Not a lot of new info in this WABE article, but it does point out that both Druid Hills and the Medlock neighborhoods have been sort of stranded in the larger cityhood conversation and they very quickly need to figure out where they want to go.
We need to act rather than be acted upon,” says Justin Critz of the Druid Hills Civic Association. He says the group is asking its 4,400 homeowners and renters to pay attention to what is going on in the cityhood debate. Critz says the association is gathering information and putting it out to residents.
That is also happening in Medlock Park, a neighborhood with some 1300 homes near the Decatur city line. Lynn Ganim, acting president of the Medlock Area Neighborhood Association, says, “We have no clue what sort of power we have or what could happen to us, but we want to make sure that people are educated about options.”
Image how great the future will be if we can keep our city limits small, our schools responsive and our community engaged when the rest of Dekalb is filled with sprawling new cities wondering how to be as cool as Decatur.
“We need to act rather than be acted upon,” says Justin Critz
Let’s avoid this type of reaction and keep Decatur small.
Agreed. The best part about that is that we can keep it “small” and yet still increase our tax base because we have a core urban fabric that will allow for much more commercial development. We can go up. In a sprawly suburban world with infrastructure that doesn’t allow density, these cities will have trouble sustaining themselves on low-density commercial and residential only. We can “grow” and still be “small.”
i have few non-first world complaints about our lovely city, but lack of a clear and obvious, flag waving campaign to recruit white collar creative and tech “Industries of the Mind” businesses to locate here is one of my biggest gripes. selling Decatur to those sectors should be a relatively easy task.
new developments like the Callaway project should be required to have X amounts of office space in their master plans (ala Ponce City Market), and we still have parcels of land that could be developed or redeveloped as a Silicon Alley or somesuch thing.
love seeing the density grow, but it remains way lopsided with residential and restaurant/retail.
Agreed. Pre-recession developers told us that we were not a great office market. Post-recession office tenants are looking for areas just like Decatur that will attract smart young employees. It’s time to get them here. If Ponce City Market can fill up their gobs of office space, there is no reason that new office development would not work here, particularly with our transit advantage.
“If Ponce City Market can fill up their gobs of office space, there is no reason that new office development would not work here, particularly with our transit advantage.”
Wouldn’t the proposed development on the Avondale MARTA property be a natural for office/mixed use, albeit on a smaller scale? Also, interesting to note that State Farm is greatly expanding it’s presence here and moving from car-dependent John’s Creek to property than conjoins the Dunwoody MARTA station.
I had lunch the other day with a downtown development authority officer for another small city in the metro area, and she said the exact same thing. The market had taken care of residential needs for young professionals, and the DDA is focusing much of its efforts on attracting business. They are really pushing the large, growing and educated local workforce as a selling point in trying to convince companies why they should relocate or open another office there.
very good to hear
I hope this is true, but if it is, shouldn’t we be seeing the existing office buildings undergoing some extensive remodeling? Or has that already happened and I just didn’t notice?
This was researched pretty extensively during the 2010 Strategic Plan process, identifying the basic challenges we face.
1. Decatur has very limited quantities of the kind of Class A office space sought by “big fish” tenants.
2. Decatur does not have the easy locational access sought by “big fish” tenants, save for local institutions like Emory.
3. Decatur’s best prospects lie in small businesses, especially creative and tech, as Rick mentions. However, we lack the kind of “funky space” (often old and cheaper) typically on the wish list of such firms.
Thus, the disconnect that mandating more office space doesn’t necessarily solve. Buttoned down, top-drawer space won’t draw the big fish because they object to our location (which, admittedly, could change if attitudes about Marta change); new funky space won’t necessarily draw a lot of start-ups because it’ll be new and, therefore, probably not cheap.
In short, it’s a challenge.
“Buttoned down, top-drawer space won’t draw the big fish because they object to our location (which, admittedly, could change if attitudes about Marta change);”
I assume you are referring to location in terms of difficulty in getting here, and I don’t disagree. But what about Ponce City Market, which is in what I consider a very crappy location in terms of access and I’m assuming is not exactly cheap?
