RealJournalism1d ago
DecaturNature

RE: https://mastodon.social/@RealJournalism/116336708108848365

It seems that the big division over the beltline is whether it should be a park or a street. I was not impressed by the vision presented by the BAT representatives in this GPB story. I don't know if it's a good representation of their arguments, but don't see anything better on their website.

If we want more nature in the city (as they claim), we need to make space by reducing car dependence. Mass transit makes sense when embedded in pedestrian-centered pathways; it's near useless when embedded in car-centric areas. In this view, the beltline serves as an example of how streets can be structured and creates flexibility by reducing car traffic on neighboring streets.

If these guys want to see transit bringing people to the beltline, we need to build out several other pedestrian-centered destinations that are worth connecting to, and reallocate car space to mass transit, without first changing street usage patterns by building beltline rail.

Apr 4 at 1:16pmWeb
Show threadDecaturNature1d ago

The website for Better Atlanta Transit does not help present them as a serious 'transit' group. I looked at their slick, extensive website for information about their proposed alternatives for transit (contrasting with Beltline Rail), and after about 10 minutes of searching found absolutely nothing.

Here's what they have:
- Top: "Click to Donate"
- Header: A few section links that lead into a maze of pages.
- "Beltline 2.0 - 'click here'": a convoluted way of saying "let's make the path wider, not add a train"
- "Learn More" - a page just showing the people involved in their project.
- BAT Blog. The first story is called "priorities and distraction", which seems promising, but is just a bunch of hyperbole and snark, suggesting that the attention given to beltline rail is the cause for all other transportation failings in the metro area (from dirty MARTA cars to crumbling sidewalks in DeKalb county). Utter and obvious BS.

Digging deeper into the blog I did find some more pro-transit commentary, but I had to use a targeted google search to find them celebrating the idea of MARTA infill stations at the Beltline.
https://betteratlantatransit.org/blog/everyone-seems-to-like-marta-infill-stations

If you dig into the 'resources' section and the 'blog' section, you can find some commentary on transportation systems in other cities, but I still have a hard time getting a sense of how they'd like the beltline to fit into the broader Atlanta transportation system.

https://betteratlantatransit.org/

Everyone seems to like MARTA infill stations<br/> — Better Atlanta Transit

Everyone seems to like Mayor Andre Dickens’ plan to create four new MARTA heavy rail infill stations, with at least one to the Beltline.

Better Atlanta Transit
Show threadDecaturNature1d ago
They'd be more credible if they weren't organized explicitly against beltline rail. By taking this position, it makes everything else they write feel like motivated reasoning rather than weighing the pros and cons of various options.
Show threadMichael H1d ago

@DecaturNature It's a bullshit group just like the Bowers real estate guy funds his group to keep crosswalks off of Peachtree.

They are just rich and entitled assholes that use their money to push around everyone else. And when they don't get their way, they throw money at the General Assembly until they find a legislator wanting to file a bill to ban whatever they don't like.

Show threadDecaturNature1d ago
@michael The "learn more" (profiling their members) page did give the impression that BAT is just an influence peddling operation.
Show threadMichael H1d ago
@DecaturNature 100%. You got me really fired up over this...haha.
Show threadDecaturNature1d ago
@michael I know I've seen critical commentary about BAT here before... but then I hear about them again every few months and forgot what I'd heard, and need to go look into it again. Quite a waste of time, really.
Show threadMichael H1d ago

@DecaturNature *cracks knuckles* BAT is an astroturfed group of [mostly business] property owners that formed for the sole purpose of giving the local media an "opposing side", so that a make-believe debate could occur.

What grinds my gears is that we, the voters, voted for this - along with More MARTA. And, yes, a self-interested group of assholes parachutes in and wants to ignore our community's collective decision.

The key quote in the article is:

"If people are going to have to come from Southwest Atlanta to the east side in order to go to a Kroger, that's a problem that should be solved by something other than having to travel that far,” [BAT's Rader] said."

Not to be crude, but fuck him. What a dog-whistling racist. He's saying that folks in SW Atlanta are too poor or black to go to the Eastside other than to get groceries. There's a Kroger on Cascade in SW, but, I guess that fact is ignored.

Sorry to get so intense about this, but it really pisses me off when we have elections, and then decision-makers decide to ignore the results.

This is precisely why we need MARTA, and perhaps even Beltline, Board members elected instead of appointed by monied interests.

Show threadDecaturNature1d ago
@michael seriously, that was the weakest argument in the piece. At best it's a straw man, and at worst just saying "we want those people to stay over there". Nobody is proposing that the main reason for beltline rail is so that people can get groceries on the other side of the city, and anyway, If someone wants to do that it's not my place to oppose it- people travel across the city every day for all types of reasons.
Show threadMichael H1d ago

@DecaturNature Their brains are living in a different time - a shittier and more segregated time in Atlanta. They are appealing to people's worst impulses for their own self-interest.

And the problem in Atlanta is that, if you get a few of the wealthier money people agreeing with you, then the Atlanta Way takes over and then projects that people want and need get canceled or ignored.

They dehumanize people who live in other parts of the City, not treating them as fellow Atlantans who deserve the same opportunities, including access to jobs and transportation, that they do.