Talk:Atlanta/Archive 2003-2018

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This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

I guess it's obvious by context, but isn't there a whole COUNTRY called Georgia nowadays? Shouldn't this page just be under 'Atlanta'? (I haven't quite come to grips with how the naming terminology really works but I'd GUESS that the capital of the state of Georgia is the biggest Atlanta around and gets the unadorned title.)

I totally agree. I'm worried that the article naming conventions aren't really that accessible; I'm going to try to restructure some things so that people recognize them better. -- (WT-en) Evan 12:31, 4 Sep 2003 (PDT)

Appied Template

I've applied the 'large city' template to this article. I know Atlanta is a pretty large place, with many restaurants, etc, but in truth it is not a very interesting place for the traveller, with not much in the way of things to see or do. On that basis I decided not to use the huge city template, with all the district heirarchy baggage that brings. One consequence of this is that I have effectively orphaned the one rather vestigial district already present. I've moved the content to the main page, but here is a link in case somebody with a huge amount of info on Atlanta joins Wikivoyage and we want to move to the huge city model. Atlanta/Little Five Points -- (WT-en) TheForester 12:32, 6 Aug 2004 (EDT)

I'd like to say: excellent work! Thanks for pitching in on this page!. I'm going to nominate L5P for deletion. If we don't have much to fill the pages with, we should keep this a large city. --(WT-en) Evan 14:44, 6 Aug 2004 (EDT)
I noticed that both this page and Little Five Points had [[Atlanta/Little Five Points]] on them and this was causing the page to show up as a wanted article as the original was deleted. I changed Little Five Points to redirect to Atlanta and this page to point to Little Five Points. If anyone wants to resurrect the subpage they now have to copy the wikitext above first, not just follow the link. This will save creating non-articles. -- (WT-en) Huttite 03:38, 4 Jan 2005 (EST)

Should we really describe things as "ghetto"?

Well, yes, we should. The previous description indicated that the shopping mall is posh at one end and grungy at the other. Assuming this is true, travellers would find this more useful than merely known that it's "upscale". (WT-en) Jpatokal 23:07, 28 Jul 2005 (EDT)

But is "ghetto" the right word? Wouldn't grungy be better. I've been in this mall. There is a bit of a change of scenery from one end to the other, but I really pick up more on the racist inference of the term, rather than describing it as less posh. I just feel like there is a better word. -- (WT-en) Ilkirk 23:21, 28 Jul 2005 (EDT)


Another note, someone described lenox as upscale on one side, and less so near the food court. that is just not true. there are many upscale shops over on the other side of the food court near the marriot. Actually that is the quietest and nicest side. Is it really important anyway?

What is considered suburban?

Personally, i think considering the zoo as in the suburbs as absurd. I think anything within the city of atlanta should not be considered the suburbs. Maybe we should use the word "intown" for areas that are not necessarily urban but are still within the city. That is what most Atlantas call areas like grant park and virginia highlands.


The end of Music Midtown?

Peter Conlon cancelled Music Midtown for this year. The appropriate link is here: http://www.centredaily.com/mld/centredaily/news/nation/13569751.htm

I removed "Music Midtown" from the list of events. There is a chance Midtown might be held in the future, somewhere else in Atlanta, but it won't be held in 2006.

Recommendations & classifications

I'm certain that we can go round & round regarding which restaurants & bars to include, and I know that there isn't really a single "good" recommendation for visitors. That said, I'd like to take issue with: -Zyka classified as in the "East Suburbs." Zyka is in Decatur, and Decatur is not in the "suburbs." I don't mean to bring in the stupid ITP/OTP arguement, but Zyka lands very clearly within what people consider to be "in-town." That said, there are much better Indian restaurants to name (Udipi springs to mind,a nd it's even in the same area). -Hard Rock Cafe should be removed from the downtown list... because it's a chain restraurant that anyone can visit in any city. Should we be showcasing local resturants in order to truly reflect the character of the city? Or are we including this one as a fail-safe place that everyone knows? -Are the restaurant lists worht expanding? I've got a few good ones that come to mind.

206.61.144.2 10:17, 7 August 2006 (EDT)

Edits

I did a complete overhaul of the page the past two weekends to add/reclassify a lot of the restaurants, bars, shopping and sights. Please add on!

Stay safe

Having lived in Atlanta for almost three years-in the city itself I find it weird that there is no "Stay Safe" section. Atlanta was quite violent with shootings occurring on a regular basis. This is mostly in the southern and western parts of the city such as College Park, East Point and Bankhead. Downtown is filled with aggressive beggars and scam artistes.

Districts?

