I think this is a Google Fiber truck?

Spotted near Ponce City Market, turning onto Ponce.

The fences are down and the some of the first tenants are opening at Ponce City Market in Atlanta, as 11Alive reports.  (I’d embed the video, but you all would kill me, because it starts automatically at launch).

As the site’s news page states…

 So you can walk hard-hat free around the property, shop Binders (who quietly opened their doors last week in our construction site!) take classes at General Assembly and drop your kids at Suzuki School in addition to grabbing your daily cup of coffee from Dancing Goats.  Because they’re all open or opening in the next three weeks!

“Well, that’s all well and good” you say, “but what’s up next”?  Well…

…we’re already looking ahead and our team is working tirelessly to deliver the next batch of tiered openings and lease announcements in the coming months.  First you’ll see announcements about more food hall purveyors and retailers in the big brick building as well as the BeltLine rail shed…then more office folks move in before end of year.  In spring of next year there will be a big wave of restaurants and the Central Food Hall will open its doors to the public along with the BeltLine bridge connection, the BeltLine rail shed and some retail followed by more retail throughout the rest of 2015 and lastly, the Roof at Ponce City Market. 

And if you’re ever in Midtown next year and need a little taste of West Ponce, drive over to PCM and swing by Dancing Goats and then take in a little Chai Pani in the food court.

Photo are rendering courtesy of Ponce City Market website

Check. It. Out.

Many of the Ponce City Market renderings too date have looked like something you could only enter on your Xbox.  Which I suppose is why I found this new, dramatic, sunset rendering so lovely and interesting.

And what’s all that stuff on the various roofs?  A golf course?  Chicken coops?  A merry-go-round?

Rendering courtesy of Silverman Construction

Dancing Goats Coffee Bar has been a Decatur retail success story for near on, what?  Five years now?  A mix of great coffee, good location and ample parking for both your car and rear-end make it one of the happening-est places in a city happening places.

In that time, the Washington-based coffee company – with a roasting plant here in Atlanta – has not added any other retail locations around metro Atlanta.  But that all changes today…

What Now Atlanta? reports…

Dancing Goats, a coffee bar in Decatur, will open a temporary store in the former auto-service bay area on the corner of Glen Iris and North Avenue at the former City Hall East site, according to Mike Ferguson, business development director for the coffee brand.

The coffee bar will relocate to a permanent 1,000-square-foot space in about two years, Ferguson told What Now Atlanta in a telephone interview Thursday.

Which leads to the obviously premature question of: is Ponce City Market the new Decatur??

Jamestown Properties’ planned renovations to the old Sears warehouse on Ponce de Leon Ave has even got the New York Times all atwitter.  Or at least paying attention.

Early blueprints make Ponce City Market look not unlike Chelsea Market, the renovated biscuit factory that leases space to the Food Network and other technology and media companies. It will contain high-ceilinged office space, a range of restaurants, a food market, apartments, exhibition spaces, a skywalk and perhaps even an amusement park, Jamestown says.

The plan calls for reducing the building’s square footage by nearly half, to 1.2 million square feet, constructing a parking garage with at least 2,000 spaces inside the structure and demolishing many internal walls and ceilings. But Jamestown says it will preserve the exterior and as much equipment as possible from the original Sears department store and distribution center. A giant electrical panel will become the backdrop for a bar, and a train trestle will be repurposed as a pedestrian walkway.

Maybe I just haven’t been paying attention, but the article sure makes it sound like Jamestown knows what it’s doing.  In addition to owning NYC’s Chelsea Market, they’ve dealt with renovations of the former New York Port Authority (which was recently purchased by Google), and a section of Chattanooga called “Warehouse Row“.

The Atlanta Business Chronicle reports that Jamestown Properties will put $180 million into the old City Hall East and turn it into Ponce City Market.  According to the ABC…

Early plans call for about 236,500 square feet of retail and 21,250 square feet for restaurants. Developers will also try to lure companies that want loft office space — a rarity in Atlanta. They’d offer 100,000 square feet floor plates and skyline views.

For a bit of context, North DeKalb Mall offers 635,000 square feet of retail, while Lenox Square has 1.5 million square feet.  However, the retail renderings remind me primarily of the Grove Arcade in Asheville, which is actually of similar size in terms of retail at 260,000 square feet.

Sounds like this old Sears and Roebuck building could be pretty dang cool once all is said and done.

A couple more rendering pics HERE.