THE PROBLEM

Ask ten people to define sprawl, and you will probably get ten different definitions. In this report, we define sprawl as: random unplanned growth characterized by inadequate accessibility to essential land uses such as housing, jobs, and public services like schools, hospitals, and mass transit. Sprawl-driven development has negatively impacted the population, jobs, investment capital and tax base of the urban core. Typically, strip centers, low-density residential housing, and other isolated, scattered developments leapfrog over the landscape without any rhyme or reason.

Sprawl creates a car-dependent citizenry. Urban sprawl is consuming land faster than population is growing in many cities across the country. Historically, the decentralization of employment centers has had a major role in shaping metropolitan growth patterns. Government policies buttressed and tax dollars subsidized this decentralization through new roads and highways at the expense of public transit. Tax subsidies made it possible for new suburban employment centers to become dominant outside of cities, and to pull middle-income workers and home owners from the urban core.

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WHY STUDY SPRAWL?

Sprawl is not a new phenomenon. Suburban sprawl has been the dominant growth pattern for nearly all metropolitan areas in the United States for the past five decades. Why study sprawl? First, sprawl affects every aspect of our lives and daily routine. In a growth-dominated region like Atlanta, sprawl affects the quality of life where people live, work, play, shop, and go to school. Second, sprawl affects our health---physical and mental health. Third, sprawl intensifies economic and racial polarization. The American society has never been classless or color blind. Both race and class have always mattered in shaping the complexion of our cities, suburbs, and rural areas.

It is quite clear that growth and sprawl are not synonymous. Sprawl need not accompany metropolitan growth. An increasing number of Americans are challenging the wisdom of sprawl-driven development that creates potential environmental and public health threats. Sprawl is costly. Planners are now questioning the costs and benefits of allowing central city core areas to deteriorate, while pushing urban and suburban pollution further into rural areas, farm land, and "greenfields."

In the end, all Americans pay for sprawl with increased health and safety risks, worsening air and water pollution, urban decline, disappearing farmland and wildlife habitat, racial polarization, city/suburban disparities in public education, lack of affordable housing, and the erosion of community.

Government policies, including housing, education and transportation policies, have aided and in some cases subsidized separate and unequal economic development, segregated neighborhoods, and spatial layout of our central cities and suburbs. Sprawl-fueled growth is pushing people further and further apart geographically, politically, economically, and socially.

Malls, strip centers, mass transit systems, road, highways, and freeways do not spring up out of thin air. They are planned. In some cases, the planning is not very good. More cars and more roads translate into more pollution and clogged freeways. Pollution from automobiles clog more than highways. Air pollution from cars is contributing to the asthma epidemic in most urban areas. Zoning and other exclusionary practices are used as "protectionist" devices. However, zoning can limit the mobility of poor people and people of color who are concentrated in central cities.

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STUDY AREA

Metropolitan Atlanta has experienced constant growth since the 1900s. The 1960s were considered the boom years in which Atlanta established its regional dominance. The 1970s and 1980s were characterized as a time the city became increasingly black. During this same period, Atlanta experienced a steady decrease in its share of the metropolitan population since 1960. Metropolitan Atlanta continued to experience breakneck growth in the 1990s. An average of 69,100 people moved into the metropolitan each year during the 1990s, compared to 61,788 in the 1980s. The ten-county Metropolitan Area (Cherokee, Cobb, Douglas, Clayton, Fayette, Fulton, Henry Gwinnett, DeKalb, and Rockdale) has a population of over 3 million persons.

Much of the growth in the 1990s was characterized by suburban sprawl and economic disinvestment in Atlanta's central city. Although the Atlanta Regional Commission predicts some population slowdown in the late 1990s, the large counties (i.e., Gwinnett, Cobb, and Fulton) are still adding large numbers of people. Gwinnett County added over 20,300 (6.6% increase) to its 499,200 population during the 1997-98 period; Cobb County added 15,100 persons (2.7% increase) to its 550,000 population, and Fulton County added 13,200 (1.7% increase) to its 773,000 population during the 1997-98 period.

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STUDY DESIGN AND RESEARCH FOCUS

This study uses a multi-disciplinary approach to analyze and critique the emerging crisis resulting from urban sprawl in the ten-county Atlanta metropolitan region. A series of policy papers were commissioned from an interdisciplinary team of local experts. The contributors to the commissioned paper series include sociologists, lawyers, urban planners, economists, educators, and health care professionals. All of the contributors examined institutional constraint issues that are embedded in urban sprawl. The study is written in a non-technical readable style that should be useful to policy analysts, government officials, community leaders, and other individuals working on urban and minority issues.

