You may have heard that the new owners of Atlantic Station have plans to diversify the mixed use area’s commercial base. But the Midtown Patch site has some pretty interesting quotes from the new owners, which provide a bit more detail as to the problems and the proposed solutions.
[Mark] Toro [managing partner at North American Properties] said his plan is to change between 20 and 25 percent of the retailers at Atlantic Station. That means of the 1.3 million square feet of retail space, about 150,ooo square feet will be retooled, he said. The development’s major tenants IKEA, Dillard’s and Target shall remain, Toro said.
“Midtown is a mecca for the creative class,” Toro said. He said he wants Atlantic Station to bring in those retailers that appeal to “Generation Y” shoppers. He said he hopes local boutiques and mom-and-pop restaurants will be among the new tenants. “The national chains have not done well here.”
Toro said Atlantic Station will evolve over the next three or four years. “It is going to be slow, but steady,” he said. But Toro said leaders will immediately be more engaged with Midtown residents.
It’s interesting to hear this brand-new view of Atlantic Station, which admits to the national retailers combined shortcomings outside their mall-confines and envisions more “mom-and-pop” stuff. Not to mention the slightly odd – but understandable – juxtaposition of the stated desire to hold onto the big-box stores. (Is the urban retail future actually a combination of the big-box and “authentic” local retail shops and restaurants?)
These quotes also raise the topic of developing or retaining “authenticity” in urban areas. Cities, neighborhoods and towns can acquire this “authenticity” in different ways, either through a diverse array of local shops or historic streetscapes. While having both is preferable in the 21st century retail search for individuality – as Decatur currently does – having none may just be a death-knell in an urban setting.
Stuff to think about.
This is also a smart cover for the fact that many of these national tenants have expiring leases in the next few years and will want to leave regardless. So this is a smart way to put a spin on it that the retail mix is deliberately changing.
Regardless, I am fully in support of NAP and Mark. They are a great team to get it back on track.
I wonder if they’ll lower the rent to bring in these new types of tenants in too. I get the sense that it’s very expensive to rent in Atlantic Station because the prices of everything are super high and only the “national chains” have much of a presence. Although Decatur has high rent too…
I work in Atlantic Station and the dining choices are abysmal. I frequently head over to Howell Mill to dine at places like Flip, Yeah Burger, Star Provisions, etc. I hope that we start to see some changes.
You’re absolutely right. The dining choices at AS really ARE abysmal and uninteresting! Hope to see some changes made soon! Really, IKEA, Dillard’s, and the movie are the only establishments at AS that make me want to go there…
H & M.
West Elm
I only go to Atlantic Station for Ikea and the occasional movie theater excursion. Everything else is just silly.
From last week’s 30 Rock:
Tracy: I have a responsibility to fix the word starting with the worst place ever.
Kenneth: IKEA on a Saturday?
PREACH IT, KENNETH.
Ha!
The best time to visit Ikea on Saturday is right when they open at 10AM. The crowds are very small and you can get in and out real fast. If you wait until later it is a zoo.
Atlantic Station is forever off of my list until they change their policy on motorcycles. When a cop stops me and says, “Motorcycles aren’t allowed here, you’ll have to leave it at Target” is when I take my business elsewhere. Not that I miss it, since it’s a worthless destination to begin with.
Really? That’s bizarre. Did they say what their reasoning was? What about scooters? Are they banned as well?
Are they expecting Marlon Brando leading the Wild Ones into IKEA?
They’ve had a problem with white people being scared of the black people who ride (usually in groups) motorcycles.
You think I’m kidding? I’m serious.
When I pushed back and asked why, I was given a B.S. answer that they had problems with motorcycles not paying for parking and riding around the barrier arm. I don’t know if all the roads within Atlantic Station are private, but if they’re not I don’t understand how they can ban motorcyclists who have helped pay for the roads.
“who have helped pay for those roads”
Remember, roads don’t pay for themselves. What, wrong topic? Oh, never mind.
