To Woo Millennials, Atlanta Considers Covering Highways With Parks

January 1,2019

Cameron McWhirter, The Wall Street Journal

Leaders of this southern city want to draw more young workers, and their strategy includes covering congested downtown highways with acres of green park land.

Jennifer Ball, who works with a business group promoting a plan to cover over a section of interstate downtown, said cities such as Atlanta that in the past neglected their urban centers need to make improvements to compete for tech jobs and millennials.

“The urban core just has to be attractive,” she said.

[...]

The “Stitch” plan—which preliminary cost estimates put at more than $300 million—would create about 14 acres of new park land, attract businesses and apartment complexes and revive an area “that long lost its luster,” said A.J. Robinson, president of Central Atlanta Progress, the group pushing the Stitch.

“We decided we needed to reconnect what the interstate disconnected,” he said.

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