The study includes an analysis of factors that contribute to urban sprawl and their consequences. It also outlines some policy recommendations and an action agenda. Both primary and secondary data were used in the analysis. An extensive use of geographic information system (GIS) analysis is used in mapping and graphically illustrating the environmental consequences of sprawl on low-income and people of color communities in the region.

Among the topics examined in this study include environmental impacts, housing and residential patterns, racial polarization, economic opportunity, community development, transportation, energy consumption, public health, and schools. Our analysis also illuminates the rising class and racial divisions underlying the uneven growth and development in the Atlanta region. We expect the study results will be of special interest to the environmental groups and the growing environmental justice movement. The agendas of many community based organizations cut across the various issues such as housing, education, jobs and economic development, transportation, and environmental quality issues that are addressed in this study.

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BACKDROP OF THE ATLANTA SPRAWL STUDY

Hardly a day passes without some reference to Atlanta's sprawl problem. Local and national media have featured the region's sprawl problem. Even Atlanta business leaders' alarms were sounded when the region was tagged the "new Los Angeles." Nevertheless, most of the reports on the topic gloss over or minimize the social equity implications of Atlanta's sprawl problem. Atlanta's history is steeped in racial politics. Both race and class are intricately linked to the Atlanta's sprawl dilemma. Every public policy decision made in the region operated under this backdrop. It has been difficult to erase this legacy.

Some decisions in education, housing, lending, transportation, and environment actually exacerbated racial segregation, economic disinvestment, abandonment, uneven development, infrastructure decline, environmental degradation, and subsidized sprawl. Atlanta's regional growth policies are implicated in land-use patterns and unhealthy air that lowers everyone's quality of life. Clearly, addressing urban sprawl must be elevated to a top priority.

Sprawl is a fact of life in the Atlanta region. Whether we like it or not, it is real and must be addressed with the urgency that the problem demands. Ask ten people to define sprawl, and you will probably get ten different definitions. In this report, we define sprawl as random unplanned growth. Sprawl is characterized by inadequate accessibility to essential land uses such as housing, jobs, and public services like schools, hospitals, and mass transit.

Planners are now questioning the costs and benefits of allowing Atlanta's central city core areas to deteriorate, while pushing urban and suburban development further into rural areas, farm land, and "greenfields." In the end, all Americans pay for sprawl with increased health and safety risks, worsening air and water pollution, urban decline, disappearing farmland and wildlife habitat, racial polarization, city/suburban disparities in public education, lack of affordable housing, and the erosion of community.

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MAJOR FINDINGS

Sprawl can not be blamed for all of the social ills in Metropolitan Atlanta. However, some clear side effects can be linked to the sprawl development pattern. These side effects can be groups under two broad categories: environmental and social. The environmental effects of sprawl include automobile dependency, urban infrastructure decline, core city abandonment and disinvestment, increased energy consumption, air pollution, threat to farm land and wildlife habitat, and diminished quality of life. The social effects include urban core poverty, unemployment, limited mobility, economic disinvestment, social isolation, city/suburban school disparities, public health threats, and safety risks.

The 1990s have seen the Atlanta metropolitan area grow at breakneck speed. The region's housing starts, job growth, and low unemployment rate are envied across many regions. However, there is a down side to the regional growth pattern: namely, urban sprawl. Sprawl-driven growth has placed the health of the region and its residents at risk. Polluted rivers and streams, clogged freeways, and fouled air are byproducts of sprawl. The losers in all instances are central city Atlantans as well as suburban and rural communities that lie in the path of sprawl.

Demographic Shift

Although Atlanta's share of the metropolitan population has declined over the years, the health of the city is still important to the overall metropolitan region's vitality. Atlanta as the "hole in the doughnut" does not bode well for the region. New challenges are being raised to address socioeconomic imbalances resulting from sprawl. What happens outside the city affects all Atlantans.