I’m not aware of Ponce City landing much in the way of the more “corporate,” big fish crowd, which I think reflects the same location challenge that Decatur faces. But with the smaller firms, especially tech and creative, I’m sensing that they’re getting the more established of them rather than the start-ups and that they’re doing so by leveraging the rather immense hipness factor associated with the building, its history, and what they’re doing with it.
If Decatur had a huge old brick building oozing curious character, I think we’d be seeing a different dynamic.
“If Decatur had a huge old brick building oozing curious character, I think we’d be seeing a different dynamic.”
But we have Brick Store, Kimball House, Leons, Paper Plane, just to name a few. Probably the key advantage PCM has, though, is its proximity to the Belt Line.
I don’t disagree; just that the discussion of assets is different than the discussion of liabilities. We do have some solid things going for us — and perhaps the market assessment is out of date, as Warren notes — but that doesn’t necessarily make prospect objections go away when they’re talking with a leasing agent. They’re still there, from what I’ve heard. Overcoming them is a process.
Scott, I believe Ponce City Market was able to land a couple of big tenants, Cardlytics and Mail Chimp being the biggest names. Not old school companies, but still big tech firms. PCM is such a unique situation though. The redevelopment of that building, on top of the Eastside trail, has literally led to redevelopment of an entire neighborhood (around the O4W park).
I would argue that the “big fish” analysis is outdated. Sure, we aren’t going to get the headquarters of Proctor & Gamble, but that’s not who we should be targeting anyway. Again, the example of Ponce City Market has shown us that tomorrow’s new big fish are looking for very different prerequisites than they used to when it comes to office space and particularly location. We got that video game company, so that was start (although they’ve laid most everyone off, right?)
The building next to Chik-fil-a is a great example of older “funky” space that was re-done to attract new users. True that there aren’t a lot of other examples. No one said it was going to be easy but I’m just agreeing with Rick that it makes sense to go after this market. With more rental living units coming on line, downtown Decatur becomes an even more attractive place for young professionals and thus more attractive for employers of young professionals.
It’s an incredibly difficult task to attract those types of tenants. When Decatur recruited CCP Games it was a huge deal, simply because it was the first large-scale technology firm to set up shop downtown. They cited a lot of the amenities Decaturites love in their decision, including calling out the Brick Store by name. Unfortunately the company has not fared well and had to downsize.
There’s fierce competition to land both big name and cutting edge commercial tenants. Midtown, Buckhead, Alpharetta, Sandy Springs and others fight to lure them into those neighborhoods. And it’s one of those situations where success breeds success. Commercial tenants like to be around other similar companies, and it’s really hard to find someone willing to take a chance on a new area.
The closest thing Decatur has to a cool environment that can attract commercial tenants is East Decatur Station off of New Street. But even that’s pretty much built out. I actually think the ACE building next door could be a good opportunity for the city. The city could hold the fort and keep it’s zoning commercial/industrial, and look for someone with vision to expand the East Decatur Station vibe next door.
Google “Alpharetta seeding startups to encourage job growth.” Do we have anything close to this sort of concerted effort to encourage job growth here? Again, the dynamics will certainly be different, but what are we doing to stay competitive around here besides building apartments? Not being snarky – it’s a serious question.
I have often thought similar ideas. Just as Georgia Tech has very successful models for recruiting and supporting early stage tech companies (shared space and infrastructure, low rent), it seems that Decatur could capitalize on what seems to be a talent space at the intersection of creativity and technology to do something similar. I don’t know the funding mechanism (obtain a grant to offer subsidies for rent, or start a program?) but the talent pool seems to be present.
Re: the cost of land/space comment above. I have a suspicion, completely unsupported by data, that some of our in-town office towers have vacant space. Just from observations looking at windows . Example — 315 W Ponce advertises storage space …
+1000
+1!!!!
“… when the rest of Dekalb is filled with sprawling new cities wondering how to be as cool as Decatur.”
Any newly incorporated city in DeKalb will never have the opportunity to be as cool as Decatur as long as Georgia constitutionally prohibits them from establishing their own city school district.