Is that long list of districts the best way to divide up the city? I don't know it, but it looks like a lot – (WT-en) cacahuate talk 19:02, 7 May 2008 (EDT)

Definitely too many for a city that size, but I'm not familiar enough with the city to make a reasonable district breakdown.(WT-en) Texugo 19:06, 7 May 2008 (EDT)

OK, I've moved the list out of the article for now, so that they don't continue to get created... we should group these into maybe 5 or 7 total districts for Atlanta... User:(WT-en) Joggingman08, you seem to know Atlanta pretty well, can you help us to group these into a handful of districts? We don't necessarily go by the traditional areas of a city, unless the city is large enough to really require an article for each neighborhood. Are there certain ones of these that we can group together to make a bit larger of a "district" that makes sense for a traveler? – (WT-en) cacahuate talk 21:23, 7 May 2008 (EDT)

Yes, especially Downtown, Midtown, and Buckhead should have their own districts. I'm classifying the other districts as their location/direction in relation to the city. -Joggingman08

Are you sure that's what you're doing? It looks to me like the list of places with their own articles is growing and growing since this discussion was started. I mean, the number is up to 14 districts, not counting the gigantic list of suburbs, and not including a lot of the other districts listed on the page. Since the following eight areas are pretty well defined on the article page already, why not go with these as top-level subdivisions? We can subdivide under this level, if absolutely necessary, on the respective district pages:
  • Downtown
  • Midtown
  • North Atlanta/Buckhead
  • Northeast Atlanta
  • East Atlanta
  • Southeast Atlanta
  • South Atlanta
  • West Atlanta

I think the long list of suburbs needs to be seriously cut down too. Obviously some need to stay, like Decatur, but surely not all of those communities have enough attractions and accommodations to stand alone. (WT-en) Texugo 01:35, 8 May 2008 (EDT)

Sleep listings in the Atlanta overview?

Although there is an info box mentioning that all individual listings should be placed in the appropriate district articles, there are still some odd hotel listings in the Splurge sections, and even some advertisements. Is it ok to put the real listings in the appropriate district sections and delete the ad listings? --(WT-en) MarinaK 16:35, 23 March 2009 (EDT)MarinaK.

Yes! (WT-en) LtPowers 16:53, 23 March 2009 (EDT)

District Organization...Finally

Some proposed changes to better organize the district:

  • Downtown -
    • Remove Fairlie-Poplar. It is only 3 square blocks, and can easily be included in the adjacent Five Points district.
    • Rename Historic King District to Sweet Auburn. King district refers only to the MLK Jr. sites, Sweet Auburn will be more inclusive and less dull sounding.
  • Midtown - Remove SoNo. This is a rather nebulous section, which depends on how you define the Midtown/Downtown boundary. If we say that Downtown's north border is North Avenue, then we obviate the need for SoNo.
  • South - Remove Southeast Atl. By reorganizing the district this region is redundant.

Still a work in progress, will migrate info from larger district regions to specific districts, and then eliminate links to the district regions themselves. Any input, objections? --(WT-en) Jtesla16 01:05, 19 July 2009 (EDT)

District Definitions

Atlanta District Regions

This map is not article quality, but I think it can help organize listings behind the scenes, and be a basis for someone ambitious and willing to make a real map. The outlining blue road is 285, the "perimeter."

  • 1. Downtown
  • 2. Midtown
  • 3. Buckhead
  • 4. East Atlanta
  • 5. South Atlanta
  • 6. West Atlanta

Definitions - District are probably most easily defined by street boundaries. North boundary denoted as N:Street Name; East boundary = E:Street Name; etc.

Downtown Districs
  • 1. Downtown (Discussion)
    • N: North Avenue
    • E: Blvd & Hill St.
    • S: 20
    • W: Northside Drive
  • 2. Midtown
    • N: 75 & 85
    • E: Piedmont Ave NE & Monroe Dr NE & Park Dr NE & Ponce De Leon Pl NE
    • S: North Ave
    • W: Howell Mill Rd & Northside Dr
  • 3. Buckhead
    • N: Atlanta city limits, [1]
    • E: Fulton County Boundary
    • S: 85
    • W: 75
  • 4. East Atlanta (Discussion)
    • N: 85
    • E: Atlanta city limits, [2]
    • S: 20 & Blvd
    • W: Downtown and Midtown
  • 5. South Atlanta
    • N: 20 & Hill & Blvd
    • E: Atlanta city limits, [3]
    • S: 285
    • W: 85 & Sylvan & 285 & Lee St
  • 6. West Atlanta
    • N: Intersection of Chattahoochee River and 75
    • E: 75 (Western boundaries of Buckhead, Midtown, Downtown & South Atl)
    • S: Atlanta city limits, [4]
    • W: Atlanta city limits, [5]

Feel free to debate the boundaries if you like, but lets try to use what we decide on as a reference to end the Atlanta confusion. --(WT-en) Jtesla16 01:54, 19 July 2009 (EDT)

Great to see this getting sorted out. I can't really help with defining individual districts, since I don't know the first thing about the city. But the one thing I noticed is that the city boundaries on your map don't appear to align with the official city limits, which I understand to be like this [6]. --(WT-en) Peter Talk 18:48, 19 July 2009 (EDT)
There's a few areas I think are problematic if we use the official boundaries. Without getting into the specifics, mostly to do with areas where neighborhoods have outgrown the boundary, and in areas where the Decatur article has already covered it. So how important is it that the article's scope match the official boundaries? Seems like it might make sense to included a slightly larger area in some cases, and cut back in others. Do you think that's a problem? --(WT-en) Jtesla16 20:57, 19 July 2009 (EDT)
The main reason for using the official boundaries is just to ensure we have full coverage, and don't run into overlap. If you think we can avoid both gaps & overlaps, and keep things clear in this fashion, then I have no objections. --(WT-en) Peter Talk 22:03, 19 July 2009 (EDT)