• The city of Atlanta share of the region's jobs dropped from 40% in 1980 to 29.5 in 1990
• Atlanta's Northern suburbs share of jobs rose from 40% in 1980 to 52% in 1990
• Between 1990 and 1996, all but two of fifteen census tracts adding more than 5,000 people were located in Atlanta's northern suburbs
• Nearly one third of the region's people of color live in Atlanta, compared to only 6.3% of the region's whites
• Twelve of the region's "super districts" had majority black and other population in 1996
• These 12 super districts accounted for 61.6% of the region's people of color population
• The economic activity centers and emerging activity centers are concentrated in the region's northern suburbs. Fifteen of the 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 is located south of I-20.

Major Activity Centers

 

Widening Disparities and Concentration of Poverty

The Atlanta region is experiencing a growing disparity between the "have" and have nots." These disparities are more pronounced between central city and suburbs as illustrated in the poverty gap.

• The 1990 poverty rate for the Atlanta region was 7.7% vs 24.6% for the city of Atlanta
• The city of Atlanta contains only 12 % of the region's population and 65% of the area's public housing
• Over 88% of the Atlanta region's poor blacks lived in Fulton and DeKalb Counties, 62% in the city of Atlanta, and 6% lived in Cobb and Gwinnett Counties
• On the other hand, 40% of the metro area's poor whites lived 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

Atlanta's Regional Growth Machine

The Atlanta regional economy boomed in the 1990s. Unemployment remained low and job growth remained strong. Most new jobs, new homes, and newcomers were located outside the city. Sprawl development accelerated urban core disinvestment, infrastructure decline, and housing segregation by race and income. Help wanted signs proliferate in the region's northern suburbs. In most cases, public transit is either inadequate or nonexistent. In order to access these major employment centers one nearly always has to have access to an automobile. The Atlanta regional growth machine has produced some startling statistics:

• An average of 69,100 persons moved to the Atlanta region in the 1990s
• Atlanta'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
• The population outside Atlanta's urban core increased by almost 40%, but grew by only 2% percent inside the city limits
• In 1996, Atlanta led the nation in residential construction with 48,262 building permits
• Between 1990 and 1996, over 420,000 jobs were added to the region. Newcomers flocked to the region for obvious reasons---jobs.
• In 1996, the Atlanta region ranked 1^st as metro area for investment potential
• In 1998, it ranked only 16^th among 18 metropolitan areas for potential investments in 1999

Urban Flight and Racial Polarization

The Atlanta metropolitan area continues to be racially separate and unequal. Sprawl-driven development fueled this pattern and affect the racial and ethnic makeup of residential areas and public schools. African Americans are still the most racially segregated ethnic minority group in the region. While suburbanization largely meant out-migration of whites, some black Atlantans also made the move to the suburbs. Black expansion into Atlanta's suburbs occurred largely after 1970 and quite often reflected the segregated housing pattern typical of central-city neighborhoods.

Some government policies, i.e., education, housing, transportation, environmental, and lending, have actually exacerbated sprawl-related problems. Sprawl has unintended consequences that are not randomly distributed.

• Federal mortgage subsidies still facilitate middle-income home owners flight out of the central city into outlying suburbs and rural areas at the same time many Atlanta central city neighborhoods are starving for investment capital
• Sprawl development in the suburbs creates disinvestment incentives, depresses property values, and stagnates business opportunities in older inner city areas where African Americans and other people of color are concentrated
• Flight of whites and middle-income families to the suburbs contributed to and exacerbated both economic and racial polarization in the region
• Racial barriers also deprive a large segment of the central city population major investments through home ownership and business development
• Racially segregated housing patterns have extended into Atlanta suburbs

School Segregation

Segregated housing patterns also affect racial and ethnic composition of public schools. Atlanta public schools is clearly a majority black system. Where one lives can also impact ones accessibility to quality libraries and other nonresidential amenities. The education gap between and within urban and suburban schools is widening. The "haves" and "have nots" follow a distinct racial and geographic line. Too many young inner-city students are falling by the wayside.

• Clear racial patterns emerge in both Fulton and DeKalb County Schools with African Americans concentrated in the southern portion of the two counties with whites concentrated in the north
• An increasing number of African American, Asian, and Latino students now comprise a growing student population in the suburban school systems
• Who gets into college and who qualifies for HOPE scholarships have a lot to do with access to quality public schools

Barriers to Fair Housing

Studies over the past three decades have clearly documented the relationship between redlining and disinvestment decisions and neighborhood decline. Redlining accelerates the flight of full-service banks, food stores, restaurants, and other shopping centers in inner-city neighborhoods. In their place, inner-city neighborhoods are left with check-cashing stations, pawn shops, storefront grocery stores, liquor stores, and fast-food operations--all well buttoned up with wire mesh and bullet-proof glass.