I was at a charity walk there last year and after taking a photo that happened to have one of the buildings in it, I was warned by a rent-a-cop not to take any more photos of their property. A.S. is B.S. period, and no better than suburban strip mall hell.
I am interested in the “topic of developing or retaining “authenticity” in urban areas”. An urban planner friend of mine says A.S. and the Edgewood District are examples of faux urbanism. I think she is on to something. To be a real urban neighborhood, there needs to be some dirt, some street life, etc. Sadly downtown Decatur also lacks some of this. My friends who visit from Chicago and Brooklyn, etc usually remark how clean our downtown is. It almost seems unreal. A balance is needed. Maybe a little more danger!
First question is do we want to be specifically an urban downtown or is a community downtown adequate? I would argue that non-urban small cities and towns and even some villages have downtowns. I remember my grandmother who lived in a rural village of 100 folks saying the she was going “downtown” or “over street” to the nearby main street and square of the neighboring town. I can’t tell you how big that town was but it had to be under 1500 residents, maybe even under 800. But it had a full cluster of stores, schools, and churches on a few central blocks–e.g. drugstore or two, grocery store or two, hardware store, small department store, post office, some doctors’ and lawyers’ offices, shoe store, a few restaurants, etc.
Another basic question: Does a downtown have to be dirty to be an authentic urban downtown? What about the downtown of Burlington, Vermont? Pasadena, California?
Doesn’t need to be dirty…downtown Chicago is very clean. I just vote for more urban city and less Disney. A.S. has always felt like a Disney wannabe to me.
I think you are on to something AnotherRick. I tried to articulate such, in my strategic planing session, but I had a hard time, as you are now, articulating what I mean.
I don’t think you necessarily mean “dirty” as in unclean, but in truly urban places there is something, maybe undefined – think NYC or San Francisco – or authentic (i.e., “danger”) about it that you can’t truly re-create. I think a sort of unprogrammed street life (I don’t mean street people here folks), is the missing element. In order to have that though, people have to get out of their cars and onto the streets.
Come to think of it, although far too small to truly be its own district, I think that “downtown” Oakhurst actually functions as a better “urban” district than downtown Decatur as far as having this element we’re trying to describe but can’t quite put our finger on.
Around the late 80s, it wasn’t uncommon to see hookers downtown, especially after dark. Is that the kind of authenticity you’re yearning for? Because most places “blessed” with such authenticity are doing everything they can to get rid of it.
Hookers in downtown Decatur?
Decatur hookers…? Guess they COULD turn tricks in between soccer practice carpools…but you know they’d ruin it by talking trash about WalMart and the Diner…
So THAT’s why minivans have dark windows!
I think we have all made it clear that is not the kind of “authenticity” that we are looking for or desire.
Look, even today on the Square, when walking way back from, say, Brick Store, to where I may have parked south of the Square near Eddies Attic, I am usually hit up for spare change after a certain hour.
If there were actually more actual street life on the Square – the positive type – this would either (a) not happen or (b) if if it did it would not be as intimidating/frustrating, because there would be other people out and about.
No, hookers and drug dealers do not thrive in thriving, authentic urban areas – quite the opposite they tend to thrive in the shadows of quite desolate areas.
Similar to the comment above about prostitution on the Square, I know someone who moved off of Mead Avenue in the early 1990s after they had a child because they felt it was too dangerous to be out after dark in the area. There was open drug-dealing and scarey stuff in the 80s and early 90s. I don’t think that “authentic” or “urban” have to include that an area be dirty or dangerous. In fact, people will be more likely to use their cars and less likely to walk and use mass transit if they feel unsafe. I rented in Inman Park in the 1980s so that I could use MARTA but then ended up never walking to or from the station after dark because the crime rate was high then and the station had no attendants or police presence. Despite an active neighborhood watch, there was tons of crime around the station and even a murder. (Lawsuit led to better MARTA police patrolling.)
Why does “urban” equate to dirty? Is it because many North American cities have been rundown for so long that people expect that for a city to really be a city, it has to be dirty? Most German and Scandinavian cities are far cleaner and well maintained than Decatur, yet I don’t think the Berlin or Stockholm lack any “urban” qualities.
