Tell me about Hotlanta.

[democracyindanger]

I'm interviewing with a company there next week. All I know is that Coca-Cola HQ is there, and that it's called Hotlanta. Or 'lanta.

Seasonal climate? Everybody live in the suburbs? Cool neighborhoods in the city to live?

I'd be moving from SF, if that matters. Any responses appreciated.

[CottonBear]

1. Atlanta is big and varied and surrounded by a circular interstate highway

called I-285 or simply the Perimeter. (Once, one of our Atlanta Braves pitchers, who was not a native of this country or used to Atlanta traffic, got lost on the perimeter and drove completely around it several times thus missing the start of the game he was supoosed to pitch!)

Inside the Perimeter is mostly urban and BLUE. Outside the Perimeter is mostly suburban and RED. There are exceptions to this rule. There is public transit in the Metro Atlanta area but not in the suburbs except for a few express bus line. Amtrak has a station in downtown Atlanta. MARTA is the transit authority (train and bus.) You'll need a car in order to leave the inner Perimeter area by highway. The MARTA train connects to the airport which is the world's busiest. (It's huge!)

There is a huge arts, culture, music, theater and sports scene in Atlanta. GBLT citizens are very at home here. Elton John has a home in the trendy, super expensive part of the city.

There are many neighborhoods and areas to live from suburban to older neighborhoods to high rise condos to New Urbanist communities to in-town bungalows and neighborhoods.

GA Tech, GA State Univ., Spellman, Morehouse and Emory are among the many colleges and universities.
College football is HUGH!11!! is the South. UGA and GA Tech are bitter rivals. We Dawgs and Yellow Jackets hate Florida and Clemson and the USC Gamecocks. ;)

Atlanta is a center of urban black culture, music, art and style.

There are lots of restaurants of all cuisines! There is a large immigrant population of Asians, Caribbean people and Hispanics in addition to white and black Southerners. Many whites fled to the suburbs after desegregation in the 1960s and 1970s, however, many are returning to the city as suburban life grows wearisome and the commutes hellish. There are some very nice suburban areas so don't count those out until you visit. There are some great farmers markets including the DeKalb Farmers Market.

We have four seasons here. It's very hot and humid in the summer, cold and wet in the winter (interspersed with beautiful sunny days) and spring and fall are glorious!

It's only about 4 hours to Savannah and the coast. It's just a few hours to North Georgia Mountains and a few more to Western NC. Chattanooga, TN (a great city) is about 2.5 hours north of Atlanta via I-75. I live in Athens (home of UGA) which is about an hour and 1/2 (non-rush hour) from Atlanta. Macon, Columbus and Augusta are just a few hours from Atlanta.

Hotlanta is a 1970's nickname. There are lots of museums here: The High (art), Fernbank (Natural History) and the MLK historic site in addition to loads of civil war sites and museums.

Atlanta was founded as a railroad terminus and intersection. Ironically, there is one Amtrak line here now. :( However, trains are planned to Lovejoy, Athens and Chattanooga. Atlanta is the home of Coca Cola, Home Depot and (I believe) UPS among many large companies. Ted Turner began CNN here and there are CNN studios downtown. There are pro football, basketball, hockey and baseball teams here. We love the Atlanta Braves. The guy who built the new aquarium downtown also owns the Falcons.

:hi: Have fun! We are generally very friendly and warmn people. Look up "Creative Loafing Magazine , Atlanta" on Google and you'll find some more Atlanta info!

PS: Oh yeah: be prepared to drive like a freaking NASCAR driver when you get on the interstates especially the Perimeter.

PPS: Everything is a "Coke" here. It's not called soda, pop or soda pop. ;)

[democracyindanger]

2. Cool. Thanks! Tell me this

Got any neighborhood names in the city proper that you can recommend?

[CottonBear]

3. Can any other GA DUers recommend some good neighborhoods in Atlanta?

I live in Athens but am familiar with Atlanta having worked there and visited many times.

However, I'm not so familiar with the in-town neighborhoods. Perhaps an Atlanta DUer can help. Krebs and Caspar live in the city.

See this thread: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=146x3264

You might want to scroll down through the thread in the GA forum.

[RebelOne]

6. I live in Woodstock in Cherokee County northwest of Atlanta.

I love it here. Only bad thing is that it just about a 100% red area. Kennesaw and Marietta in Cobb County are nice areas, too.