Two-tiered hierarchy

Right now we have districts & subdistricts for Atlanta. I think subdistricts are almost never a good idea, since they bury content, and would prefer to see the hierarchy flattened into one level. The districts are already grouped nicely in the main article by city area—I just want to see the links to middlemen like Atlanta/Downtown, Atlanta/East, etc. go away. I think they unnecessarily spread out our content across too many articles, when all the information that would go in them could just as easily be put in either the main Atlanta article or the individual districts themselves. --(WT-en) Peter Talk 18:59, 19 July 2009 (EDT)

Agreed, that's the plan, and the next step, after I build some consensus for the organization. --(WT-en) Jtesla16 19:26, 19 July 2009 (EDT)
Atlanta/Southwest also needs a place somewhere. --(WT-en) globe-trotter 08:43, 5 March 2010 (EST)

Removed listing

I removed this listing because an editor changed it to indicate it was closed. Please verify. (WT-en) LtPowers 15:26, 6 March 2011 (EST)

  • <eat name="Craft" alt="" address="3376 Peachtree" directions="inside The Mansion on Peachtree" phone="+1 404 995-7580" url="http://www.craftrestaurant.com/craft_atlanta_style.html" hours="" price="$28-$48" lat="" long="" email="info@craftrestaurant.com" fax="">New York celebrity chef Tom Colicchio (most famous for his role as head judge on Bravo’s Top Chef) chose Atlanta as the third location for his award-winning restaurant Craft. Located in Atlanta’s newest luxury gem, The Mansion on Peachtree, the menu consists of bold, a la carte American classics that use only the finest ingredients Georgia has to offer. Craft's Atlanta location is now closed.</eat>

Atlanta vs Metro

Can I just say, I really dislike the current division between Metro Atlanta, Atlanta, and other nearby cities like Decatur? Having lived here for 10 years, I don't think of Decatur as being separate from Atlanta, and I don't think it's useful to travelers to present it this way either.

Consider that on the Decatur page, "Get in" lists the MARTA stations... but MARTA is only described on Atlanta, which is not above the Decatur page! The hierarchy is really broken there.

I think it would be much more helpful to ignore the historical trend of Atlanta not to incorporate its surrounding suburbs like Decatur, Chamblee, and Doraville, and treat Metro Atlanta as the main article here. Maybe a more appropriate division would be to separate ITP from OTP, or "places served by MARTA" from "places not served by MARTA" (although that's not very different from ITP/OTP). Or, maybe Metro Atlanta needs to be renamed Greater Atlanta area, to make it clear what the division is. There's a big difference between Decatur which is 15 minutes' drive from downtown, and Buford, which is almost 1 hours' drive on the highway. --(WT-en) BigPeteB 14:22, 8 April 2011 (EDT)

Proposed new breakdown for "Atlanta" limits

Please go read Talk:Metro Atlanta#Proposed new breakdown for "Atlanta" limits and contribute to the discussion. I consider it part of a large effort to restructure Metro Atlanta, Atlanta, and the districts within Atlanta. --(WT-en) BigPeteB 13:28, 8 May 2011 (EDT)

Multi-level districts

I realize Atlanta is big and all, but it's no New York City. Do we really need sub-districts within districts here? It seems like we should combine some sub-districts and get down to 9-11 single-layer districts. (WT-en) LtPowers 21:57, 27 December 2011 (EST)

I think my answer is "yes, but no". Atlanta is so spread out that it's very helpful to have these subdistricts just for understanding geographic proximity, but I think it could be done in text instead of sub-sub-pages. E.g., take the Atlanta/East page, and in the text group the listings into Virginia Highlands, Little Five Points, etc. So then it would remain as the 6 or so districts that are currently listed. You're probably right that some of the current 6 districts could be split apart some, although I'm not sure where I'd draw the new lines.
As you can probably see, I'd like to do some heavy-handed reorganizing of Metro Atlanta and Atlanta (and have already started some of it) but I've been refraining from doing too much all by myself without input from anyone else. --(WT-en) BigPeteB 09:35, 28 December 2011 (EST)
There's also the method used by Chicago, which has 30+ districts but the districts are grouped on the main page (Manhattan does the same thing). That might work best. (WT-en) LtPowers 20:57, 28 December 2011 (EST)

SWEET TEA IS NOT A SOUTHERN TERM, but a corporate invention

I was born and raised in the south, and the term has ALWAYS been "iced tea." McDonald's put a commercial on television two or three years ago that re-named iced tea as sweet tea, and now this term is everywhere. Ask anyone who was raised here. They will tell you that they NEVER heard anyone say sweet tea until recently. I have lived in the south for fifty years, and I never heard of sweet tea until McDonald's came up with the term.

When ordering in a restaurant, people have always asked for iced tea. The waitress then asks whether you want it sweetened or unsweetened. Some places only sell unsweetened iced tea because you can add sugar or Sweet and Low or whatever you wish to sweeten it. It makes it easier on the restaurant to make it only unsweetened. However, most places give you the choice of sweetened or unsweetened, but ICED TEA is what you order.

Some young people do now suddenly use the term "sweet tea" because they have been brainwashed by a TV commercial. They do not even realize it.

The south is hot, and that is why iced tea came into being in the first place. It really isn't that hard to understand. All it is is hot tea that is cooled and then poured over ice. PERIOD! Incidentally, most people sweeten hot tea, so why not start calling hot tea sweet tea as well?