Simple reason why: better maintenance and cleaning means higher taxes.
Scott and I have gone back and forth on this point before. I used to pull out phrases like “faux urbanism” too. And while I still don’t like the look and feel of AS, I’m not sure it’s “faux”. There are two key difference between AS and a more “organic” downtown. One is that it’s all built by the same developer and the other is that it’s all brand-new. Now, our older, historic downtowns weren’t all built at once, but at one point all of their buildings were new. The only difference is that in the organic communities, the newness of some buildings are off-set and toned down by older ones. (Think small German towns with their 13th century structures next to ridiculously modern stuff. It works there because the shear volume of the old off-sets the radical form of the new.)
If AS survives 30 years and develops into a thriving community, it’ll be interesting to see what it looks like at that point. Remember that many old mill towns were built all at once and today hold lots of charm. Sure there are some terribly ugly buildings at AS, but nothing’s to say that those will still be there in 30 years. There’s a natural evolution of the site that just hasn’t happened yet. Is natural evolution of a “downtown” possible when everything has the same owner? Possibly not. But if AS is broken up into pieces someday, it could easily become just as authentic as any downtown.
There is no connection between age and authenticity. The entire Upper West Side of Manhattan was built out in essentially the same amount of time it’s taken to build AS. And, in terms of the street network and developable lots that directed where things got built, Manhattan and AS are equally “master planned.”
The difference as most people perceive it is that Manhattan reflects the work of many hands (that is, many lot owners building many human-scaled buildings within a relatively tight range of style) while AS reflects the concentrated work of a few (limited lot owners building a small number of large buildings of unrelated and arbitrary styles). People like and respond to subtle variations in their surroundings.
However, you don’t have to have many owners to create an authentic place that stands the test of time. Country Club Plaza in Kansas City was built in 1922 and remains loved to this day. And there are many others. The key is that they stuck to long established rules of urban form and scale.
DM, your point about the mill towns is another great example. Often controlled by one entity and built in a very short period of time, they remain endearing to this day. Why? Because of their form, which throws both those strawmen arguments (age and master-development) out the window.
I disagree with your first sentence. I think that age has traditionally been one of the key ways to create “subtle variations” in the landscape. Be it through patina or changing fashions. There are ways to get around it, and replicate it, but I don’t think it’s easily replicated.
Curse your attention to detail, DM! Yes, age may add to greater variations but it’s the evolving variations themselves that provide the sense of authenticity. So I guess what I meant was that there’s no *direct* or “guaranteed* connection. Age can help a good place grow increasingly authentic, as we seem fixated on the term, but it can also have no effect at all.
As I mentioned, Manhattan’s Upper West Side sprang up ridiculously quickly yet I’m sure it was considered entirely authentic from Day One. In fact, until well into the 20th century, no one even had these types of navel-gazing discussions about authenticity.
Today, we focus on a meaningless, post-modern analysis of authenticity rather than simply building good, lasting, human-scaled places that will inevitably take on the very real, and ever-changing character of those who inhabit them.
Amen.
I like that idea. For the downtown to be a real place, a community place, it needs to develop over time, organically, and cannot be created all at one by one mega-developer. That makes it like a Disney or movie set. You will probably thing I am a little strange, but as a teen I spent a lot of time in NYC. I loved the old Times Square, and really do not care for the cleaned- up version of today.
Agree 100%. Too me places like Atlantic Station are no better than suburbia.
I like this concept of an “authentic” downtown even if we are all having trouble defining what we mean and even if everyone has a slightly different persoal vision. “Authentic” suggest a place that residents really use for a full range of daily activities rather than a pseudo-shopping mall. Freeport, Maine is really a giant catalog-company shopping mall, not a true downtown, no matter how New Englandy they make the buildings look. AS feels that way too. Seasonal beach downtowns are often pseudo-boutique malls not real downtowns. However, the boardwalk of Hollywood Beach, Florida seems to have some authentic downtown characteristics because residents, not just tourists, are using it daily. The Edgewood shopping district seems a notch closer to a downtown feel compared to AS but it’s missing the non-shopping elements of a true downtown–schools, post office, government buildings, doctors’ offices, ordinary business offices, places of worship, parks, playgrounds, sports, etc.
