But mixed in with the crowd were proponents of the plan, including city department heads, Beltline staff and supportive community members who want to see MARTA extend its eastside streetcar.
The $230-million project would lengthen the streetcar from downtown to Ponce City Market and is funded by More MARTA money — funds approved by Atlanta voters in 2016 to go toward transit expansion.
Supporters see rail transit along the city’s iconic trail as a way to alleviate pressure from the underused and unpopular MARTA public transportation system and as a way to connect dozens of Atlanta neighborhoods and reduce economic development disparities between them.
But since the Beltline’s inception, residents have grown to love the easily-traversed corridor that — in its most bustling stretches — is often shoulder-to-shoulder with foot traffic. Community members against the idea of light rail share concerns over the system’s noise and speed, cost to ride and ridership levels.
In a Monday editorial board meeting with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Beltline leadership said the project’s design is only 30% done, so there’s ample time to engage with impacted communities.
“(Since) the More MARTA sales tax was passed about eight years ago, there’s just been a gulf of new information — perhaps misinformation out there — about what Beltline transit is to be,” Beltline CEO Clyde Higgs said. “I just think the general public needs the information.”
“In this calendar year for sure, you will see efforts from Beltline, from MARTA, from the city just to do some level-setting so that people are all working from the same set of facts,” he said.
Organized opposition
When Mayor Shirley Franklin was pitched the Beltline project some 20 years ago by then-City Council President Cathy Woolard, Franklin said at the time that she didn’t want another massive infrastructure project with all the work she was pouring into the city’s water and sewer system.
Fast forward…
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