African Americans, Latino Americans, and Native Americans do not have full access to lending by banks and saving institutions as their white counterparts. African Americans are three times more likely to be rejected for home mortgages compared to whites. Yet, federal regulators continue to ignore discrimination in lending. These alarming loan rejection statistics still leave some government and industry officials in doubt as to whether the culprit is a function of discrimination or neutral "market forces." Nevertheless, discriminatory lending practices subsidize the physical destruction of communities of color.

A number of obstacles still keep many blacks out of the suburbs, including low income, housing discrimination, restrictive zoning practices, inadequate public transportation, and fear. Housing barriers still persist for many people of color in the Atlanta region. Discrimination by banks, mortgage companies, and real estate brokers limit housing options for thousands of Atlanta area residents. Housing discrimination remains greatest among African Americans in the region.

Housing discrimination denies a substantial segment of the African American community a basic form of wealth accumulation and investment through home ownership. The number of African American homeowners would probably be higher in the absence of discrimination by lending institutions. Only about 59 percent of the nation's middle-class African Americans own their homes, compared with 74 percent of whites. On the other hand, some $50 to $90 billion dollars a year tax subsidies underwrite suburban homeowners. This middle-class entitlement is by far "the broadest and most expensive welfare program in the U.S.A." Results from Atlanta Metro Fair housing indicate that discrimination is alive and well in the region.

• African Americans are twice as likely to experience housing discrimination in Atlanta's suburbs than in the city of Atlanta
• Results from fair housing "testers" reveal that African Americans are treated less favorably than whites 30% of the time in Atlanta and 67% of the time in Atlanta's suburb

  Insurance Redlining

  Racial redlining by insurance companies deprives a large segment of Atlanta's minority population major investments through home ownership and business development. Home owners in mostly African American neighborhoods are especially vulnerable to insurance redlining. For example, Fulton and DeKalb residents have the highest insurance rates in the region. The highest rate paid in the region was $618. Residents in thirty-five percent of Fulton County Zip codes paid $618. On the other hand, All of the zip codes in Cherokee, Clayton, Cobb, Douglas, Fayette, and Gwinnett Counties paid less than the region's average rate of $430.

  Environmental Quality

  The middle-class dominated environmental movement built an impressive political base for environmental reform and regulatory relief. Few environmentalists, however, realized the sociological implications of the NIMBY (not in my backyard) phenomenon. Given the political climate of the times, hazardous-waste facilities, garbage dumps, and polluting industries were likely to end up in somebody's backyard. But whose backyard? More often than not, locally unwanted land uses or LULUs end up in poor, powerless, people of color communities rather than in affluent suburbs. A case in point is the location of Atlanta's combined sewer overflows or CSOs. Atlanta's CSOs represent sewers which combine storm water with raw sewage and overflow into creeks or onto streets during heavy rains. These CSOs pose health risks since many contain heavy metals, organic compounds and petroleum products as well as viruses and fecal coliform bacteria from humans and animals.

  Fulton and DeKalb Counties

  • Seven of the nine (77.7%) CSOs in Atlanta (Fulton and DeKalb Counties) are located in mostly African American neighborhoods where home values fall well below the median
  • Nearly 83 percent of the city's African American population compared to 60 percent of whites live in zip codes that have an uncontrolled hazardous waste site

  The distribution of polluting facilities is correlated with racial composition of surrounding neighborhoods. This pattern is most pronounced in Fulton and DeKalb Counties-two counties that have the largest concentration of people of color.

  Fulton County	DeKalb County

  Polluting facilities are not randomly scattered across the urban landscape. They are often located in communities that have high percentages of poor, elderly, young, and people of color residents. The nonrandom pattern of waste facility siting is not due to chance or the luck of the draw. People of color are disproportionately represented in the region's "dirtiest" zip codes according to EPA's toxic release inventory data.

  TRI Releases and Distribution of Poor Population by Zip Code

  TRI Releases and Distribution of Minority Population by Zip Code

  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 large counties.