[luckyleftyme2]

24. FOREST PARK

i have a friend who lives and grew up in forest park,it is a suburb of atlanta. about 15min to the center of town.i like this area of atlanta.seems safe,nice neighbors.reasonable prices for rents or houses.about 10 min to the parking garage at the airport.
traffic can be hectic in downtown atlanta;so public transportation is an option.

[Iris]

34. Midtown, VA Highlands, East Atlanta, Decatur, East Point

[kevinam]

4. yea, a couple.

It depends what you are looking for and price range. Some of the more hip areas are probably Decatur and Grant Park areas. I think Virginia Highlands is a cool area, and is one of the bar districts. Vinings is also a pretty nice area, but not quite in the heart of the city. In Midtown, there are a lot of condos, apartments, and lofts. Just my two cents, I live in the outer burbs, so I am not great with intown areas. Do you know what area you will be working?? Do you want to live real close to where you work?? House vs condos/apts, are you looking for good schools for children, that sort of stuff. Do you want a yard for pets, or do you want to be close to parks??

Kevin.

[democracyindanger]

10. The Alliance Center?

Don't know if that's a building or a complex. I'd hate to commute. Single no kids, but I might want to get a dog, being near parks would be nice. Renting, not buying. If I was moving to LA (another option), I'd get a small house or bungalow in Santa Monica or Manhattan Beach--are there cool small-home neighborhoods like that in Atlanta proper?

[kevinam]

12. It looks like....

There is an Alliance Center (high rise building) in Buckhead. I would guess that is it. That would put you north of the city proper, and a little north of Midtown. The closest areas are obviously Buckhead, and Lenox (real close to Lenox Mall). Brookhaven is a little north of there. Those areas are fairly pricey (by Atlanta standards). Throughout Buckhead and Brookhaven there are a lot of nice neighborhoods. Some of the other posts had links. You might try those. I am not sure exactly where that building is, but using Lenox Road, and Peachtree St. as a guide should give you a fairly good starting point. Good luck with your interviews.

Kevin.

[mrmartinbong]

5. Intown neighborhoods

It really does depend on what you want in a neighborhood. I would guess that Atlanta house prices will seem reasonable for you. Grant Park is a nice neighborhood, big park in the middle of the neighborhood, the city zoo is located there, also the cyclorama (a circular painting of the Battle of Atlanta). A few restaurants and a great ice cream place across from the zoo. Going east from Grant Park puts you into Ormewood Park, very nice area, convenient to almost everything in the city. East Atlanta is a cool neighborhood with lots of restaurants, bars, and shopping, much like Virginia Highlands, only hipper. Kirkwood is a up and coming area. I work with an architect in Reynoldstown, right next to Cabbagetown (historical mill town neighborhood), these are both convenient and near to lots of stuff. L5P or Little Five Points is the cool place in the city, hipsters, grunge, hippies, and punks all converge on this area and shop, eat, drink, and party. Astride to L5P is Inman Park, Atlanta's first suburb circa 1890's, victorian homes, close in, friendly neighborhood. Candler Park is on the other side of L5P and is a very nice area also. There is the poncey highland neighborhood near Virginia highlands, also Midtown is a great place to live. Downtown Atlanta has really changed over the last 10 years and there are a lot of lofts/condos down there. There is the historical west end neighborhood that flanks Morehouse, Spelman, and the rest of the Atlanta Universities. There are small neighborhoods around Georgia Tech, Home Park and just to the north a new development Atlantic Station. Ansley Park, Morningside, Buckhead, Chastain Park, Castleberry Hill, Druid Hills, Lake Claire(the lake is no longer there),Summerville, Peoplestown, Mechanicsville, Choosewood Park, and Brookhaven are most of the neighborhoods I can think of intown, oh yeah, Lakewood, the neighborhood I used to live in, near the Big House, Federal Pen.
I currently live in the Decatur area and have lived here before, I lived in Atlanta for 16 years, so I now a lot of neighborhoods. Decatur is a fairly open minded place, great schools, restaurants, Emory University, bars, and shopping.
www.coldwellbankeratlanta.com is a comprehensive site that I have used for research for my job and also to look at houses, craigslist/atlanta, ajchomes.com are also good sites. The coldwell banker site lets you search by a lot of variables, loft, condo, house, number of bedrooms, schools, neighborhoods.
It was Hotlanta when I was in high school, Lately it is ATL, as in the airport code and movie, but I have heard that it's played out and the hip term is A-town. If you are looking for something specific please let me know and I will try to answer you questions.

