Sprawled Out in Atlanta (Dallas, Clayton: fit in, school districts, living)

[Iconographer]

Originally Posted by Novadhd5150

You want to talk about sprawl , drive around DC metro.

THANK YOU. I'm sick to death of Atlanta being singled out for this. I've lived in four other cities, including the one you reference. In terms of traffic, there's not a dime's worth of difference.

[true_wu]

Originally Posted by Bor Roll

...And the hundreds-of-millions of dollars t GDOT/SRTA is about to spend on the I-75 South managed lanes in Henry County (where EVERYBODY pays, not just single-occupant vehicles)...and the hundreds-of-millions of dollars that GDOT/SRTA is about to spend to extend the I-85 HOT lanes, etc, etc...

The problem is not necessarily that the State of Georgia is spending hundreds-of-millions (if not billions) of dollars on building toll lanes alongside some of the busiest stretches of freeway in the metro area.

The problem is that the State of Georgia is spending hundreds-of-millions (if not billions) of dollars on toll lanes without spending so much as a dime on improving, upgrading and expanding the Atlanta region's vastly-undersized and severely-ailing bus and rail transit network.

The toll lanes only provide a way to escape from the worsening traffic jams in your vehicle if one is willing and/or financially able to pay potentially-exorbitant tolls (tolls that are likely to exceed $1.00-per-mile in the not-too-distant future). The toll lanes can maybe just slightly improve traffic but are by no means a cure-all for improving traffic congestion and mobility on a large-scale.

I heard those stats recited before, but those stats are extremely-misleading as Atlanta (with its overdependence on curvy, winding and meandering 2-lane roads) has nowhere near the metropolitan road network that Los Angeles has (with its grid network of surface roads and much more comprehensive freeway network).

Because of the big freeway widening project back in the 1980's, people often think that Atlanta has this comprehensive road network, but for the most part, Atlanta has only a relative few multi-lane freeways and even fewer multi-lane surface roads anchoring a curvy maze of winding and often-discontinuous 2-lane roads.

The winding and discontinuous network of mostly 2-lane roads (along with the lack of transit outside of the I-285 Perimeter) is one of the major reasons why metro Atlanta is so overly-dependent on its freeway network which is politically-restricted from being further expanded.


There's not much chance of a spurge of large-scale roadbuilding occurring in the Atlanta region as the region's past knack of building roads to generate traffic (and severe congestion) to speculative real estate developments has pretty much turned the public against further large-scale roadbuilding efforts.

There's also increasing construction of denser real estate development going on in the Atlanta region. The only problem is that the very-limited road network can't adequately handle the increased traffic that denser real estate development generates without adequate transit service.

Building high and higher-density development on an already severely-congested very-limited road network without adequate transit service is basically like building transit-oriented development without the transit....Building transit-oriented development without transit makes traffic even worse than it would be with lower-density development on a very-limited road network.

Metro Atlanta's biggest problem is trying to use a severely-constricted road network with very-little or no transit.

I have family that live in the Atlanta area and the thing that I noticed along with road network is that most people live in houses. In Dallas and for that matter most of the metroplex half of the population live in a muli-family development. Along with a freeway and tollway system that goes EVERYWHERE, and almost all of the non residential surface roads are six lanes even out in the suburbs.

Traffic is also reduced by have many job centers out of the CBD.

[AtlantaIsHot]

This article is discussing the problem but doesn't seem to want to touch the real issue of the primary CAUSE of growing poverty. Over the past 14 years we have had a net zero in job creation. We STILL have not recovered the SAME jobs we had in the year 1999. Yet, immigration has kept on at 1,000,000 per year, even though the native born population increased as well. There have not been enough jobs to go around and yet our labor market is flooded. These immigrants are moving to suburbs these days, which explains the rapid rise in poverty in suburban areas. There is NO surprise in suburban poverty. Not only is immigration too high, it is also the WRONG immigration. Our policies favor low-skill, ALREADY POOR, poorly-educated immigrants. Immigrants that are pouring into the U.S. lack education and are poor laborers for the most part. The immigrants that are pouring into the country use public support far above the mean population. The current immigrants are not growing their incomes enough to close the gap-ever. They NEVER earn enough to take them to the middle class. For example, 60% of Hispanics never get a high school diploma, let alone a college degree. This is true in their own countries as well. Mostly due to a social stigma toward education. My question is why does it surprise people? What did they expect would happen?