My take on the hard-to-put-your-finger-on “authentic” downtown is that humans are conditioned to being most comfortable in organic environments. By “organic” I mean, environments that have developed over time through natural selection. They are varied and slightly chaotic. It’s the same rule whether you’re in the forest or in the city.
So when a development is built all at once, it can easily lose this element, for any number of reasons (building materials are similar, architects all come from the same “school, crap architecture is as prevalent as lasting styles, etc) New Urbanists have learned to mitigate this in some places by selling LOTS to residents instead of houses, so that individual styles/preferences are applied to residences (under guidelines). ASIDE: Some may dislike the idea of guidelines, but they help in most cases because they take the place of the natural limitations that available building materials once imposed. (Thanks a lot steel!)
Towns like Rosemary Beach, FL benefit from this sort of variety, and while they may not feel quite as “authentic” as a downtown Oakhurst, the variety helps. TIME will help do the rest.
They banned motorcycles AND scooters because the biker boyz were turning AS into their Friday night hangout and residents were complaining about the noise.
“This policy applies to motorcycles only and does not apply to mopeds or scooters with engines smaller than 150 cc.”
http://atlanticstation.com/site_parking.php
Okay I’ll be ‘that guy’. The crowd I see at Atlantic Station now is COMPLETELY different than the crowd it drew when it first opened. Not talking about race or social class here. Saw a group of Caucasian males there a few weeks ago walking around shirtless and shoeless. Gaudy tattoos everywhere. I often see inappropriate clothing. Saw a group of Asian kids get into a fight. It may sound prudish, but if I had kids I would question bringing them there now. I’m not saying it’s low class or anything, it’s…hard to put my finger on really. That said, I’m curious how this perceived shift on my part will affect the new tenants.
JB,
Do you see the same kind of changes as what happened in the Buckhead area a few years ago? I used to love to go to Buckhead on weekend evenings, then it just got too dodgy for me. It sounds from your description that AS is heading in the same direction.
It is a steep and slippery slope when business owners and developers start trying to influence/control the demographic makeup of the people that are attracted to their locale. Efforts in that area are definitely not going to be “PC”. Customer base is obviously influenced by the makeup of the business mix, but when an area becomes popular to groups of people that are not necessarily customers… it can be costly. The rapid decline of Underground Atlanta in the 70’s is a case in point. That area has never recovered… and it was very successful initially.
Similar to Buckhead. A lot of these kids are probably in (or just out of) high school and loitering on weekends. It’s become the place where local kids meet up after school on a Friday night. Since it’s outdoors I suspect loitering restrictions are more difficult to enforce.
I think race, in addition to “crowd,” plays a role in who will now frequent AS. I know people who will not go over there even for a movie b/c of “crowd” (though I can always distinguish those that say crowd but really mean race)– I tell them they are lame, but get no feeling of shame on their part. I think both parts of the phenomena (crowd/race plus those who now refuse to go) are having a huge impact on the finances of the development. And I have no idea of Disney-esque design played a role in this– may be a uniquely atlanta thing.
I think you’re spot on Macarolina.
The “wrong crowd” is nothing but code for race. If it were a bunch of white people out and about having a good time, we call that a festival. But if they are black, it obviously means trouble.
Marshall, that’s b.s. I was there one night when the motorcycle “crowd” was there and YOU COULD NOT HEAR A CONVERSATION on the sidewalk because of the constant accelerating and showboating of the motorcycle “crowd.” There were so many motorcycles parked along the curb that it was hard to cross the street at the main open space. The riders were black but race had nothing to do with it. It was about behavior that got out of control, not race. They have not banned motorcycles either. Below is the AS policy from their website:
Limited Motorcycle Parking Policy
After receiving a number of complaints from Atlantic Station residents and guests about the noise and disruptions caused by motorcycles, a policy is now in place that prohibits motorcyclists from riding through and parking in the main retail district in Atlantic Station… However, we welcome motorcyclists to park throughout Atlantic Station outside of the main retail district. Much of this parking is well within walking distance of all Atlantic Station stores, restaurants and entertainment options. This policy applies to motorcycles only and does not apply to mopeds or scooters with engines smaller than 150 cc.