  Metro Atlanta's Ten "Dirtiest" Zip Codes

  • Atlanta metro residents (five-county area) who live in majority white zip codes are exposed to an average of 38.2 pounds of toxic releases per person annually
  • Atlanta metro residents (five-county area) 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 873.9 pounds of toxic releases per person annually
  • Fulton County zip code 30336 is 98.2% black

  Transportation

  Atlanta is now perceived as a risk for overbuilding. How the region handles its traffic and infrastructure problem will go a long way in shaping the investor outlook. When the Wall Street Journal sounds the alarm that the region's traffic congestion and poor air quality may keep new businesses from relocating to the area, even the Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce heeds the "wake-up call" to become an anti-sprawl advocate. But words do not automatically translate into action. And talk is cheap. Only time will tell if the region's business and political leaders will heed the call for reigning in sprawl.

  Sprawl can easily be seen with the naked eye as one attempts to navigate Atlanta's grid-locked freeways. Freeway congestion tells the story. Building roads to everywhere is the problem--not the solution. One does not have to be a rocket scientist or a traffic engineer to know that the region's traffic has gotten substantially worse over the past four or five years.

  Atlanta's regional transportation policies are implicated in land-use patterns, unhealthy air, and sprawl. The Atlanta region is a nonattainment area for ground level ozone with cars, trucks, and buses as the largest source of this pollution. The region could lose over $600 million in federal transportation funds.

  • On average, people in the region drive 34 miles per day--more than anyone else on the face of the planet (50 percent further than Los Angeles area residents)
  • Atlantans lead the nation in miles driven per day (over 100 million miles per day)
  • The region has more than 2.5 million registered vehicles
  • 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.

  The Atlanta metropolitan area has a regional public transit system only in name. The Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority or MARTA serves just two counties, Fulton and DeKalb. Cobb County operates CCT that has limited links to MARTA. In September 1998, Gwinnett County officials voted to build its own public transit system. It is too early to tell at this time what shape Gwinnett's public transit system will take. Getting people out of their cars and into some form of coordinated and linked public transit may well be the key to solving a major part of the region's transportation problem.

  • Only 4.7% of the region's workers commute by public transit
  • The percentage of commuters into Fulton County is 70% compared to 29% of those commuting outside Fulton County for work
  • Over 34.9% of Atlanta's black females and 24.3% of black males use public transit to get to work
  • For whites, 5.2% females and 4.2% males use public transit to get to work

  Air Quality and Public Health

  Generally, major transportation investments in the region support low-density sprawl that generates increased vehicle emission and air pollution. The federal EPA designated the region's a nonattainment area for ground level ozone. Given the heavy dependence on the automobile in the region and the limited role of MARTA and CCT in the region, it is doubtful that emission-control technologies adopted under the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments (CAAA) are adequate to ensure that transportation fairly contributes to attainment of healthful air quality in the region.

  Not only are Atlanta area residents paying for sprawl with their hard-earned dollars, but they are also paying with their health. It is not difficult for passengers flying into Atlanta's Hartsfield International Airport--one of the busiest airports in the country--to make a quick comparison with the smog-choked skies of Los Angeles. Poor air quality translates into increased public health risks. Although air pollution is not thought to cause asthma and related respiratory illnesses, it is a major trigger. Asthma has reached epidemic proportions in the Atlanta region.

  Persons suffering from asthma are particularly sensitive to the effects of carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxides, particulate matter, ozone, and nitrogen oxides. Ground-level ozone may exacerbate health problems such as asthma, nasal congestions, throat irritation, respiratory tract inflammation, reduced resistance to infection, changes in cell function, loss of lung elasticity, chest pains, lung scarring, formation of lesions within the lungs, and premature aging of lung tissues.

  • African Americans are two to six times more likely to die from asthma
  • Asthma hospitalization rate for African Americans is 3.4 times the rate for whites
  • The most vulnerable population is children
  • Asthma is 26 percent higher among African American children than among white children
  • Pediatric emergency clinic visits in Atlanta increased by one-third during peak ozone level
  • Asthma is the number one reason for childhood hospitalization in Atlanta
  • Four counties in the Atlanta metropolitan region (DeKalb, Douglas, Fulton, and Rockdale Counties) exceed national ozone standards
  • A disproportionately large share of the childhood asthma cases (90.1 percent) in the Atlanta nonattainment area occur in Fulton and DeKalb counties--two counties with the largest share of people of color

  Energy Consumption and Deforestation

  Sprawl development encourages the destruction of forests, farm land, and wildlife habitat outside the central city. Sprawl also supports wasteful energy consumption associated with commuting from distant suburban subdivisions.

