If it wasn’t too busy to pay attention, Atlanta might still be reeling from the recent one-two punches it recently received from author James Howard Kunstler and musician-turned-urban biker David Byrne after the New Urbanism conference set up shop in downtown last month.

But today, what’s left of the dwindling Atlanta blogosphere (seriously, it’s hurting these days.  we lost yet another yesterday – good luck in Chi-town Ben!) is peeing its collective pants over a nicely articulated piece by Christa at Pecanne Log, who decided to write the response to “America’s Greatest Urban Minds” herself after no one else stepped up to the plate.

Here’s a tangy, yet undeniably sweet taste of her post “There’s nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so”…

I also HATE when people compare Atlanta to other cities, even indirectly. Sometimes I get fired up and do this myself, and then I hate myself for it. I haven’t lived in that many other cities, so what do I really know? And if people want a city where they don’t have to have a car, or where they can be cooler than literally everyone else in the United States, or where they have more job opportunities in a particular industry, or where there are New England autumns, or where all the big policy problems are already solved, then Atlanta just isn’t going to be able to fulfill that need (even Decatur can’t provide a good Connecticut fall experience, as much as it tries). That’s cool! Do what you need to do! But when there’s some Atlanta vs. Denver, or Atlanta vs. whoever else debate, the cities just don’t usually line up enough to make any real comparisons. It becomes just a subjective exercise in what one wants out of a city.

Decatur Connecticut Fall Experience Festival!  Who’s with me!?

On his recent stop in Atlanta for the Congress for the New Urbanism conference, author James Howard Kunstler took a time to hit the streets of downtown Atlanta for a little walking tour.  The resulting picture diary he created HERE gives renewed meaning to the phrase “brutally honest”.  (Get it?  Because of all the Brutalist Architecture??)

You probably won’t ever hear these sorts of descriptors on the Atlanta Segway Tour…

• “The Soffit terminates at the HVAC vent. Nice for wino shelter in wintertime.”
• “Overhead, gerbil chute. Ahead to left, WTF??? A giant tape measure suspended over an escalator???”
• “Ingress / Egress for cars. Humans need not apply.”
• “Forensic pathology lab? Fuhrerbunker? No. Main Atlanta Library”

Only Broad Street gets any love.  The rest is relegated to the scrapheap of 1970s concrete.

h/t: Fresh Loaf