—The preceding comment was added by (WT-en) MelKel (talk • contribs)

If you can stop shouting for a moment, I think your concerns are a bit overblown. The term has had currency for at least nine years; see Georgia House Bill 819. Although it was a joke bill, it makes clear that the term "sweet tea" was in existence and used well before McDonald's ad of "two or three years ago". Regardless of how it came about, though, "sweet tea" is what the beverage is called today when there is need to distinguish it from the unsweetened variety. Is there a specific change you'd like to see made? (WT-en) LtPowers 11:50, 15 February 2012 (EST)

Get around by foot section

I overhauled the discussion in this section a week or two ago and was surprised to find most of my changes reverted back.

First off, I think it is silly to portray the city in a negative light and by its negative stereotypes by implying that the walkable part of town is so small (Midtown, Downtown, Decatur and Virginia-Highland? That's it?) and by saying that renting a car is "highly recommended." It is also redundant and negative to bother saying that "driving is often faster and more convenient than walking even in the more pedestrian-friendly areas, if you want to maximize your mobility." Most cities, even those with world-class public transit, especially in the U.S., are like this. San Francisco is an extremely walkable city with decent public transit, but driving from one place to another is consistently much faster than walking or taking a bus. Being able to get around easily in a city by foot and transit does not mean being able to get everywhere without a car as fast as you could with a car. It means being able to get around the places you want without a car without too much inconvenience or loss of freedom of mobility over having a car. That is how public transit works in all but the most congested cities worldwide.

The fact is, Atlanta has an urban core -- chiefly, the areas of Midtown, Downtown, the North Highland Ave. Corridor including Poncey and Virginia Highland, Little Five Points, Old Fourth Ward/Sweet Auburn, and the areas in between. In those neighborhoods, the city is highly walkable, and even walking between two of these places is not out of the question. Outside of that core and Buckhead, due to the large and liberally defined area of the city limits, the city contains lots of areas where walking and using transit are hopeless... but what visitor to Atlanta would run out of things to do in the core and have to resort to those parts of the city anyway? When you visit San Francisco, you don't hang out in the Avenues. When you visit New York City, you don't hang out in east Queens. When you travel, you hang out in the interesting parts of the town, which in Atlanta are mostly the core areas (plus Buckhead and Decatur which are not too hard and easy respectively to reach by transit).

Rant aside, this section should paint a realistic but positive picture of the possibilities for getting around without a car in the parts of town that people will want to go. I lived in Atlanta for three years with a car, one year on Georgia Tech campus and two years around Berkeley Park. Berkeley Park was out of the way for transit, but even there it was still not too bad using MARTA (which I did frequently -- I bought monthly MARTA passes instead of paying for parking on Tech campus and often used it to get to other parts of town as well). Now I no longer live in Atlanta but visit often. When I visit, I never have a car and spend a lot of my time exploring on my own. I use transit the whole time, and honestly, I rarely have problems getting anywhere efficiently or less efficiently than transit in any other city would get me around. The only transit trip that ever frustrates me is the extreme cross-town connection between West Midtown and, for example, Little Five Points (often a 40 minute trip due mostly to the idiotic route bus 1 takes). That one is annoying, but most of the time the transit works beautifully. Overall, I've lived in San Francisco before as well, and if you restrict your view to the core places I mentioned, mobility without a car in Atlanta is not far behind mobility without a car in San Francisco (where the situation is similar -- the interesting parts of the city are all highly walkable, but the relatively boring western half is much more difficult).

(WT-en) DJLamar 16:45, 7 April 2012 (EDT)

Hi. I felt that you definitely added lot of useful information, but there was also a lot of fluff; Wikivoyage articles tend to accumulate a lot of extra verbiage, so it's best to say what you mean to say concisely. For example, you wrote "A MARTA station makes access to downtown Decatur very easy, and that area is extremely walkable. The town is home to a huge number of excellent bars and restaurants, as well as nice bookstores and coffee shops. Decatur is also one of the most progressive places in the metro area" which reads like an advertisement for Decatur. If Decatur is that wonderful, that should be described 2 or 3 sections up in the District or Understand sections. Details about the politics of MARTA are totally irrelevant to visitors.
Mostly, though, I think that the article needs to present an unbiased opinion... Atlanta is the 20th most walkable city in the U.S., which is not very good. The City of Atlanta scored a walkability score of just 52.9, which is barely above "car-dependent", and that's just the city, not the metro area.
I appreciate your attitude, that the article should "paint a realistic but positive picture of the possibilities for getting around without a car", and I may have been too quick to remove some of your additions. But I think it's also fair, unbiased, and helpful to tell visitors that cars are usually as fast or faster than MARTA. Five Points Station to Lenox Station is 15 minutes by MARTA, and 16 minutes by car... but if you go there by car, you can drive directly to your destination, instead of walking from the MARTA station, so it's going to be faster. And that's just station to station; if you have to take rail and bus (as you do for quite a lot of the activities and restaurants currently listed in the article), I don't see why we shouldn't tell visitors that cars will be faster.
Regardless of what does end up staying in the article, it should be clear and concise; the current paragraph about hotels near transit is pretty wordy.
-- (WT-en) BigPeteB 09:46, 9 April 2012 (EDT)

I agree with the fluff part and I'll try to be more concise with some of these things. I've been aware of Walkscore.com but have always been skeptical about it -- sure Atlanta has a relatively low score, but look at the distribution of walkable areas and not so walkable areas -- the areas I mentioned mostly all are rated very highly, 85+, and are mostly compactly arranged near each other where even walking between two of them is not that hard. The west side of the city and many other parts score horribly, but like I said, what tourist is going to go to those places? I've never been to most of those places in red and like I said I even lived in the city for three years. Besides, Portland, Oregon has a reputation for being extremely easily walked and pedestrian-friendly, but walkscore.com doesn't rank it that far above Atlanta (and only 11th in the U.S. rankings according to that site).

