One of Bankhead’s most high-profile BeltLine sites is on the verge of a major plot twist. Atlanta Mission is moving to acquire a 15.5-acre tract that had been teed up for a glitzy mixed-use district, and early plans shared with neighbors carve out roughly eight acres for a homeless housing campus, with the remaining land aimed at affordable housing. The shift would effectively sideline The Allen Morris Company’s multi-phase BeltLine vision at 1060 Donald Lee Hollowell Parkway and could pull two of the nonprofit’s downtown and Midtown shelters together at a new westside campus. Atlanta Mission has told nearby residents it will hold a public open house on Wednesday, Feb. 24 to walk through the concept and gather feedback. The proposal turns one of the Westside’s most visible pieces of real estate into a test case for whether rapid redevelopment can be redirected toward immediate housing needs.
As reported by Urbanize Atlanta, Atlanta Mission spokesperson Rachel Reynolds confirmed the nonprofit is under contract to buy the site and has already shown preliminary concepts at a community meeting. Neighbors who attended said roughly eight acres are slated for homeless housing and the remaining acreage is intended for capped affordable units. According to materials shared with attendees, board documents and presentations also indicated the group plans to close two shelters in downtown and Midtown and consolidate services at the westside property. Urbanize Atlanta noted that Atlanta Mission currently serves up to 1,000 men, women and children across metro Atlanta each day.
Allen Morris bought the 15.5-acre parcel in 2022 for roughly $31 million, then pursued rezoning and a Development of Regional Impact filing that laid out a much larger private development. Earlier materials and renderings showed as many as 1,600 residences and roughly 700,000 square feet of office and retail space, plus an adaptive-reuse plan that would have turned a 60,000-square-foot warehouse into a BeltLine-fronting town center. Coverage of the property’s sale, rezoning process and early renderings can be found via Allen Morris and local reporting by CRE-101.
What It Means For The BeltLine
If the deal goes through, the property will connect to the Westside Trail and nearby neighborhoods in a very different way. Instead of a commercial town center hugging the BeltLine, the site would put social services and housing closest to the trail. As outlined by Urbanize Atlanta, BeltLine inclusionary zoning rules would have required a substantial share of affordable units in any private residential project on the parcel, which sits just east of Maddox Park and the Bankhead MARTA station. The new concept could bring housing to the now-open Westside Trail more quickly, while scrapping a planned retail and recreation hub that BeltLine boosters had hoped would help pull jobs and daily foot traffic to the Westside.
Next Steps And Community Questions
Atlanta Mission has invited residents to the Feb. 24 public meeting as it refines the site plan and collects feedback, but leaders have not yet committed to a construction timeline or outlined a full funding strategy. Any land purchase, shelter consolidation and new-build campus would still need city approvals, financing and partnerships with both public and private backers. The nonprofit’s website says it serves up to 1,000 people a day in Atlanta and Northeast Georgia and details its existing shelter and recovery programs, with its main campus and program pages offering context on services and locations. Neighbors and advocates will be watching closely to see how the affordable units are distributed and whether the campus layout addresses long-standing concerns around services, safety and access to transit…