Limited motorcycle parking is available on level P3 in the designated area with an entrance off of Fowler Street.
Thousands of residents live Atlantic Station and nearly 8 million guests visit here every year, and our intention is to make Atlantic Station as resident- and guest-friendly as possible. We’ve worked hard to create an in-town community where people can eat, shop, work, walk their dogs, catch a movie, grab some coffee, enjoy the spa, and attend world-class events like the AVP volleyball tournament and Cirque du Soleil – all in a safe and enjoyable atmosphere. Many of the decisions we make are to ensure that this atmosphere stays intact. That includes our motorcycle policy.
Sounds like a ban to me. You can’t ride through or park in our district but you can park on the edges and walk on over! Do the have a separate drinking fountain for bikers as well?
Code words: Kind of like what my friends from Cobb and Gwinnett who abhor MARTA say to me. They never have used Public Transit, and never will. You know, it is dangerous, and dirty. They tell me I am crazy, risking my life. Etc.
“though I can always distinguish those that say crowd but really mean race”
You can always distinguish what they really mean? Always? Sorry, but this sounds a bit like projecting one’s worldview onto others. Those lame others who aren’t ‘enlightened’ like the rest of us.
But, more importantly, why are these folks supposed to feel shame for choosing to frequent one area and not another? If I chose to not go to L5P because I lack the required number of piercings or amount of ink to fit in, does that mean I should feel shame as well?
Robbie, point taken, I wasn’t really meaning to speak in absolutes, but I did, so I have to take the flak.
I don’t care where people hang out. I do care when people are being racist, and I do think that is shameful. Social shame is a powerful mechanism of change.
And yes, maybe some people I know (not strangers) that I perceive to be not wanting to go somewhere b/c of race (instead of social group) are really just feeling uncomfortable being a minority position vs being racist. I’m glad you made me think about this more, b/c maybe next time I hear the comment about not wanting to go to ATL Stantion b/c of not my crowd, I’ll just flat out ask them if being a minority (ie a white in a large group of black) makes them uncomfortable. Maybe if they get a chance to talk about it, it would actually increase their comfort with the concept. And then I suspect there will be a few who just admit that they don’t like being around so many black people due to race. And then I’ll head off to Atlantic Station for a movie without them.
Re: Is the urban retail future actually a combination of the big-box and “authentic” local retail shops and restaurants?
Is the Main St model economically competitive? I think mall terminology applies; it’s probably the anchors that attract shoppers in quantity.
Re: developing or retaining “authenticity” in urban areas
Developers will eventually apply noise generating layers over the straight lines.
oh man, i remember going to buckhead to go clubbing in the late 90s until the early 2000s, it just got insane around 2001 or so
Enjoying the conversation about how to define or characterize “urban” and “authentic,” and can’t resist adding my two cents’ worth. A subject dear to my heart.
I think one aspect of the authenticity some of us crave in our downtown/commercial areas is a grittiness that occurs organically when there is true diversity–of economic circumstances, race and ethnicity, age and life stage, and last but not least, personal taste. That’s one reason my flesh crawls when I hear criticism of a residence or commercial property exterior as “not fitting in” or “not appropriate for our community.” (Ex: the sniping about the Decatur Diner) If it is here, then it’s by definition appropriate, UNLESS you are comfortable with a contrived community, in which case you wind up with an environment that feels (to some, at least) Disney-esque in all of the bad ways. That goes for people as well as the built environment. [Suggested reading: Team Rodent, How Disney Devours the World by Carl Hiassen.]
