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Originally Posted by jayden
This project is great for the area and paired with Toll Bros will make it one of the densest areas in Midtown. Ya'll complain about everything.
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Yes, this current crop of towers will be successful as offices and apartments and bring people into areas that used to be weed-filled empty lots, but they fail from a pure aesthetic point of view. Local newspapers used to have architecture critics, but those days are long gone, so there's no one left to teach the general public what to ask for in their built environment, and we fawn over what the latest crane will bring. I dread the development of the Tech Square lot across from the Biltmore. Years ago, there was an article in the AJC calling for that lot to act as a front yard for The Biltmore as a public park. That part of Midtown lacks any green space, and that lot could be a popular place for students to hang out like NYU's Washington Square.
I don't think developers should be getting a pass from this construction cycle. It's obvious from the towers built in the 1980s and 90s that have defined the character of Atlanta's skyline for the last 40-50 years, developers were aiming to make statements about Atlanta's rise as an international city. What statement are developers making now? It seems like they're saying our public transportation sucks, so they have to accommodate half of the square footage to an ugly parking podium that should probably occupy a plot down the block or underground, and the office/apartment component is going to be a bunch of odd window and balcony placements that don't allow for anything resembling symmetry, good proportions, or a nod to the historic architectural vernacular. All the roofs are flat with no cornice treatment let alone a celebratory top. Dare I say they're a high-rise version of a Jeff Fuqua development? I won't say that about Portman's building, but there are plenty of other nondescript examples within a couple of blocks of this development.