dangerous areas

[goozer]

Originally Posted by plessthanpointohfive

I didn't find the aquarium spectacular...its' nice but not awe inspiring...

In my opinion the Botanical Gardens are one of the best things to go to. They have art exhibits throughout the gardens. They usually have some sort of cocktail event going on over the weekend. Checkout the website in an earlier link I posted or just Google it.

I second the Botanical Gardens. I'm not a big plant person, but it is a suprisingly nice place to visit.

As for the aquarium, if you go you might want to shoot for 4pm-ish on a weekday to avoid the "school field trip" crowd and the regular weekend crowd. It is a much more enjoyable experience when you are not being crushed by a horde of people.

[rcsteiner]

Originally Posted by CityFan

It's the problem of people who give money to them. If NO ONE, I mean NO ONE, gives, they will not be there asking for money.

So why aren't there any cops nailing them for loitering? Or are there simply too many panhandlers and not enough cops?

[atlantagreg30127]

Originally Posted by rcsteiner

So why aren't there any cops nailing them for loitering? Or are there simply too many panhandlers and not enough cops?

There have been several occasions in the past where city leaders have told the police to "go out there and enforce the panhandling laws", and for a few days they do. Then, activists immediately start protesting and filing lawsuits against the city saying that they are discriminating against the homeless. Most of the time it stops at that, but sometimes it gets racial as most of the homeless downtown are black, and then they add the race issue to the lawsuit saying it's racial discrimination as well (forgetting apparently that all city leaders and our police chief are also black).

That aside, the last time they really enforced the vagrant laws, was right before the Aquarium opened. As soon as they started the enforcement, someone organized a whole slew of the vagrants downtown into marches around the yet unfinished Aquarium, and on TV they demanded that the city leave them alone, and, that the Aquarium hire "only the homeless" to work there. They then threatened to "shut the Aquarium down" if everyone didn't meet their demands. The guy who was leading it all wound up getting arrested for unrelated crimes (no kiddin'. Surprise), and it eventually quieted down, but it's pretty much what happens whenever they try to clean up the downtown area and in particular, the Five Points area.

At one point they had varied services set up near downtown such as food distribution centers, shelters, free psychological counciling, etc., and they would walk around passing out fliers to the vagrants down there directing them to these resources - which again were all free. The activists again protested even this, saying that the city was "trying to sweep away people who had the right to be downtown if they wanted". So, again, the city stopped.

So, they back off. Things go back to normal (which isn't good). This is also the reason why the city has pretty much abandoned the Five Points area and now focuses much of it's tourism efforts around Centennial Park, where some of the land is private, and privately-controlled security has more right to shoo away vagrants, and does so.

[antiquesmountainapache]

Try to go to Buckhead while you are here, also. This is one of the prettiest areas of Atlanta. Some places that might be overlooked are the Atlanta History Center and lunch at the Swan Coach House and a tour of the Georgia Governor's Mansion. The mansion features a large collection of Federal antiques and other objects from the state.

[bacmook]

can anybody tell me where to buy a verizon prepaid phone in the downtown area?
i got the feeling that there's a lack of shops!

[plessthanpointohfive]

There's one on Ponce across for City Hall East in Old Fourth Ward/Midtown. And there's one up in Buckhead but I can't remember the street. And one at Northlake Make...that's not downtown but...

[bhoffman]

The entire city of Atlanta is dangerous. It would take forever to list all the bad areas, you'd have to name practically every neighborhood. Nowhere is safe.

[Pappy&Me]

Originally Posted by rcsteiner

So why aren't there any cops nailing them for loitering? Or are there simply too many panhandlers and not enough cops?

Criminals killed most of the cops , JUST KIDDING ! Seems to be lots of cops and robbers shooting it out there though .