  • Sprawl supports wasteful energy consumption associated with commuting from distant suburban subdivisions
  • Sprawl also fuels deforestation and loss of green vegetation and increases the heat island and energy consumption
  • 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
  • Loss of tree cover translates into a larger heat island, increased energy consumption, higher electric bills, more pollution , and more soil erosion and flooding
  • Data from NASA Landsat Satellite show that from 1988 to 1998, the metro area lost about 190,000 acres of tree cover

   

   

  Atlanta's Heat Island

  (2/24/2000-New NASA images show that sprawl-driven development in "Hotlanta" is altering local weather patterns. Click here to view the online report.)

  1972	1978
  1986	1993

  Working Across Political Jurisdictions

  Urban sprawl cuts across political jurisdictions and has unintended consequences that are not randomly distributed. Sprawl fuels urban disinvestment, depresses property values, stagnates business opportunities in central cities, and exacerbates environmental problems. Since sprawl cuts across jurisdictional boundaries, everyone has a stake in seeing that this problem is favorably resolved. These diverse group of allies agree that sprawl is costly and the bill is being paid by ordinary citizens.

  • Sprawl critics have now amassed allies from inner-city neighborhoods, suburban homeowners, rural farmers, environmentalists, academics, civil rights activists, and even some business leaders
  • It will take a host of public players to arrest sprawl---including city, county, regional, state, and federal government players

  Zoning and Land Use

  For the most part, zoning is considered a local matter. Implementation of zoning ordinances and land-use plans have a political, economic, and racial dimension. Competition often results between special interest groups (i.e., real estate interests, developers, civic clubs, neighborhood associations, environmentalists, etc.) for what these groups regard as more advantageous land use. Real estate interests generally have a great deal of influence over zoning boards and local officials who make the decisions. In their quest for quality neighborhoods, residents often find themselves competing for desirable neighborhood amenities (i.e., good schools, police and fire protection, quality health care, parks, open space, and recreational facilities, etc.) and resisting outputs that are viewed as having negative consequences (i.e., landfills, incinerators, sewage treatment facilities, polluting industries, chemical plants, etc.). The differential residential amenities and land uses assigned in the region cannot be explained by class alone.

  • Generally, government officials have done a miserable job protecting low-income, working-class, and people of color communities from pollution assaults, industrial encroachment, and environmental degradation
  • Zoning has not been able to protect some communities from environmental assaults
  • Race underlies and interpenetrates with the other factors in explaining the socio-spatial layout of the Atlanta metropolitan area, including housing patterns, streets and highway configuration, commercial development, and industrial facility siting
  • Poor whites and poor blacks do not have the same opportunities to "vote with their feet" and escape undesirable physical environments
  • People of color and low-income residential areas are disproportionately and adversely affected by unregulated growth, ineffective regulations of industrial toxins, and public policy decisions authorizing locally unwanted land uses (LULUs) that favor those with political and economic clout .

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  POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS

  Communities are not sitting back waiting for government or business to come up with the "silver-bullet" solution to urban sprawl. Some communities are taking action on their own. Whether urban, suburban, or rural, it will take a coordinated effort among the divergent interest groups to fix the Atlanta region's sprawl problem. A long-term commitment is needed to address the legacy of neglect and procedural, geographic, social, and intergenerational inequities that are exacerbated by sprawl.

  A major challenge facing the region is to create meaningful forms of collaboration among the regional actors. The following policy recommendations are offered as a start:

  • Broad Coalitions and Alliances. The sprawl issue has the potential for bringing diverse community based organizations, home owners associations, civic clubs, academic institutions, activists, and government to form broad coalitions and alliances. The seamy side of sprawl may serve as a unifying theme to groups whose history has been characterized more as conflict rather than cooperation. Working together, neighborhood groups from Atlanta, the suburbs, and surrounding rural areas can band together to arrest sprawl.

     

  • Proactive Race Relations Strategy. Race still matters in the United States. The Atlanta metropolitan region is no exception. Improving race relations needs to be an explicit priority in the region. Racial polarization is impeding community and economic development within Atlanta. Attracting middle-income residents, addressing regional transportation, creating a 24-hour downtown, and in general maximizing the city and the region's potential will require examining racial issues and resolving related conflict. Dismantling racial barriers would go a long way in boosting financial incentives and reinvestment in central city neighborhoods.

