Alternative Land Use Futures: Metropolitan Atlanta 2025

Abstract

The purpose of this graduate planning studio was to inform the ongoing regional discussion of possible land use futures for the Atlanta region. This project is intended to help citizens and decision makers understand the scope and type of the land use changes needed to accommodate likely future growth. This project is designed to reinforce other similar efforts that are looking at regional land use issues, such as the Georgia Regional Transportation Authority’s Northern Subarea Study and the Metropolitan Atlanta Chamber of Commerce’s Regional Land Use Vision. Hopefully, the Atlanta Regional Commission will be able to draw from all of these efforts as it prepares the 2030 Regional Development Plan and Regional Transportation Plan. The purpose of this project was not to produce an ideal or optimal plan, but to construct and test a series of distinct alternatives. While the project was careful to use officially prepared population and employment estimates and the best available information on existing land use, students were explicitly instructed not to consider the political feasibility of implementing their alternatives. The alternatives are best thought of as a series of “If… Then” propositions. They are meant to help us understand how an additional 1.1 million residents could be accommodated and what the consequences of the alternative patterns would be.