[mrmartinbong]

7. City website of neighborhood links

http://www.atlantaga.gov/residents/neighborhoodlink.aspx

[democracyindanger]

9. That'll help. Thanks.

[tenshi816]

23. CottonBear, that's an excellent summation

of Atlanta except for one thing: my husband says Georgia has only two seasons - summer and January. Poor baby had a hard time with the heat when he lived there, but thought Southerners were all wusses about cold. I remember going to his apartment once when we had just started dating when the temperature was about 60 degrees. I was wearing jeans and a sweater. He was outside, barefoot, shirtless and in his swimming trunks, washing his car and complaining about the heat.

[CottonBear]

25. LOL! I'm used to the weather, having lived in the Southeastern Piedmont

and in the Southeastern Ridge and Valley area my entire life!

My hubby is from NOLA. He immediately puts on 3 layers of clothing when the temp drops below 60 degrees!

[CottonBear]

8. If you're moving from CA, the low real estate prices here will floor you.

My cousins moved from Palo Alto (4 bedroom ranch) and bought a beautiful 1940s estate home on a huge lot in the Lenox Mall/Phipps Plaza area (Phipps is a very upscale mall and is very chic). They even had money left over to remodel the house, the landscape and the pool) I think the ranch sold for over $500,000 10 years ago. You can buy a huge home or acres of land in GA for that amount of money.

[Casper]

11. Just a couple more things...

There are in-town neighborhoods across the city - you'll want to pick one that offers easy access to your workplace. Traffic here rivals LA and Boston so your choice of home will have an impact on your life.

We live in SW Atlanta, inside the perimeter. It's a lovely 1950's neighborhood with lots of trees and green space. It's nearly solid blue (one contribution to George Bush in my zip code).

Atlanta straddles Fulton and Dekalb counties. Dekalb County is one of the bluest counties in the country. Fulton is good too. Coming from SF, I would highly recommend that you focus on Fulton or Dekalb (again, with strong consideration to where you'll be working).

Traffic also has an impact on your non-work activities so you may want to explore some of the areas that offer the things you like to do when not working (museums, parks, libraries, shopping, restaurants, etc). Ideally you would live close to them too. The cool thing, is that there are enough little neighborhood pockets, that with some planning you can do that.

I moved here ten years ago from Ann Arbor, MI and love it. The weather is great, cultural opportunities are varied, accessible, and reasonably priced. Good restaurants. But, no SF Bay, Muir Woods, or Fairmont Hotel...

[RubyDuby in GA]

13. Feh! Nonsense!

"Coming from SF, I would highly recommend that you focus on Fulton or Dekalb"

What.Eveh! Come on out to the hinterlands where it takes mucho true grit to be a Democrat :P You get more than your fair share of opportunities to make freepers look like fools when you challenge them with facts, not truthiness. Really, it's become a favorite past time of mine. Like shooting fish in a barrel....

[BooScout]

16. Yah....

you can do all that while sitting stuck in traffic trying to get to work.:9 (jes messing with ya Ruby:-) )

[RubyDuby in GA]

18. Work? What is this 'work' you speak of?

Work is for the little people... :)

Ha. I wish I could make statements like that. Actually, my boss is pretty flexible about time, so I go in a bit later when traffic doesn't make me want to kill everyone in sight.

[Orsino]

14. Traffic BAD!

Air quality is lousy and getting worse. You may prefer, as my wife and I do, to live far west of town, upwind from most of the pollution.

Pollen counts in the brazillions, too. April would be the best month for you to sample that aspect.

[BooScout]

15. I gotta sayyyyy.....

Decatur is the place to be and I am very prejudiced since I grew up there. The one draw back for you would be the property taxes since you are single it may be that you should move just outside of the city limits of Decatur. Why Decatur? It's very blue, has an old time square with concerts in the nice weather months. Lots of quaint shops, bars and restaraunts. Dog friendly parks where you can let your pooch run and visit with his/her doggy friends and great and friendly people. It also has a Marta Station right in the middle of the town which makes it very convenient. Propert prices range from a condo in the center of town around 250k up to about 750k for a 3000 sq foot house in one of Decaturs lovely neighborhoods.....and then you get everything in between as well. You can get a 3 or 4 bedroom for the 300k range....or less if you are willing to fix it up.....but fixer uppers go very fast in the area.

