Atlanta becomes 6th largest metro in the US

[unknown1]

If only we could get some transit upgrades so it doesn't take 45 minutes to go to the grocery store.

Atlanta metro area now 6th largest in U.S., Census Bureau estimates

Metro Atlanta has leapfrogged both Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia to become the nation’s sixth-largest metropolitan region. While not the fastest-growing metro area in the country, the Atlanta metro had the third-largest total population increase in the country between 2022 and 2023, the...

www.ajc.com

 

[CEE DOG]

MARTA should have had the train running from Atlanta to La Grange, up 75 to Rome, down 20 to Augusta and back towards the Bama line by now. The rednecks of Georgia set Atlanta back decades ago and yet it still continues to grow. At some point they gotta realize without Atlanta the state of Georgia is useless.

 

[buckwheat1911]

Cool! Atlanta and DC are great places for AA's. What's drawing people to Atlanta? The entertainment industry, Fortune 500 companies, or business startups?

 

[unknown1]

Marta has issues managing their funds. And it's hard for them to do much of anything rail wise because CSX and Norfolk Southern own all the rails and refuse to share with them. There was supposed to be a commuter rail line that ran from Morrow to the airport but Norfolk Southern shut that down. It's the same issue Amtrak has here, they have to use NS rails so they have to play by NS rules. Thus, a city this size only having ONE rail line that runs between NYC and New Orleans. CSX owns all of those lines that run from Atlanta down through LaGrange and Columbus down to Waycross (which is where the largest railyard in the southeast is). They have a busy intermodal yard in Fairburn along that line (https://www.herzog.com/project/csx-intermodal-fairburn-capacity-expansion/) and they're about to build a huge one in LaGrange that'll be along that line as well. (https://www.lagrangenews.com/2024/01/13/lagranges-planned-inland-port-to-have-major-impact/) They're not going to share that with passenger rail... that port freight is going to be booming.

It would take something like what Brightline is doing in Florida or out west for it to really happen. Laying new heavy rail is wild expensive considering how dense the city is now. Folks in the suburbs really don't want Marta there either... if we've being honest lol. Folks that move to areas like Alpharetta, Douglasville/Villa Rica, Acworth, etc... do it for a reason. Laying that much rail at this point will be crazy expensive... that HSR line they're building in California between SF and LA has something like 100 billion in overages and they're nowhere near done.

 

[unknown1]

Cool! Atlanta and DC are great places for AA's. What's drawing people to Atlanta? The entertainment industry, Fortune 500 companies, or business startups?

All of the above... plus the fact that, even though the cost of living is rising here daily, it's still more affordable than it was for those moving from the Northeast and from out west. Anyone around here could tell you the amount of those black and yellow NYC tags have just become obnoxiously common. When you can get, here, for 425K... they may have had to pay north of a million for and in a much worse neighborhood.

There's a huge boom of black owned businesses here though, I'll definitely say that. From retail to restaurants to food trucks... a lot of people feel like they can become successful here because a lot of other people do exactly that. For the most part, you can dodge the high crime areas and pick an area that suits your needs for schools if you have kids. Could be South Fulton (which, the Sandtown area is very slept on), or it could be Alpharetta. You can find whatever suits you really lol.

Also, a lot of black folks that have money love being able to be around the same. There are a lot of neighborhoods here now in black areas where a white pizza delivery man would be mind blown to know it's an all black neighborhood after seeing the houses. Tech here is in it's infancy and probably the worst possible timing with AI about to take over.

 

[buckwheat1911]

All of the above... plus the fact that, even though the cost of living is rising here daily, it's still more affordable than it was for those moving from the Northeast and from out west. Anyone around here could tell you the amount of those black and yellow NYC tags have just become obnoxiously common. When you can get, here, for 425K... they may have had to pay north of a million for and in a much worse neighborhood.

There's a huge boom of black owned businesses here though, I'll definitely say that. From retail to restaurants to food trucks... a lot of people feel like they can become successful here because a lot of other people do exactly that. For the most part, you can dodge the high crime areas and pick an area that suits your needs for schools if you have kids. Could be South Fulton (which, the Sandtown area is very slept on), or it could be Alpharetta. You can find whatever suits you really lol.

Also, a lot of black folks that have money love being able to be around the same. There are a lot of neighborhoods here now in black areas where a white pizza delivery man would be mind blown to know it's an all black neighborhood after seeing the houses. Tech here is in it's infancy and probably the worst possible timing with AI about to take over.

cool. We have a lot of black areas in the DMV that have nice black neighborhoods.

 

[unknown1]

Yea I lived in DC... most of the areas popping up in the burbs here are similar to what PG County is there. I think a large difference though is that many of those moving here are renting where as many up there own. There was a report a few days ago that showed how 3 corporations own over 19,000 residential properties in the ATL metro... more than anywhere else in the country.

Once they started losing money from commercial real estate after Covid... they started dabbling in residential. Now you have whole ass neighborhoods being built that are never put up for sale... only for rent. 3BR Homes, 2BA for $2700+ a month. HOA fees on top of that. That didn't use to be the reason that folks move here... but it's definitely how it is now if you want to live in a decent area.