ATLANTA, GEORGIA -- A new study from the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University examines the impact of urban sprawl on communities in the ten-county Atlanta metropolitan region. The report entitled, "Sprawl Atlanta: Social Equity Dimensions of Uneven Growth and Development," concludes that Atlanta is rapidly becoming the "sprawl capital" of the nation. "Sprawl-fueled growth is widening the gap between the region's 'haves' and 'have nots' and is pushing people further and further apart geographically, politically, economically, and racially," said sociologist Robert Bullard, the principal author of the report. The study was funded by the Turner Foundation. Bullard and a team of social scientists, urban planners, educators, and environmentalists report that many government policies--including housing, land use, energy, transportation, environmental, and education--have actually aided and in some cases subsidized urban sprawl.

Every week, 500 acres of green space, forest, and farmland in the Atlanta region are plowed under to make way for new housing subdivisions, strip malls, shopping centers, and highways.

The Atlanta region's urban land area expanded 47% between 1990 and 1996. Still, Atlanta is the least dense of all U.S. metro areas with 1,366 persons per square mile. Between 1990 and 1996, all but two of fifteen census tracts adding more than 5,000 people were located in Atlanta's mostly white northern suburbs. Atlanta's northern suburbs captured the lion's share of the 420,000 jobs added in the region during the 1990-1996 period. The population outside Atlanta's urban core increased by almost 40%, but grew by only 2% percent inside the predominately black Atlanta city limits.

The economic activity centers and emerging activity centers are concentrated in the region's northern suburbs. Fifteen of the region's eighteen activity centers are located north of I- 20 freeway--a freeway that historically divided the region racially and geographically. Only one of the five emerging activity centers are located south of I-20.

While sprawl can not be blamed for all of the social ills in the three million plus Metropolitan Atlanta region, sprawl development pattern has contributed to the concentration of urban core poverty, limited mobility, economic disinvestment, social isolation, and city/suburban disparities. For example, over 88% of the metro area's poor blacks live in Fulton and DeKalb Counties, 62% in the city of Atlanta, and 6% live in Cobb and Gwinnett Counties. On the other hand, 40% of the metro area's poor whites live in Fulton and DeKalb Counties, 13% in Atlanta, and 34% in Cobb and Gwinnett Counties. Over 84.1% and 44.1% of Atlanta's poor live in high poverty neighborhoods and extreme poverty neighborhoods, respectively. Comparatively, 44.4% and 18.8% of the region's poor live in high poverty neighborhoods and extreme poverty neighborhoods, respectively.

Fair housing laws are not uniformly enforced across the region. Housing discrimination is a major barrier for Black Atlantans. African Americans are twice as likely to experience housing discrimination in the region's suburbs than in the city of Atlanta. African Americans are treated less favorably than whites 30% of the time in Atlanta and 67% of the time in Atlanta's suburbs.

Where you live can be hazardous to your health. People of color are disproportionately represented in the Atlanta region's "dirtiest" zip codes based on the U.S. EPA's toxic release inventory data. While people of color comprise 29.8 percent of the population in the five largest counties contiguous to Atlanta (Fulton, DeKalb, Cobb, Gwinnett, and Clayton Counties), they represent the majority of residents in five of the ten "dirtiest" zip codes in these counties.

Atlanta metro residents who live in majority white zip codes in the five-county area are exposed to an average of 38.2 pounds of toxic releases per person annually. Atlanta metro residents who live in majority people of color zip codes are exposed to an average of 208.6 pounds of toxic releases per person annually. The "dirtiest" zip code (i.e., 30354) in the five-county area is located in Fulton County and receives over 1.55 million pounds of toxic releases annually; people of color make up 69.1 percent of the population in zip code 30354. Residents in zip code 30336 are subjected to a whopping 873.9 pounds of toxic releases per person annually; this Fulton County zip code is 98.2% black.

The region is a nonattainment area for ground level ozone. Cars, trucks, and buses are the largest source of this pollution. The region has more than 2.5 million registered vehicles. Atlantans lead the nation in miles driven per day (over 100 million miles per day). Atlantans drive an average 34 miles per day--50% further than Los Angeles residents. Sprawl is exacerbated by the fact that Georgia's motor fuel tax is the lowest in the nation (7.5 cents per gallon) and currently can only be used for roads and bridges.

Getting people out of their cars and into some form of coordinated and linked regional public transit may well be the key to solving a major part of the region's transportation problem. Atlanta's Metropolitan Rapid Transit Authority or MARTA is regional only in name since it serves only Fulton and DeKalb Counties. The mostly white and suburban Cobb County created its own bus system that has limited links to MARTA. Only 4.7% of the region's workers commute by public transit.

Georgia's newly elected governor Roy Barnes has proposed the creation of the Georgia Regional Transportation Authority (GRTA). This could signal a new direction for the three million people 13-county Atlanta Metropolitan region. Generally, major transportation investments in the region support low-density sprawl that generates increased vehicle emission and air pollution.

The future of the region is intricately bound to how government, business, and community leaders address Atlanta's quality of life and social equity issues. It will take a concerted effort on many fronts and across political jurisdictions to arrest runaway sprawl. To continue down the current road of sprawl is too costly for everyone.

To view the Executive Summary of "Sprawl Atlanta" and sample maps click HERE