As for mentioning that driving is faster, it just sounds silly to me because like I said that's a fact of life even in many places with absolutely stellar transit, so it goes without saying. Go do a few searches for directions on Google Maps between different points in New York City and compare the estimated travel times by car and by transit. Even in Manhattan, driving is almost always faster, and if you're going between Manhattan and Brooklyn or Queens then transit can take as much as twice the time of driving. However, no one in their right mind would rent a car when visiting New York City and half of the people living there don't own one -- even most people living in the less accessible outer boroughs like Brooklyn. Subways and buses don't take you from door to door as fast as a car does -- and in most cities, for most trips, there will be walking involved -- but they free you from the stress of owning (or renting) a car and the stress of navigating traffic. Plus, your Five Points to Lenox analysis doesn't include traffic, finding a parking spot, or walking from the parking lot into the place. Have you ever taken MARTA to Lenox Mall? As soon as you step out of the train you're already closer to the entrance than many of the parking spaces are. In general, the flaws you're talking about with transit are true of most systems (though more heavily utilized systems are able to minimize transfer time etc. a little better than MARTA usually does, partly due to better funding and more fare revenue), and to some extent it's not that MARTA is that much worse than many other transit systems, but that parking in Atlanta is easier than in many other cities. But especially for visitors, having to wait on transit transfers is often worth the benefit of not having to bother with a car. Most people really don't want to worry about (or pay the extra money for) a car when they visit a place if they can reasonably help it, and most people expect to have to walk a bit when they use transit anywhere.

(WT-en) DJLamar 15:43, 9 April 2012 (EDT)

"What tourist is going to go to those places?" Is the point of this guide to recommend things that are close to transit, or things that are worth doing in Atlanta regardless of whether you need to walk/bus/drive there? I think both.
If you exclude things because they're not car accessible, you're leaving out lots of good things to see/do. Not everyone comes to Atlanta by plane and uses MARTA; plenty of visitors in the U.S. drive to their destination and have their car with them, or rent one. What about business travelers who have to rent a car to get to the business they're visiting... surely we don't tell them to use MARTA for sightseeing when they've already paid for their car?
You're right about my Five Points to Lenox route being a toss-up. But I chose it as a deliberately unfair comparison because you don't start and end at the stations... you have to bus or walk from where you start to the station, and from the station to your destination. Let's try another one... Lenox Stations to Straits (one of the restaurants mentioned). By MARTA and walking, 28 minutes; by car, 12 minutes. Or how about Five Points to Bacchanalia (another restaurant)? By MARTA, 25 minutes; by car, 9 minutes.
I recognize that traffic during rush hour does slow things down, and that's mentioned in the guide. But I've lived here for 11 years now, much of which was spent in and around Tech and Midtown, and I promise that during most times of the day I can always get from point to point faster than MARTA. -- (WT-en) BigPeteB 11:10, 10 April 2012 (EDT)

I wasn't implying that the further reaches aren't worth visiting because they're not close to transit. I was implying that, sure, while there's some stuff out there, most visitors (with or without a car) would be more likely to stick around the neighborhoods I listed than to go drive up Briarcliff Road to find an Indian restaurant in a shopping center. I meant that the cases where people will care much about going to those neighborhoods at all will not make up most of their trip usually, and if they do want to get to something out there it's still not impossible to get there by transit (even some stuff in suburbs like Sandy Springs or Doraville is more accessible than you might think with transit).

Your point about visitors that have a car anyway is valid though, and my main complaint to begin with was the implication of the section that getting around without a car is hopeless (which would just turn a lot of people off from visiting altogether if they were just seeking to travel somewhere new for fun). I think the section is quite fair for the most part now.

As for MARTA trip times, I already said that most trips would take longer and I acknowledge that, but as I said transit isn't there to get around as fast as a car without ever walking. And like I said before, many other cities that have excellent reputations for being able to live without a car have similar ratios of transit trip time to car trip time (I think part of Atlanta's obsession with cars is down to the availability of parking, really, and the fact that it's a catch-22 where if more people used transit then it would run more frequently and make trips faster and then more people would use it).

Anyway, like I said the latest iteration of the section looks good for the most part now. I think it would still be useful to have a brief "where to stay without a car" blurb (like before but shorter), just because of the broad boundaries of many neighborhoods of Atlanta. For example, Midtown is often defined (not legally but semantically) as stretching all the way up to the areas northwest of Atlantic Station which gets into the not so walkable parts of town. There's a hotel up there at Northside Drive and 17th Street that, while far from being a death sentence for someone without a car, would present a pretty sub-optimal experience for visitors traveling on foot (walkable to the West Midtown district, partly on roads without sidewalks, but a short bus ride away from Midtown proper), especially compared to something in the heart of Midtown near Peachtree Street. That hotel is inside Priceline's definition of the Midtown region, if I remember correctly. Maybe just put something to the effect of "stay a few blocks from Peachtree near a MARTA station, or near North Highland Avenue"?