Houses for around $125,000 can still be had in the nearby Clarkston area without the high city taxes of the city of Decatur. Take Ponce de Leon east out of the city limits and start exploring neighborhoods. If you head west out of Decatur you will find Atlanta and pricy neighborhoods. But it's even closer to Atlanta.

No offense to those that live in the burbs, but if you are single they are boring as hell and the commute in is hell on earth. To live 20 miles outside of town you may get more house for the money but you also get a commute of well over an hour during rush hour. Do you really want to spend 2 hours in your car heading to your suburban home? .....and frankly the suburbs are getting so built up that you don't really have those wide open spaces much anymore.

Climate? Wonderful........except for summer when the humidity reaches 100 percent and the pollution soars with the heat index. Learn to love air conditioning.:D .....Mosquitos suck......buy a house with a screened porch and sit on it in the warm summer evenings and laugh at the lil bastards as they buzz around just outside the screen.

If you get the job (I'll cross my fingers for you)....consider renting a while and then get to know the area before you decide to buy......but I still say Decatur is the best.B-)

I miss it. I moved to the UK last fall and I am really missing Atlanta in the spring with the dogwoods and azaleas........in teh spring no where beats Atlanta.

[atldem]

17. Midtown

Unless you have a problem living with us gays! :) I rent, I'm only a few blocks from piedmont park, there are public transportation stops on all sides of me (it's MARTA so don't expect too much), I can and regularly do walk to 2 grocery stores and restaurants. Don't even think about the burbs, I try very hard to never go outside the "fruit loop" aka I-285. We call that OTP (outside the perimeter).

[RubyDuby in GA]

19. The "fruit loop"

Well you just got uninvited to my big bbq and definitely removed from my Christmas card list. :P

Just kiddin'. Being OTP has it's drawbacks, but it also has perks. I like it. And there is no way to deny that you get way more bang for your buck out here. But I work right smack in the middle of downtown Atlanta, so I get the best of both worlds.

[CottonBear]

27. LOL! I live inside the Athens "fruit loop" AKA Ga Loop 10. n/t

[tenshi816]

20. First of all, a little heads up -

no Atlanta native ever calls it "Hotlanta". Never have and never will. Just like San Franciscans never say "Frisco". If you use the term Hotlanta, people won't point at you and laugh (at least not to your face), but inwardly they will be mocking you. I've never heard anyone say "'lanta" either, and I grew up there.

Atlanta has a much, much, much lower cost of living than San Francisco. My husband worked in his firm's Atlanta office for a couple of years back in the 80s (over from London) and one of his friends from the same company was transferred to San Francisco for exactly the same period and exactly the same salary. Hubby had a huge apartment in a complex with two swimming pools, jacuzzis and several tennis courts; his friend had a small apartment in San Francisco with no "extras". By the time they both returned to London, my husband had saved enough money to put nearly £20,000 down on a flat, plus he had taken numerous vacations (including several trips to New York and California, as well as ski vacations in Aspen and Vail). In contrast, his friend in San Francisco couldn't afford to save anything, and didn't have the extra money to take a lot of vacations - all his salary went to rent and day-to-day living expenses. I know prices have gone up since the 1980s, but it's still easy to live very well in Atlanta at a fraction of what it costs in some other major US cities.

I mostly hate the suburbs in Atlanta. Generally speaking, they're soulless places and because of traffic it takes ages to get anywhere.

Having lived there for a long time, I'm partial to the Virginia-Highlands section of Atlanta. It has a real "village" feel to it and there are some fine places to live, along with interesting shops and restaurants. There are also some not-so-nice places there too, but the good far outweighs the bad. Decatur has a similar vibe.

Atlanta, as I'm sure you've heard by now, is blue - but once you're outside it, it's red hell (except for places like Athens and Savannah). I'm proud of what my hometown has accomplished since the bad old days of segregation; Atlanta's a proudly multicultural and gay-friendly city and (except for the traffic) an enjoyable place to live.

A few final points about the weather:

(1) No matter how hot you think it will be before you go there, you'll still be unprepared for the combination of heat and humidity. I never used to notice it so much until I left, and now when I go back to visit, it saps all my energy until I get used to it again. Georgia is hot

(2) Winters are very short compared to most places, but for the six weeks or so it actually gets really cold, it can be brutal. I live in the north of England now and rarely get cold weather as bad as it can be in Georgia in January. Snow is pretty rare though, and when it happens it doesn't stick around long. Ice storms are a bigger problem, and more dangerous. Driving in snow is easy, but ice -not so much.

