Atlanta has an abundance of trees and
green spaces that add natural beauty to
metropolitan cityscapes.
Woodruff Park
Woodruff
Park
underwent a $5 million facelift courtesy of a
grant from the Robert W. Woodruff Foundation,
and became a landmark spot in the heart of
Downtown Atlanta. Located on Peachtree Street
between Edgewood and Auburn Avenues, the park’s
designers built the park around a 30-foot
fountain, a waterfall, benches and a music
pavilion. In the park’s western corner,
officials erected a bronze statue, “Atlanta
From the Ashes,” a figure of a woman and a
bird, which represented Atlanta’s comeback
after the Civil War. www.woodruffpark.com
Centennial Olympic Park
The privately
funded, state-owned $78 million
Centennial Olympic Park, a 21-acre
green space located Downtown adjacent to the
Georgia World Congress Center (GWCC), Georgia
Dome and CNN Center, served as a central
gathering place during the Olympic Games. The
park, the largest center-city park developed in
the U.S. in 20 years, became a permanent civic
symbol and community focal point as well as a
long-term catalyst and anchor for new
residential and commercial development.
The park
connects the GWCC and the Georgia Dome to the
Downtown hotel district, and the park’s
distinctive features captivate guests. The
Fountain of Rings is the world’s largest
fountain utilizing the Olympic symbol of five
interconnecting rings. Other park features
include a court of 24 flags, one Olympic flag
and 23 flags honoring the host countries of the
modern Games; the Southern Company
Amphitheater, a natural amphitheater seating
1,200; a six-acre great lawn; and pathways of
commemorative bricks that stitch together
pieces of the park’s quilt-like landscape.
Centennial Plaza, which comprises the
amphitheater and the fountain, features daily,
musical water shows. www.centennialpark.com
Georgia International
Plaza
Right next door to the Centennial
Olympic Park sits Georgia International
Plaza, a six-acre landscaped
urban park with walkways, park-type lighting
and a stately fountain. The plaza, which the
state of Georgia and parking revenues finance,
is an attractive front door to the GWCC and the
Georgia Dome campus. The pedestrian plaza
serves as a gathering place for visitors and
conventioneers and is home to the “Flair Across
America,” a fantastic sculpture.
Freedom Park
In southeast Atlanta,
adjacent to Freedom
Parkway near
the Carter Center, Freedom
Park, a 45-acre park with
biking and jogging paths, underwent a $13
million, federally funded renovation. The city
needed an arboreal gateway with pedestrian and
bicycle trails and access to the Atlanta/Stone
Mountain Trail. Freedom Parkway, owned by the
state of Georgia and located on the site of
former Presidential Parkway, responded with the
Freedom Trail, which provided access to all
facilities in and around Freedom Park and a
trail that connected the Atlanta/Stone Mountain
loop to downtown Atlanta. http://www.freedompark.org/
Hardy Ivy Park
Hardy Ivy
Park rests at the point where
Peachtree and West Peachtree Streets split. The
park serves as a small reminder of the city’s
first permanent settler, Hardy Ivy. Pieces of
the city’s old Carnegie Library now make up a
beautiful pavilion in the center of the
park.
Other green
spaces in the Downtown include:
Hurt Park
Hurt Park
Edgewood Avenue and
Courtland Street within walking distance of
Five Points Station, surrounded by Georgia
State University campus on three sides.
Georgia Plaza Park
Georgia
Plaza Park
On Central Avenue
and Mitchell Street, just outside the Georgia
State Capitol and Museum and City Hall.