(WT-en) DJLamar 10:25, 12 April 2012 (EDT)

Eat section (and reversions)

Please stop reverting back and forth. If the only problem with the "Straits" listing is that it's also in the Midtown article, it's hardly unique in that respect; all of the listings in this article should be moved to district articles or deleted as duplicates. However, rather than leave the Eat section empty, the listings should be changed into prose describing each restaurant briefly and linking to the appropriate district article. I suggest restoring "Straits" and then converting the whole section into proper prose. (WT-en) LtPowers 22:07, 24 April 2012 (EDT)

I don't think specific restaurants should be mentioned at all at this level. Mentioning restaurants only invites additions by users, including self-interested people. Instead, the "Eat" section at this level should make more general comments about the pricing and selection of restaurants and other eateries in Atlanta. The alternative to specific listings is not to make the section blank, nor to mention selected restaurants by name without using full listings. (WT-en) Ikan Kekek 00:13, 25 April 2012 (EDT)
While I see the slippery slope there, I think a blanket ban on at least naming individual restaurants is uncalled for. For the 10 years I've lived here, whenever I mention I live in Atlanta to someone from out of town, the first question is often, "Do you eat at the Varsity often?" because it's that famous. I think that a few of the most famous or noteworthy restaurants can be mentioned by name at the top level, with the details in the appropriate district article.
Otherwise, LtPowers has the same idea I do... it's best if the whole section were rewritten to be prose, but in the meanwhile it would be better if content weren't removed, and instead left so that a suitable replacement can be made possibly referencing the same info. (WT-en) BigPeteB 09:40, 25 April 2012 (EDT)
I disagree with keeping up duplicate listings for any reason. Instead, they could be moved to the talk page to facilitate the editing of the section. But since you all have a clear plan, I'll defer to you. (WT-en) Ikan Kekek 14:32, 25 April 2012 (EDT)
San Francisco#Eat is a good model to follow here. Typically when a city is broken into districts the main article becomes a pointer about types of cuisine found in the city and a guide to lead the reader to the appropriate district article. (WT-en) Ikan is correct in stating that typically you don't want individual businesses listed at the top level - reference some of the other star articles for further examples. As to the back-and-forth edits in the interim, I'll leave that to those involved to sort out :) -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 14:51, 25 April 2012 (EDT)
Agreed that usually we don't need to mention specific restaurants... but sometimes if they're notable enough, they should be. There's no reason to leave someone wondering what district to look at if they want to know where a particularly famous restaurant is. The other factor that caused me to suggest mentioning the restaurants in prose is the "Celebrity chefs" section; that's certainly a notable aspect of Atlanta dining and there's no reason to avoid mentioning the specific chefs (and restaurants) in the main article, so long as the actual listings are kept to the district articles. (WT-en) LtPowers 18:39, 25 April 2012 (EDT)
I'm probably just repeating things ;) But: a) it's OK to call out individual businesses, but only if there's a strong reason to (mentioning establishments traditionally considered in the running for "best Chicago style pizza" is a good example), b) it's usually preferable not to, and c) there should be no restaurant listings in the main article at all. --(WT-en) Peter Talk 19:17, 25 April 2012 (EDT)

Neighborhoods in East Atlanta

Atlanta has a weird neighborhood situation on its east side. There are many small neighborhoods that are distinct enough to be referred to separately (and usually are referred to separately by locals), but that blend into each other and form larger cohesive neighborhoods, and there are a lot of places that are fairly small but don't fall into one nearby neighborhood cleanly.

Basically, we have Poncey-Highland and Virginia-Highland as two different places, even though they're less than a mile away from each other and pretty much one cohesive neighborhood by many people's standards. But then Little Five Points is right nearby, but has a separate identity. And then there's all the Inman Park/Old Fourth Ward stretch of N. Highland Ave. and Highland Ave. that doesn't fit into either category, plus the smaller outcroppings of stuff in EAV and the budding entertainment/restaurant/arts district around Edgewood and Boulevard.

To top it all off, the East Atlanta article looks nearly empty because all the content is relegated to the individual articles, so even though East Atlanta has many of the most attractive parts of town for many visitors, if they only click one level into that article they'll miss it entirely.

So what I'm saying is, all of the East Atlanta content of this page needs serious re-organization. Any ideas? We should probably move the sub-districts and their discussions to the main East Atlanta article. If we don't move the sub-districts altogether, we should at least group them more cohesively (i.e. Poncey-Highland and Virginia Highland go under a head called "Highlands" or "N. Highland Ave." with Inman Park or something, and maybe start talking about the Old Fourth Ward as a whole and including Highland Ave., Edgewood and Boulevard, etc.). (WT-en) DJLamar 11:23, 13 June 2012 (EDT)

General aviation

SWEPT IN FROM PUB

I'm wondering about this edit, which reverts what an anonymous user had added about general aviation airports near Atlanta, with no explanation given. I couldn't find any WT policy on general aviation, but I thought it was generally not excluded. I've certainly seen it mentioned in a lot of other articles. -- (WT-en) BigPeteB 09:43, 10 February 2012 (EST)

