Moira Bucciarelli reminds us about the city’s new audio walking tour (mp3), which was mentioned in January’s Decatur Focus (pdf).  Here’s the Focus blurb, transcribed by Moira…

Are you interested in taking a 20-minute self-guided walking tour of downtown Decatur? Download Decatur’s audio tour from www.decaturga.com to your MP3 player, put on your favorite walking shoes and go. The tour begins at City Hall and ends at the old train depot.

The tour features some of Decatur’s history along with Lyn Menne’s observations about the city’s current growth and development. It also includes local musicians (the Dappled Grays and the Stonehouse Posse) and residents, and is narrated by David Hirt. Many thanks to Daren Wang for facilitating the process and to Moira Bucciarelli for putting it together. If you have ideas for other tours, please submit them to [email protected]

Honestly, it’s a very enjoyable and interesting tour, for old and new alike.

Next Stop…Decatur has a great pic of Decatur’s welcome sign at the intersection of Ponce de Leon Ave and Scott Boulevard circa 1950.

Looks like Decatur was all about cursive lettering and the Rotary Club back in the day!

Scott points out that Decatur was featured on CNN’s Issue #1 this afternoon in a segment about the real costs associated with living farther outside of a metropolitan area. In it, Decatur residents’ transportation costs are compared to those of distant Dacula.

Unfortunately, we don’t have the video, just the transcript. And its a little long, so I’ll post it in full in the continuation. Scott found the video!

Good press for our little city! Plus it continues to show that Decatur is on the right side of a long term trend in sustainable living.

Thanks Scott! Read the rest of this entry »

Looks like we’ve passed a significant threshold here at Decatur Metro. 100,000 page views in only 8 1/2 months! Not bad for a blog that covers a city of only 18,000.

Traffic has really picked up in the past few weeks, helping us reach the goal much sooner than anticipated.

Thanks to everyone that reads and comments. Over the past months, my focus for the blog has shifted from one that included a good deal of mocking opinion (mostly of DeKalb County) to one that now focuses mainly on Decatur development, events and politics.

Even though the more broad range, sarcastic stuff got a few more links on other sites (like when I was quoted on Slate.com very early on), I really wanted to make this site a place where people could stay up-to-date with what was going on in the city and hear what fellow residents thought about it. The AJC and county news sites have limited resources to cover Decatur and I knew in such an active, dense community, there was a lot of other stuff not being covered that people would be interested in hearing. Message boards have been great for many neighborhoods, but divide us up into districts, are somewhat inconsistent in what they cover, and can easily get out of control. In between those two entities is the gap that Decatur Metro and InDecatur have attempted to fill.

Whether you’ve been reading since the beginning (David and Catherine) or you’re a new comer to the site, I am thankful you are here and hope you continue visit. I’ve learned a lot about our city over the past months (from alcohol permits to zoning), due in large part to your input. So thank you for making this site so enjoyable for me.

Cheers to another 100,000!

This is the report I’ve been waiting for.

Early this year, when the city commission took up the issue of annexation to a packed house at city hall, the main concern that current residents voiced was in regard to accommodating an additional 500 students into an already crowded school system. The commission decided in that meeting that they needed to ask the superintendent/school board to look closely at the issue before the annexation initiative went any further.

Well, CDS finally has its report and its up on their website. Just like many previous school reports, this one was produced by Rosser. There’s a lot of good data in it and I urge every resident concerned about school capacity to take a look, but I will try to sum up.

From what I can deduce, if the city were to annex the entire proposed area, the real strain on the school system would be at the elementary level (K-3 & 4-5). I’ve heard some say that DHS is already “at capacity” but these charts don’t show that (see page 23 of the presentation). Even with annexation there still seems to be enough room at Renfroe and DHS. Also, its worth noting that even without annexation, Glennwood will still be over capacity by 2010.

As a result, the seven options given in this report have to do with accommodating these additional students in the lower grades. (Full details of these options can be found on pages 24-27 of the report.)

Option I – Move 5th graders to Renfroe and open four K-4 schools (Oakhurst, Clairemont, Winnona Park, Glennwood)

Option II – Move 4th and 5th graders to Renfroe and open four K-3 schools (same as above)

Option III – Open Westchester as a 4/5 academy (this doesn’t deal with the K-3 issue)

Option IV – Split 4/5 into two buildings and add 3rd graders to the mix. K-3 schools become K-2.

Option V – Make Glennwood K-5 and have four K-5 schools

Option VI – Open Westchester as “choice school” with K-5 open enrollment

Option VII – Open Westchester, have five K-4 schools (Oakhurst, Clairemont, Winnona Park, Glennwood) and move 5th graders to Renfroe.

As I said, check out the full presentation for more detail. With each option, the report also details potential positives and negatives that go along with it.

The report also states that the city will begin a PR campaign regarding annexation this summer and that support “for” and “against” annexation is evenly split at 45% with 10% undecided among residents. (It doesn’t specify whether that’s in the annexation area or within the current city limits though). Additionally, the earliest date for annexation would be School Year 2009/2010. (All of page 21)

The last pages gives next steps, which include many meetings and using GPS mapping to give CDS a more precise visual of where students in the annexation areas are coming from, down to the street level.

InDecatur morns the loss of Decatur High Stadium, with a full report from last night’s Decatur City Commission meeting where commissioners approved a new master plan for the high school complex.

Green space seems to be a key concern of the DHS master plan, with the biggest change being the replacement of the current parking lot behind the stadium with plans for a quad in the long term. See InDecatur’s post for many more details of the meeting including a bizarre altercation between the mayor and a resident identified as “Paul”, who “implied he knew why he was not being given the respect the Commission usually offered others, and would make that public.” Uh…OK.

David goes on to accept some of the blame for the stadium’s demise, along with other DHS alums. “We, the alumni of DHS and friends of history, have to take some blame here. Had we started a SAVE OUR STADIUM campaign back in late summer, when we first learned of the plan, and had we developed and presented alternative plans, this travesty might have been prevented.”

I, for one, like the new plan’s inclusion of more green space and the new auditorium, but do believe the stadium might have been saved through remodeling and incorporated into the new plan rather easily. Especially if the new men’s and women’s locker rooms, which was a main justification for a new stadium, will be housed in the new auditorium anyway [according to inDecatur].

The Decatur Stadium issue is a perfect example of the struggle preservationists are currently having with themselves over their own philosophy. For 50 years, preservationists have waved the flag of mixed-use development, maintaining green space and retaining character, because these were the qualities of the downtowns and neighborhoods that were under attack by urban renewal.

Today, the argument has been turned on its head.

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