home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
TIME: Almanac 1990
/
1990 Time Magazine Compact Almanac, The (1991)(Time).iso
/
time
/
062689
/
06268900.040
< prev
next >
Wrap
Text File
|
1990-09-22
|
1KB
|
23 lines
NATION, Page 31ATLANTAUnderground, Off the Ground
As a complex of shops and restaurants where warehouses once
stood, Underground Atlanta was meant to be a symbol of the city's
new vibrancy when it opened in 1969. Instead, it became a study in
urban failure: thieves and rowdy teenagers patrolled abandoned
storefronts as shoppers fled to the suburbs. The place was
shuttered in 1982.
Now Atlanta is trying again. Nearly 5,000 boosters braved a
thunderstorm last week to celebrate the reopening of Underground
after a 2-year renovation that cost $142 million, including $85
million in city-backed bonds. The complex, decorated in
turn-of-the-century style, will eventually boast 140 stores,
restaurants and nightclubs -- as well as dozens of security guards
meant to reassure the suburbanites and tourists who are essential
to the downtown's revitalization. Critics charge that the city's
money could be better spent elsewhere. Protesters disrupted Mayor
Andrew Young's opening address by chanting "Atlanta keeps the
homeless underground." But if the project succeeds, it will create
3,000 new jobs and generate $5 million a year in additional tax
revenues.