You'd have to ask User:(WT-en) Dguillaime to be sure, but looking at the IP's previous edits, it appears the reason for the reversion was to eliminate the spamming of the link to "Jetset Charter", rather than any particular antipathy toward general aviation. To the larger question, general aviation is certainly a valid topic for our guides, though only the most significant GA airports in a given region should be listed. (WT-en) LtPowers 10:13, 10 February 2012 (EST)
The company in question has been copying and pasting the same text to numerous articles, so had User:(WT-en) Dguillaime not done so I would have also reverted them under the Project:Don't tout guideline. There was a similar discussion about listings for private jets in the USA article at Talk:United States of America/Archive 2007#Private jets? and the consensus was that it didn't make sense in that article, and I feel that the same holds true for articles like Los Angeles or Atlanta where private charters aren't something that's relevant to 99.999% of travelers. However, for cities with small airports like Santa Monica where the major airlines do not operate then listing smaller operators might make sense - that assumes that the company in question actually operates the planes and isn't just a booking agent. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 11:12, 10 February 2012 (EST)
Yes, the spamming of the company link was why I reverted those. You'll see more instances of that in the edit history for that IP address, for other cities, and never with any contact information for that company besides the link. -- (WT-en) D. Guillaime 11:38, 10 February 2012 (EST)

Number of outline districts

It appears to me, that there are too many districts (at least for now) and some could indeed be fused into one. Some are held back at outline because they have no sleep listing (one even had no sleep section until recently), others are hardly more than the standard headings themselves. I know reorganizing districts is hard work, but if the result are better quality articles, it's well worth the effort. Best wishes Hobbitschuster (talk) 11:59, 25 June 2015 (UTC)[reply]

District discussion

Given that the situation with regards to the outline districts has not changed in nearly half a year, I hereby start the discussion of redefining districts... Other than the airport (which is a separate article) I have never been to Atlanta, though. Is there anybody who has sufficient knowledge of the place to help? Hobbitschuster (talk) 17:28, 24 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I've lived here since 2001. Here's the question I'd like to have answered: "What should WV consider the boundary between Atlanta and Metro Atlanta?"
According to a 2014 report, of all U.S. metro areas, Atlanta has the most urban sprawl. Locals generally think of anything inside I-285 highway as "inside" the city (which they call "ITP"), and anything outside it as being the suburbs ("OTP"). But that's a huge area; I-285 alone has a rough diameter of 30 km (20 miles).
The current districts were clearly chosen by looking at the local political boundaries (with Decatur added at my urging), and while according to Wikivoyage:Geographical hierarchy#Dividing geographical units that's okay when "they're the best way to break up a region", I hope everyone will agree it's the wrong thing to do here. Within I-285 I count 10 incorporated cities (Sandy Springs, Brookhaven, Chamblee, Doraville, Decatur, Avondale Estates, College Park, Hapeville, East Point, and Atlanta), even though these are all broadly considered part of "Atlanta" by locals.
The current district map notably omits the northeast direction, which includes Buford Highway, notable for a huge number of good Asian and Mexican restaurants. It also omits Sandy Springs in the north which is home to a large shopping center centered around Perimeter Mall, which is directly accessible from the subway. It omits East Point and College Park to the southwest, although there's not much of interest to travelers there. When the Braves baseball team moves to their new stadium next year, that will also be excluded by the current districts!
I have two suggestions for possible criteria:
  1. "Atlanta" is everything inside I-285 (and some exceptions for a few things that are outside but adjacent to I-285), and beyond that is "metro Atlanta". In other words, follow the local distinction between ITP and OTP. There's very little to argue about this way.
  2. "Atlanta" is everything that's reachable by MARTA (subway and buses, plus a reasonable radius). This excludes the northwest corridor up I-75, but frankly there's not much of tourist interest up there anyway. It includes some area to the north outside I-285, which includes a major shopping center and business offices. This has the advantage of being useful for travelers who don't rent cars. But it might discourage travelers who do have cars to explore some areas they would find interesting, and also overrepresents suburbs (which naturally have a lot of bus routes, but no tourist attractions).
--Bigpeteb (talk) 22:56, 25 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I've lived in the area for fifteen years now and I must say that Bigpeteb makes a very good point. While those cities are all independent entities, the line between them is very blurry for most locals. Further complicating it is the fact that most residents use their city name and Atlanta interchangeably. A lot of businesses and important buildings also use Atlanta in their address instead of the city that they are actually in. For example, three of Atlanta's five hospitals (Northside, Saint Joseph and Scottish Rite) are in Sandy Springs but use Atlanta as their address and most people would swear that they are in Atlanta.
I think that Bigpeteb's first suggestion of everything inside I-285 and a few things adjacent being considered "Atlanta" is a good idea. It would eliminate several partly or wholly empty pages. It would also stop the fudging of attraction locations in order to get them listed.
I would suggest adding Dunwoody to the list of cities as one of the "few things adjacent". As a city it just as "blurry" as the other ten cities and is bordered on three sides by Sandy Springs, Brookhaven, Chamblee and Doraville. It also does not have enough to warrant its own page but it does have a few things that do need to be listed.
Putting these eleven cities (Sandy Springs, Dunwoody, Brookhaven, Chamblee, Doraville, Decatur, Avondale Estates, College Park, Hapeville, East Point, and Atlanta) into one group would result in a lumpy vaguely egg shaped area that could be divided into four areas.
North - Buckhead, Sandy Springs and Dunwoody
East - East Atlanta, Brookhaven, Chamblee, Doraville, Decatur and Avondale Estates
West - West Atlanta and Midtown
South - Downtown, South Atlanta, College Park, Hapeville and East Point
This breakdown should result in four much more robust pages and a simpler way to see what Atlanta has to offer. It would also condense twenty-four pages into just four.

