@gttx, jnihiser, rudyjk, etc - I think we all really agree.
I think everyone's right about the Westside. The apartments going up are cheap...but unless people want to/can start paying $3/$4/$5psf rents then this is basically all the city can afford to build, and I still think Elan is the best in class of new $2/sf infill apartments going up around the city. The traffic is horrendous and I'm not creative enough to envision what can be done about it (especially now with Howell Mill squeezed between White Provision and Elan, and in other parts). Walking is a pretty short distance though still quite hostile (I know for a fact there are some CNN and Coke employees who live in White Provision and actually walk to work quite frequently...maybe not in the dead of summer however).
That being said - Walkable urban paradise? Certainly not. Huge transformation and major step in the right direction for Atlanta? Yes - and that's why people are taking note.
The shopping demographic is Buckhead centric - residents come straight down Howell Mill. There is no other way Sid/Ann Mashburn, Kolo Collection, Room & Board, and all of the other stores around there survive on 1-3 mile radius demographics alone (same goes for restaurants). Sales are strong, some of the strongest in the region actually (shop by shop case - many are in the $500-$1,000psf range in sales while others are in the $350-$500 range, all north of the average for malls in this country, and rents reflect this to a degree - high $20s to low $40s along Howell Mill and in Westside...the boutique office rents there are also neck and neck with class A space in MT/Buckhead). Shoppers of the Westside are buyers - strong conversion, high price points; high walk-by traffic is not totally needed (in contrast many people at Lenox are strollers/loiterers rather than buyers due to the number of options that allow people to go without a special item in mind, so foot traffic is extreme). Arguably the most concentrated collection of notable/good restaurants and eateries in metro Atlanta is on the westside.
Units at White Provisions sell for ~$250psf. If you are accustomed to something "much cooler" that you can find in the New Yorks and San Franciscos of the world, you might be inclined to say something negative about the condos at WP, but then again you would be paying $1500++psf for these places in said cities (and likely get less square footage and no "view" as nearly all units have at WP). I think this is the attraction (at least for out of town buyers/new residents). It really is quite a shocker Jamestown has had trouble selling those condos - not yet sold out and years later...at $200-$300psf. I think the mentality in Atlanta is that this is high, and only deserving of a Peachtree address...quite ridiculous because most condo developers lose money due to this attitude. As cheap as some of us think Novare and some other more "admired" Atlanta condos are by big city standards (I won't name other buildings, but others can and have), their pricing is so cheap that developers still can't turn a decent profit, if at all...arguably most have lost money building condos over the past 10 years!
And from my ever evolving perspective, I always lived in Midtown because I craved walkability. If I ever moved back to Atlanta, I would probably give in to the car=necessary realization and choose a relatively "cool" neighborhood rather than Midtown. I bet it would be between Inman Park, Decatur, or the Westside. I want to like Castleberry Hill but it can still be shady and there's nothing there (and I don't need to spend $400K+ in Atlanta for a remote loft in a district that can't seem to come alive). Midtown is "walkable", but where do you walk to? There's still nothing there. Inman Park has far more places to hobnob, eat, shop, drink, etc, and it's on the Beltline. Decatur too, but it's detached. Westside is a contained version of this with city views, and so it appeals.
RE: malls/retail dying, etc
I was originally tempted to respond to Libertarian's post but thought better, now I am
. Fortress malls such as Lenox are of course doing as well as prime urban street retail in 24 hour markets nowadays (in fact the Lenoxes of the world are still the high end "street retail" for the masses in America). It's the generic vintage 70s and 80s malls in declining suburbs (just as declining cities lost their retail...it's all about the demographics) or suburbs undergoing rapid demographic changes too drastic for landlords to keep up (Gwinnett Place, South Dekalb, Cobb Galleria to a lesser extent, Southlake, etc).
Also, internet retail is as subjective a trend as retail trends in general. I would think most people prefer to shop for clothes, furniture and other soft/hard goods in person, and I would think this is more true the higher the price, as well as for discount middleman retailers such as TJ Maxx and ROSS where the expansive, yet limited inventory is in stores only and the draw is finding good clothing that fits for a bargain. Amazon/Best Buy is a different story altogether. I don't need to see the latest Brad Thor or Sylvia Day book in person and I know that basically all 42" LCDs look and fit the same nowadays.
Prev
Linear Mode
