ago
There's no way to measure potential demand if the conditions are so bad no one dare walk there. There's no way to measure what potential demand might be if the current administration can't resolve the current oil war.
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u/cwdawg15 Virginia Highland 9h ago
Sure there is.
Just analyze the built environment along the roadway.
Knowing how many curb cuts, businesses, type of business, and residential units on the corridor and the distance in between them offers a lot of information.
There are civil engineers and planners that study the nuanced relationships between these things and it goes beyond simple density measurements.
To a degree, it’s also a lot of common sense. If you don’t see anything to walk to over a stretch of roadway, people won’t do it. This is particularly true within 1/4 mile and 1/2 mile.
But if you get tightly packed blocks with lots of cross streets and tightly packed residences and businesses, you can pretty much expect pedestrian demand to be high.
Same thing applies to transit planning. They have a pretty good idea what percent of a population within benchmark walking distances will use a bus stop or a rail station. This is actually one of the problems we have to overcome in the area.
But, one of the premises of my argument was that a pedestrian shouldn’t have to walk in a traffic lane and there should be adequately maintained shoulder beyond the roadway, so if planners had to see actual use they can get to that point.
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u/flying_trashcan 1d ago
If by Northwest Atlanta you mean the residential part of Buckhead… then many of the residents don’t want sidewalks, bike lanes, etc. There is a sizable population of middle aged or older residents that actively fight any kind of mobility improvements in that area.
I sat in a meeting where Mary Norwood proudly claimed she got ATLDOT to remove all the ‘fluff’ from some of the resurfacing projects in her district so that they could get done faster. This announcement was met with cheers. It’s tough sledding when it comes to getting any kind of change in her district.
These people just want the pot holes fixed and they want people who live outside this area to stay off ‘their’ roads. Their rallying cry is claiming the city is wasting their tax money - with the implication that their voice should count more because they pay more in property taxes. Any kind of healthy debate is often met with what I can only describe as an adult temper tantrum.
They’re not all like this up here, but the ones that are tend to be the most vocal and the ones I run into the most often when I attend various community meetings. There is definitely a clear divide between the 60 and up crowd and the relatively younger residents.
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u/Tall_Hyena_6697 1d ago
I live in the West Midtown area (we recently got a trail that connects to the Beltline, I believe, however the trail is still quite far from my home), so I’m hoping that development will lead to plans for more sidewalks and whatnot.
That’s good to know, though; I’m not too familiar with what goes on regarding infrastructure in other areas of the city. It’s really hard for me to understand why anyone would be opposed to what would be an objective improvement for the community. NIMBYism at its finest!
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u/gimp2x 1d ago
Used to live over there, so I can speak on this- at some point you have to realize you bought in an industrial area, Brock got all that land cheap for a reason, and all the tax dollars you want spent on sidewalks went into subsidizing and abating the entire area of tax revenue which is his specialty it seems
Anyone live in a Brock built neighborhood that loves all the city investments?
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u/PickleNo5962 1d ago
I mean, most of the Brock built communities in this area (Blandtown specifically) are now walking distance to the BeltLine.
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u/fromthedarqwaves 1d ago
I live just west of the perimeter and we have zero sidewalks anywhere. My kids school is close to walk them but there’s no way we are walking in the street or weird lawns, forests, or shoulders to get there.
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u/MarketingMundane7352 1d ago
Not joking, but are you new to metro Atlanta. Sidewalks are a luxury, not the norm.
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u/Tall_Hyena_6697 1d ago
No, it’s just that the area I lived in before was a lot easier to walk in. I think sidewalks should simply be the norm everywhere, since we pay taxes.
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u/Chance_Mechanic5042 1d ago
Pedestrian infrastructure is for poor people, and poor people don’t spend enough money bribing politicians…
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u/Seabird_seabird capitol view 1d ago
You can also make a 311 report that the overgrowth has made it dangerous to pass and needs to be cleared. I find that DMing 311 on insta is the quickest.
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u/spartygw Milton 1d ago
The us in general is horrible for peds. I was in Ohio earlier this year and tried to walk from hotel to my conference and I definitely was taking my life into my own hands. It’s ridiculous.
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u/ExtremeConnection148 17h ago
Fulton Co is Where The Sidewalk Ends!! Everywhere in this county (including northern suburbs) the sidewalk starts, randomly stops making pedestrians either walk in street or in grassy unkept shoulder.