[cwkimbro]

Originally Posted by AtlantaIsHot

This article is discussing the problem but doesn't seem to want to touch the real issue of the primary CAUSE of growing poverty. Over the past 14 years we have had a net zero in job creation. We STILL have not recovered the SAME jobs we had in the year 1999. Yet, immigration has kept on at 1,000,000 per year, even though the native born population increased as well. There have not been enough jobs to go around and yet our labor market is flooded. These immigrants are moving to suburbs these days, which explains the rapid rise in poverty in suburban areas. There is NO surprise in suburban poverty. Not only is immigration too high, it is also the WRONG immigration. Our policies favor low-skill, ALREADY POOR, poorly-educated immigrants. Immigrants that are pouring into the U.S. lack education and are poor laborers for the most part. The immigrants that are pouring into the country use public support far above the mean population. The current immigrants are not growing their incomes enough to close the gap-ever. They NEVER earn enough to take them to the middle class. For example, 60% of Hispanics never get a high school diploma, let alone a college degree. This is true in their own countries as well. Mostly due to a social stigma toward education. My question is why does it surprise people? What did they expect would happen?

Quarter_q42013.swf

In Dec 2013 our current level of employment has us back to where we were in mid-2007 before the job crash with the exception of a few seasonal peaks. I haven't seen the updated date, but we should actually be right where we left off when the recession occurred. This means the only additional lsot ground to make up for is for the growth we had since the recession, so there are reasons to start being posititve again

It is true we have few social safety nets in Georgia outside ones mandated by the federal government.... for better and worse.

This means we have deeper recessions and better grown in off years.

Our employment growth rate for 2013 and so far in 2014 is already out-competing the rest of the country and we are already back in the top 5 of major metros for the employment growth rate.

I'm not even going to address the poor stereotypes of immigrants.

[bu2]

Originally Posted by JoeTarheel

Really? I would love to see your source for that one.

You ever flown over Atlanta?

Even try looking at a key map and compare it to Dallas or Houston.

[arjay57]

Originally Posted by LovinDecatur

THANK YOU. I'm sick to death of Atlanta being singled out for this. I've lived in four other cities, including the one you reference. In terms of traffic, there's not a dime's worth of difference.

Totally agree.

The dweeb who coined the phrase "poster child for sprawl" ought to be locked up in the same padded cell with the wizards who came up with "city too busy to hate", "black mecca," etc.

For therapy they will sit in a circle and shout ridiculous slogans at each other for 14 hours a day.

[Saintmarks]

Originally Posted by true_wu

I have family that live in the Atlanta area and the thing that I noticed along with road network is that most people live in houses. In Dallas and for that matter most of the metroplex half of the population live in a muli-family development. Along with a freeway and tollway system that goes EVERYWHERE, and almost all of the non residential surface roads are six lanes even out in the suburbs.

Traffic is also reduced by have many job centers out of the CBD.

Have spent most of my adult life in either the Atlanta area or the DFW metroplex. Don't have hard and fast statistics at my finger tips, but from my vantage point, would say they are about equal in the amount of single family residences as a percentage of the whole.

Dallas does have the freeway network beyond the core city that makes moving across the burbs much easier, but the commute from burbs to city center is about the same. The flat prairie surrounding Dallas has made it easier to build more of a grid system of arterial roads than the hills and dales of Atlanta has allowed. Other than that, you have two cities that are pretty much twins.

[JoeTarheel]

Originally Posted by bu2

You ever flown over Atlanta?

Even try looking at a key map and compare it to Dallas or Houston.

Yes I have...many times, and I know that the massive tree cover hides a lot of the development around Atlanta. Saying that Atlanta development is more spotty than other metros is an opinion, so there is no source for the statement.

It's hilarious that you give Dallas and Houston as examples of more dense development. My opinion is that it is exactly the opposite, but that's the thing about opinions. We all have them.

[jsvh]

Atlanta is far from the only place with sprawl. But we have some of the worst. Few ranking don't have Atlanta in the top 10 worst sprawl.

[AtlantaIsHot]

Originally Posted by Novadhd5150

You want to talk about sprawl , drive around DC metro.

You think D.C. has more sprawl than Atlanta?? Not hardly... Atlanta's developed land area covered close to 2,000 sq. miles in 2000. D.C. at 2000 was about 1,157 sq. miles. Both have undoubtedly increased since then. Before you resort to chest-thumping and bragging (if one CAN brag about something like that), try to get correct info first. Childish, juvenile "mine's bigger than yours" has no place in adult debate/conversation.