     

  • Plans to Narrow Public Education Gap. Education is an investment in the future and public schools remain an integral part of our nation's future. All public schools are not created equal. Disparities exist within the Atlanta Public Schools and county schools as well as between central city and suburban schools. Innovative approaches need to be taken to equalize inherent funding inequities resulting from an outdated taxing system. A number of strategies are proposed that include working to assure equitable distribution of state resources; working with the business community, setting high expectations for all students; making recruitment of quality teachers a top priority; encouraging a culture of learning; providing a safe and secure learning environment; adopting a philosophy that all children can learn. In addition, increased funding, better accountability, improved opportunities for adult learning and continuing education, better planning, master teacher recruitment, innovation, and improved technology are all means to providing quality education in the region.

     

  • Regional Fair Housing Initiatives. Discrimination is still a major barrier to open housing in the region. Discrimination costs. A targeted regional fair housing strategy could maximize housing, employment, and educational opportunity options for low-income persons and people of color in the region. Private fair housing efforts, i.e., Atlanta Metro Fair Housing Program, should be expanded and better coordinated with state fair housing initiatives. An annual county-by-county fair housing "Report Cards" could be issued as one tool for evaluating and reporting progress toward open housing in the region.

     

  • Energy Efficient Housing. Improving energy efficiency in housing is a money saver and could play a major role in improving the region's air quality. Reduction in energy consumption benefits all households. It is especially pertinent for low-income residents since efficiency measures save money, improve human health, reduce air pollution, increase building durability, and enhance property values.

     

  • Vegetation and Green Space. The region's timberlands and forests are severely threatened by deforestation. Too many trees are flattened to make way for strip centers, outlet malls, and subdivisions. Trees need to be an integral part of all community planning since they increase the shade around buildings and parking lots, and lower air temperatures surrounding vegetation.

     

  • In-Fill Development. In-fill development should be encouraged in place of uncontrolled sprawl. In-fill and higher density development will improve infrastructure efficiency by taking advantage of existing capacity; save costs for roads and utilities; require less automobile dependence; reduce auto emissions; improve air quality; locate closer to stores, school, work and other activities; and provide access to pedestrian-friendly communities with sidewalks.

   

  • Enforcing Existing Laws. We currently have sufficient environmental, housing, health, transportation, land use, and employment laws on the books to protect all citizens and communities. However, laws and regulations are only as good as their enforcement. The city, county, regional, state, and federal government need to take bold steps to ensure that no federal funds or tax dollars are being used in a discriminatory manner. Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 compliance reviews and equity analysis must be analyzed and scrutinized.

     

  • Land Use Reform and Brownfields Redevelopment. Current land-use decision making favors development in the suburbs or "greenfields" rather than inner city areas. Some policies even foster abandonment and infrastructure decline. Alternatively, existing policies, such as criteria for funding water/sewer infrastructure could be modified to favor existing, rather than new development. In addition, "brownfields," or abandoned or underutilized property or buildings, need to be reclaimed and brought back into production. Residents in neighborhoods with brownfields sites must be an integral part of the redevelopment process.

     

  • Regional Transportation Authority. The time is long overdue for the creation of a regional transportation authority that will plan, administer, link, and coordinate mass transit services in the Atlanta region. Innovative and creative strategies are needed by this regional authority to link existing and new public transit services (i.e., buses, light rail, and commuter rail) in an effort to maximize resources, increase access and mobility, and reduce air pollution and congestion.

     

  • Transit-Oriented Development. Transit stations can become more than a place where commuters pass through on their way to somewhere else. Planners can shape land uses and development that are amenable to walking, bicycling, and transit use. One measure to combat sprawl is transit-oriented development that promotes more dense, mixed land uses combined with location efficient mortgages. The idea is that money saved from lower transportation costs (and thus boosting ones disposable income) could be used to qualify a greater number of lower and moderate income households for home mortgages. The spillover effect is increased home ownership in inner-city neighborhoods.

   

  • Streets for Walking, Bicycles, and Transit. As a rule, sprawl development is not pedestrian, bicycle, or transit friendly. Infrastructure enhancements and service improvements are needed to get people out of their homes and cars. Walking and biking are two major travel modes that produce zero pollution. In addition, sidewalks, bike lanes, jogging paths all encourage physical activity, enhance public health, and promote social interaction and a sense of "community."