All of this is not to say I favor untrammeled, unregulated development/redevelopment. We need standards, but IMO they need to focus primarily on keeping street scapes scaled for humans, and encouraging walk-ability and direct, person-to-person interactions throughout each day; and stay away from imposing aesthetic preferences. (And they definitely should not conflate aesthetic value with historic value, a trap we’ve stepped into in Decatur from time to time, and should try to avoid.)
The grit I’m talking about has nothing to do with grime or crime. It’s a psychic sandiness that happens when people who are unlike each other, and may dislike each other, have to interact as neighbors. It doesn’t always feel pleasant, but it does remind us that we are walking in the real world and not some contrived environment where we can be artificially comfortable. Could it be that “downtown Oakhurst” feels more authentic to some, because it still has some of that grittiness? (A lot less than ten years ago, but some.)
It’s probably obvious that grit is something I value, it drew me to Decatur in the first place and I’ve seen it steadily diminishing over time. It seems inevitable, but I keep hoping it’s not.
Atlantic Station seemed totally grit-less to me when it first opened. On my last evening visit (last summer), it felt packed with psychic gravel, but just as contrived and unappealing as when it felt immaculate. There’s an organic process that hasn’t happened there, but maybe it will. (Manhattan has never felt grit-less to me, bolstering Scott’s case.) I watched them survey and pound the stakes to build Seaside, FL back in the day, looking upon it with hilarious contempt. On the one hand, I admit that today it feels less sterile than I ever thought it would, so there may be hope for Rosemary Beach and other, similar developments in the area. And the development certainly has been good for the Walton County economy. On the other hand, I still prefer Seagrove (the village adjacent to Seaside, founded in the 1930s), and considered it a regional tragedy when the Wheelhouse Restaurant closed.
Robert Venturi and Denise Scott-Brown called it “messy vitality”.
Another word is “urban life” and “sense of place”. This has been a great discussion of a vital topic.
I didn’t find Atlantic Station on the list of MARTA stations. I will refer to it as “Atlantic (no)Station” henceforth.
hilarious!
but just in case there are some readers who don’t know, AS was built on a polluted (brownfield status) old steel mill– not a priority stop when MARTA was mapped out:)
A very large and very polluted industrial wasteland. It was the site of Atlantic Steel Mills
Maybe “Atlantic Park” was the runner-up of appellations.
I’m mentally preparing for a 15 mph drive along The Belt Line(less). That will make for a nice 2 hour adventure; I’ve been to Atlantic (no)Station once too.
http://www.decaturmetro.com/2009/09/16/decatur-metro-commenter-tapped-as-beltline-ceo/
I was scanning a DOT doc extolling PPP and nearly fell over at this:
“Two 16-foot wide dedicated bicycle and transit lanes that can connect to the Metropolitan Atlanta Regional Transit Authority (MARTA)’s Arts Center rail station (thereby making the project a transit-oriented development (TOD)”
I’m stunned at the notion that Scottdale is a half-TOD.
http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/ipd/pdfs/int_ppp_case_studies_final_report_7-7-07.pdf
If you can be TOD without transit, then shall we call Decatur a TOD-WAT (… with actual transit)?
There is an AS shuttle that carries passengers for free back and forth to both AS and the nearby IKEA store from the nearby MARTA station. Very handy, especially in bad weather. But, the walking distance from the MARTA station to AS and IKEA is no big deal for me; I usually take the shuttle back to the station if I’m carrying purchases.
I love H&M I just wish they had put in a BIG one. I lived in Edinburgh where there are 2 H&M’s on the same street. I think that Atlantic station could be a great chance for a mix of some of the more interesting national chains and some funky locals.
If they took out the publix and put in a Trader Joe’s that alone would double foot traffic there. Some other great chains for that location would be: Forever 21, Zara (one at Perimeter), Would love to see Top Shop and some of the other fun British clothing stores here. Basically anything that that we don;t already have somewhere else in town would be nice. Part of the problem is that ATL is so saturated with cheap clothing (Old Navy, Gap etc..) we don’t want to pay more for stuff and local and small = costs more.