Peachtree Street circa 1875
On Sidewalk Radio’s February show, the phrase “street smart” takes on new meaning as some of Atlanta’s brightest minds share their expertise and insights about our city’s icon, our connective landmark, the history laden, world famous Peachtree Street.
There is Broadway in New York, Michigan Avenue in Chicago, Sunset in LA, and Bourbon in New Orleans, but Peachtree Street is more than famous, it is a living, breathing, archeological diorama of Atlanta’s history told through its transitioning neighborhoods and ascending architecture.
Join host, Gene Kansas, as he explores the history, lore, legacy, culture and character of a street whose name really came from a pine tree. See, it’s already getting interesting.
To discuss the past, present and future of urban planning, transit and architecture is David Green AIA, LEED AP, and Senior Urban Designer with internationally renowned architecture and design firm, Perkins+Will. In addition to his applied professional chops, Green also adds a professor’s point of view, gained from more than 20 years of teaching at Georgia Tech, helping to educate us about how cities develop and why Peachtree is so important to Atlanta.
Perkins+Will took extra steps to make 1315 Peachtree not only beautiful and environmentally friendly, but also connected to the street, a move that limited their parking, but added to the appeal for Peachtree and Atlanta.
Preservationist Mark McDonald, President & CEO of The Georgia Trust, enlightens us about the street that boasts such treasures as The Georgian Terrace, The Temple, The High Museum, and The “Fabulous” Fox Theater, saved from certain destruction through a grassroots effort in 1974. McDonald also discusses important places we’ve lost and “Places in Peril” that we need to protect.
Lowe’s Grand Theater was site of the 1939 premiere of Gone with the Wind. It was built in 1893 and lost to fire in 1978.
Adding some real legs to our tour along this famous route is Atlanta Track Club’s Executive Director, Tracey Russell, in charge of putting on The Peachtree Road Race. In its first year, 110 runners finished the race. 41 years later, on July 4th 2011, 60,000 participants will take part in the world’s largest event of its kind, and Russell runs down a long list of impressive stories and statistics that will have you entertained and intrigued from start to finish.
And, very much a place-maker, Shannon Powell, COO of The Midtown Alliance, rounds out the guest list taking us back 15 years to shed light on a neighborhood that at one time was so unsavory you would not have walked down Peachtree at night, but now is thriving with the arts, restaurants, residences, and the promise of incredible street level retail that one day soon will be on par with its Midwestern cousins along “The Magnificent Mile”.
shopSCAD’s “Pop Up” Shop at Atlanta History Center’s 990 Peachtree Street.
Peachtree has come a long way, both literally and figuratively, growing and developing in parallel with the city, and spawning 71 variations of its name along the way. And, just like in the treaties of the Creek Indians that inhabited our land before Peachtree, the “pitch” still holds us together, symbolizing the vows that we have to history.
AND, A SPECIAL “THANK YOU” TO OUR SPONSOR, PERKINS+WILL.