Wyrvan (talk) 00:34, 30 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Trying to revive this

So, as is frustratingly common, nothing seems to have come off this. What should be done about he current less than satisfactory district division of Atlanta? Hobbitschuster (talk) 17:39, 27 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I once changed planes in Atlanta, but I was 6 years old. That would make me more knowledgeable that my friend @Hobbitschuster:, but probably less knowledgeable that @Bigpeteb:. If Bigpeteb agrees with Wyrvan's amendment, then I think there would be grounds for the reorg to be undertaken by anyone who is willing to do the work. Ground Zero (talk) 00:52, 18 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Hey, I've changed planes in Atlanta too. I never left the airport, but still. Hobbitschuster (talk) 01:00, 18 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Fair enough. I won't diss your knowledge of Atlanta again. Ground Zero (talk) 01:11, 18 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Nah, you know what they say: It doesn't matter whether you'll go to heaven or hell - there'll be a layover in Atlanta. Hobbitschuster (talk) 01:32, 18 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I just found this discussion after being disappointed by the state of the subdistricts of the Downtown district. I've only been to Atlanta once and I don't know all that much about the city, but I would suggest merging the five subdistricts of Downtown into Atlanta/Downtown. The downtown area isn't that large, and currently none of the subdistrict articles are that long. A couple of them are very short. Moreover, the borders between them are not indicated—I can't tell whether they're supposed to cover all of Downtown or if there's supposed to be part of the Downtown district that isn't covered by any of its subdistricts. There are listings in the Downtown article, some of which are duplicated in the subdistricts but some of which aren't. Given all of this, would it be better to merge all five subdistricts into the Downtown article? —Granger (talk · contribs) 23:44, 25 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

After looking a little more, I wonder if it would make sense to merge all the subdistricts into their corresponding districts: we could merge Atlanta/Atlantic Station into Atlanta/Midtown, merge all the subdistricts of Atlanta/East into that district, and so on. Then I think we would end up with seven good-sized district articles that already match the district division and map in this article, instead of more than 20 articles which are a little confusing to navigate and some of which are short outlines. (It looks to me like User:Wyrvan's suggestion would solve the problem too, if someone with enough knowledge of the city is willing to do all the work. The advantage of my suggestion is that because it relies on the existing districts, the work can be done by someone like me who doesn't know the city that well.) —Granger (talk · contribs) 23:56, 25 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I agree; after visiting Atlanta in August, our article does seem a bit overdistricted. Powers (talk) 21:09, 26 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The plan I put forward is outdated at this point. It would lead to some districts getting bloated listings due to content added since it was proposed. I agree with Granger, the best plan at this point is fold the subdistricts into the main listings. Decatur and Hapeville should be moved to the Metro page as they are separate cities and not part of Atlanta proper.Wyrvan (talk) 06:02, 12 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Seeing no opposition, I'll start merging accordingly. —Granger (talk · contribs) 22:04, 24 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Yes Done, and I moved Decatur and Hapeville to the Metro Atlanta page as suggested. This means that the map needs to be adjusted a bit, because it still includes Decatur and Hapeville. —Granger (talk · contribs) 00:14, 25 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry to jump back into the discussion late, but I strongly disagree with Decatur being listed as part of Metro Atlanta rather than a district of Atlanta. The fact that it's a separate city should have no bearing on where we put it in the hierarchy, since the traveller comes first. If we made decisions based on city lines, then we need to also remove half of South Atlanta, since Hapeville and East Point and College Park are also incorporated cities. Then we also need to remove the airport, since it's a stretch to say that an airport that only has 3% of its land in Atlanta is an "Atlanta airport".

Sarcasm aside, I hope you see my point... just because Decatur is incorporated, it's much more integrated into Atlanta than most other farther-flung suburbs. It's even fully inside the I-285 perimeter, so it's pretty hard to argue that it's part of the metro area and not just part of the large sprawl that makes up ITP Atlanta. --Bigpeteb (talk) 22:12, 27 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Bigpeteb: I don't know much about Decatur or Hapeville, so I'm neutral on the issue. It would be easy to put Decatur back under Atlanta—only two simple edits (one to Decatur (Georgia) and one to Metro Atlanta). Do you think Hapeville should be merged with Atlanta/South too, instead of being listed as a separate city in Metro Atlanta? Also pinging User:Wyrvan. —Granger (talk · contribs) 22:22, 27 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Only two metro lines showing up

What's with the other metro lines? Why do they not show up on the dynamic map? Hobbitschuster (talk) 23:39, 5 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The OSM entities were associated with the wrong Wikidata item (a disambiguation item for "Blue Line" and "Green Line" rather than the specific ones in Atlanta). I fixed this on OSM; once that change propagates to WM's OSM servers it ought to show up correctly, yes? --Bigpeteb (talk) 16:16, 8 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, it does now. But someone else removed the dynamic map, which I can't complain about too much. (I added it thinking I'd next do a crude drawing of the districts, without knowing that we don't have such a feature for dynamic maps yet.) --Bigpeteb (talk) 16:19, 8 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I believe it should be possible to add drawings of the districts to the dynamic map, using the instructions at Wikivoyage:How to use dynamic maps#Adding boundaries and tracks. —Granger (talk · contribs) 23:22, 8 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
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