(3) It often gets very rainy in the spring, and the entire state gets a lot of violent thunderstorms. Long-term residents take it for granted but it's disconcerting for newcomers. Tornadoes aren't uncommon either.

Good luck to you, whatever decisions you decide to make!

[RubyDuby in GA]

21. I will say that it is cheaper to live in "red hell"

:)

Anything outside the metro area, especially on the south and eastern sides of atlanta are far cheaper than living in the city or north of it. That's a plus. Isn't it??? Someone help me out here. :)

How are things in your neck of the woods? We had a glorious weekend here. Sunny, upper 70s, low 80s. Pollen is getting to be a bit bad now though. Yellow coated cars everywhere!

:hi:

[tenshi816]

22. To me, RD, after years of living in Britain,

everything in Atlanta is dirt cheap in comparison, so you can imagine what prices outside of Atlanta seem like to me.

We're mostly fine although my younger son has been laid really low with a nasty bug that's been going around. It's so bad and so contagious that eleven schools closed in the area for a week. He's better now but I can't stand it when my kids are sick. I'd give anything to have it be me instead of them.

Temperature in the low 80s? Good Lord. It snowed here today. I don't mind because we're leaving to go skiing in Canada for a couple of weeks on Saturday anyway - I am no stranger to snow anymore - but it does seem odd to be wearing a coat and boots here when it's shorts weather back home.

One thing I don't miss about home in Georgia is the pollen. I used to suffer terribly from sinus problems, including fierce headaches and nosebleeds. I don't get those anymore because the season for that is so much shorter in England. Having said that, though, that sort of thing is getting much worse over here too - I'm convinced global warming plays its part. In fact, it seems to me that winters in Georgia are becoming worse, or is that my imagination?

Changing the subject, I noticed in another thread that you said you work downtown. Do you work anywhere near Five Points? I used to work in both the First Atlanta Tower (or whatever it's called nowadays) and Peachtree Center. I always felt that if I was going to work in Atlanta, I wanted to work in Atlanta. I loved the buzz of being downtown during the day and found it sad that the streets tended to empty out every evening by 7 p.m. at the latest in that part of town (as soon as cocktail hour was over!). I also went to GSU, so downtown Atlanta was a part of my life starting when I was a teenager, and I had an apartment at Peachtree and 26th Street that I loved. Later on Hubby and I lived in Virginia-Highlands before leaving for the UK.

[CottonBear]

26. Hi tenshi816! The pollen count is HUGH!!111!!!! I'm SERIES!1!

Seriously, I am lucky to not have allergies. The trees and other woody plants are in the midst of a reproductive orgy right now! Everything is yellow! My horse has pollen stuck in the corners of her eyes where the eye goop collects. The water troughs have a layer of pollen floating on top!

[RebelOne]

28. As for your No. 1 & 2 points about the weather.

I can deal with the summers in Georgia because they don't last that long. Have you ever lived in South Florida? Well, the heat and humidity here in Georgia are nothing compared with South Florida. That's why when people complain about heat and humidity, I tell them to go down to South Florida to experience "real" heat and humidity.

In my opinion, the winters are not brutally cold. But I love cold weather, so no matter how cold it gets, I'm not complaining. But I do bitch about the heat in the summer. After living in South Florida most of my life, I welcome cold weather.

[CottonBear]

29. It is exponentially hotter & more humid below the fall line in Georgia. nt

[RebelOne]

30. And what and where is the fall line?

[CottonBear]

31. The point at which the acient ocean lapped against the shore in middle GA.

The fall line is a geolgical feature which runs east to west across the state.

Above the fall line there is mostly red clay soil and rivers are not navigable except by canoes, kayaks and pole boats.

Below the fall line, the rivers are navigable and the soil is generally sandy.


It is sometimes referred to as the Gnat Line as well. ;)

[BooScout]

32. Isn't it around Macon.....

...that the fall line is considered to cut thru?

[CottonBear]

33. Yes. Macon, Columbus and Augusta are all fall line cities.

"The zone along which the rivers and streams of the Piedmont flow across resistant rocks that mark the boundary with the Coastal Plain. Rapids and small waterfalls are numerous along the Fall Line. The falls provided waterpower for early industry, but impeded navigation above the Fall Line. Cities such as Columbus, Macon, and Augusta developed on the Fall Line at the head of navigation on the rivers and became major manufacturing centers due to the availability of water power."
http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761571609/Georgia_(state).html


http://home.att.net/~cochrans/geomap01.htm