full, quality city services to all neighborhoods, provide safe, healty housing for individuals and families with low to moderate incomes, and to institute policies and practices that will prevent the destruction of neighborhoods in the future. The report also creates an opportunity to bring visibility to a Legacy and Descendant community that have gone unacknowledged and undervalued, by recognizing their contribution to the City of Atlanta and the future residents of this city. INTRODUCTION “The Downtown Connector – a 12-to-14-lane mega-highway that in theory connects the city’s north to its south – regularly has three-mile-long traffic jams that last four hours or more. Commuters might assume they’re stuck there because some city planner made a mistake, but the heavy congestion actually stems from a great success. In Atlanta, as in dozens of cities across America, daily congestion is a direct consequence of a century-long effort to segregate the races.” 1 ~Kevin Kruse “Our slum clearance program will take no note of race or creed or color,” he stated in his address to millions throughout the United States. We are particularly glad that the requests from Atlanta for slum clearance have called for benefits for the entire population. Atlanta has been a pioneer along many progressive lines, and it is only fitting that the city which has been a leader in interracial cooperation should insist that all parts of its population should benefit from this new venture.” 2 "Transportation should never divide communities – its purpose is to connect people to jobs, schools, housing, groceries, family, places of worship, and more. That's what the Reconnecting Communities program and the Neighborhood Access and Equity program are designed to ensure." 3 ~Secretary Buttigieg The landscape discussed in this manuscript was inhabited by two Indigenous Confederacies; the Muskogee and Cherokee, who spent their summers along Chattahoochee, Coosa, and Tallapoosa Rivers for summertime respite before the area was annexed into the City of Atlanta and White Settlers received land lots. Primarily, the Cherokee lived in North Georgia in the Appalachian Mountain region and the Muskogee lived Middle and South Georgia and the springs of this area provided fertile grounds to hunt and gather. During the Revolutionary War era, in 1777, Georgia first opened for White settlement. 4 After numerous wars, battles, and treaties, all Native 1 Kevin Kruse, “What does a highway have to do with segregation? Quite a lot.”, The 1619 Project. The New York Times, August 14, 2019. 2 “First Slum Clearance and Low -Cost Housing Project Opened on 18- acre Tract,” “New Deal” Supplement , October 4, 1934. 3 U.S. Department of Transportation, “Reconnecting Communities and Neighborhoods: Repairing the Harm Caused by Infrastructure in the Past.”, https://www.transportation.gov/reconnecting 4 Eugene M. Mitchell, “The Indians of Georgia . ” The Atlanta Historical Bulletin , Volume II, Number 11, September 1937. p. 23.
B-5
Made with FlippingBook Ebook Creator