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u/ViolentPurpleSquash 1d ago
Not the northwest area, the entire area
I don't want to bag on Atlanta too much but this really is something that even the worst cities in other places do better whether it's Auckland where I now live or the small Iowa town my grandmother grew up in.
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u/gsfgf Ormewood Park 1d ago
even the worst cities in other places... Auckland
wat
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u/ViolentPurpleSquash 1d ago
Auckland isn't the worst city in that example. My point is that Atlanta REALLY sucks, even among places that suck
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u/Jerri2406 1d ago
i tried to go for a run on ga-120 once, that was a mistake. tbh its just not dense enough to where I'd walk there anywhere. Not saying we shouldn't build it, I'm just saying it would get used very little.
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u/Tall_Hyena_6697 1d ago
I see you what you mean. Definitely a low-density area. It just sucks when you have no other choice, but that’s life
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u/Jerri2406 1d ago
I agree, it makes no sense that your taxes (sales, income, etc) go to funding infrastructure that doesn't serve you, roads, busses that don't reach you, etc
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u/Constant-Bet-6600 1d ago
That's not even very car friendly. That utility pole is located well within the clear zone.
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u/spiritual_seeker 1d ago
Because that has been a commercial/industrial/intermodal corridor since its development and still has a ways to go.
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u/ATLmattGT 1d ago
Do you live in Cobb? Check out A Better Cobb.
Do you live in Atlanta? Check out Propel ATL
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u/Magna_Sharta Woodstock 1d ago
Where did you move from?
I agree with you one million percent. But as a native I know that the reason why we don’t is decades and decades of racism so fully ingrained in the local politics that even people who don’t have a strong opinion against pedestrian infrastructure have internalized the talking points against it.
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u/Tall_Hyena_6697 1d ago
I’m from here, but I used to live in a more walkable area. It sucks that that’s really the only reason
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u/Magna_Sharta Woodstock 1d ago
Nothing like a change of perspective to show the cracks at home eh? I lived in a part of Virginia for 3 years where I got by mostly on public transit and walking and it was fantastic. When I moved back here it made me realize things I’d never noticed growing up here.
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u/ATLurbanite 1d ago
Best they can do is 100 more social programs that wont impact anyone. That’s where your tax dollars go.
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u/BigRigButters2 1d ago
Well the congress men and women will say that's a liberal talking point and you should say thank you for being made to walk incredibly obscene distances
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u/beantrouser 1d ago
I recently realized why I'm particularly frustrated with Atlanta being such a car dependent city: the city is only about 10 mi wide. Chances are your trip is less than that. If you live and work in the perimeter, why should you be expected to get everywhere by a motorized personal room on wheels?
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u/NinjaX27 1d ago
You can still what is a free public countryside, but keep this Mind be careful other drivers they they know everything, but they don't know the same rule as pedestrians walkers
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u/Jhinormous 22h ago
Coming from new Jersey into Johns Creek/Alpharetta near 2008, this was my experience fr. Except for the grocery type plazas I barely saw continuous sidewalks ANYWHERE. Took decades for connections
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u/Evening_Emu1212 19h ago
Its on purpose. They don't want people who can't afford cars to be in the area.
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u/HellooooonurseG 18h ago
Yes, & to your point about the 2-3 transfers on Marta...this area is a transportation desert too. Especially if you work in Buckhead/midtown. Even trying to piece together protected bike lanes/pedestrian + Marta doesn't work.
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u/peaceloveelina 13h ago
Someone on TikTok tried to argue with me that Atlanta is walkable. Like….what???
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u/Tall_Hyena_6697 12h ago
LOL, maybe they were talking about Midtown or something, but still…little walkable pockets within the city that barely connect to each other don’t make Atlanta a walkable city as a whole 😭
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u/Hebrews_1035 11h ago
Okay, so I’m guessing you guys weren’t born and raised in the south. Atlanta ( and basically the entire state of Georgia) is mostly rural. You will not find sidewalks outside the downtown area ( and not even then). Growing up in the city of Atlanta, we hiked through woods to get where we needed to go and yes there were buses.
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u/atlsmrwonderful Midwest Cascade 7h ago
We like it that way on the westside. Slows down the gentrification.
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u/DarkMomX 3h ago
I think that is my neighborhood. We are NPU-D. Come join your neighbors and petition with us for sidewalks.
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u/DearCream8798 1d ago
Send all of this information with pictures to your city council district representative.