   

  • Gas Tax Reform. Georgia's has the lowest gasoline tax in the country (i.e., 7.5 cents per gallon). The state limits the use of the gas tax to roads and bridges. It is recommended that the state constitution be changed to allow for Georgia's gas tax to be used for alternative transportation modes.

     

  • Equity Analysis and Transportation Planning. In compliance with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, President Clinton's Executive Order on Environmental Justice, and U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) Order on Environmental Justice, USDOT should require planning agencies to conduct regular analysis of transportation decision-making, policies, investments and impacts to determine whether decisions have been made in an equitable fashion. It should also enforce the disclosure of geographic distribution of investments. These types of analysis should be an integral part of Transportation Improvement Programs, Major Investment Studies, Regional Transportation Plans, and State Implementation Plans. They should be used as evaluation criteria for the Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) certification and the approval of state plans.

   

  • Air Quality. USDOT should enforce air quality conformity requirements at all stages of the transportation planning process. It should also encourage the spending of investments to benefit low-income communities and communities of color, especially if these areas exhibit disproportionately high levels of criteria pollutants. USDOT should work closely with EPA and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to monitor air quality levels in the region.

     

  • Public Health and Safety. USDOT should encourage the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and other agencies to focus on neighborhood safety issues, particularly pedestrian safety. It should also ensure that a reasonable amount of transportation safety funds are spent on pedestrian-related projects.

     

  • Investment in Low-Income Communities and Communities of Color. USDOT should encourage investment in transportation funds in low-income communities and communities of color to support job creation and economic development.

     

  • Improving Access to Jobs. Improving low-income residents mobility, particularly for those making the transition from welfare to work, may be the difference between employment and unemployment. Public transportation improvements go hand-in-hand with expanding job opportunities. The region should create Transportation Pilot Programs to improve transportation efficiency, reduce the impacts of transportation on the environment, reduce the need for infrastructure investment, provide efficient access, examine development patterns and involve the private sector in such efforts. Some of these pilot projects will need to be based in low-income communities and communities of color, and focus on environmental justice issues.

     

  • Needs Assessment. The regional transportation planning process needs to include a thorough and comprehensive assessment of current and future travel needs. This assessment should incorporate transportation options such as transit, walking, and bicycling based on the location and demographics of forecasted population and employment trends. The assessment will also need to quantify the various infrastructure changes which may be needed, e.g. miles of new roads, sidewalks, and bicycle lanes, public transit and van pool service expansion, congestion pricing, and parking management, etc.

     

  • Uniform Local Public Involvement Processes. The ARC should quickly move to formally create a citizen advisory group to provide reaction, guidance, recommendations and outreach to the public on current and future issues related to transportation, air quality, and growth in the region. The group should have formal membership which is representative of the population, user, and interest groups in the region.

     

  • Outreach to Atlanta's Urban Core Stakeholders. It makes little sense to have only "white men in suits" talking to each other about solving the Atlanta region's air pollution, transportation, sprawl, and overall quality of life problems. One needs only turn on the television or turn to the local newspaper to see this one-race scenario play itself out. African American and other people of color organizations and institutions are not invisible. They have much to contribute if only given the opportunity.

     

  • Title VI and Environmental Justice. ARC should demonstrate that its TIP and Plan comply with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which assure transportation investments promote greater equity in access to opportunities in the Atlanta region. The assessment will also need to address equity, environmental justice, and adequacy and appropriateness of current data, computer modeling capabilities, process for assessing needs and developing projects, and use of performance measures. The region's congestion relieving strategies will also need to meet Title VI and environmental justice requirements.

     

  • Performance Measures and Public Information. It is also important that alternative investment and growth scenarios be analyzed by the ARC in order to give people a sense of the costs and benefits of various growth futures.

  Finally, the Atlanta metropolitan area is faced with some major challenges ahead. How it handles the challenges created by sprawl in the next few years may well determine the area's future as a desirable and livable region. Sprawl is not a necessary byproduct of urban growth and economic development. Growth can be planned and managed. However, it will take a concerted effort on many fronts to arrest the runaway sprawl pattern that typifies the Atlanta metropolitan region and most major American urban centers. To continue down the current road of sprawl is too costly for everyone. Working together, public and private joint ventures can make a difference in the quality of life enjoyed by everyone who lives in the region. The future of the region is intricately bound to how government, business, and community leaders address Atlanta's quality of life issues.

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