How far will the Atlanta suburban sprawl spread?
 

So...

Anyone who is familiar with Atlanta knows that it is notorious for its suburban sprawl. Right now the metro area is comprised of some 18(?) counties. The CSA goes as far west as the Alabama state line, as far north as the basin of the Blue Ridge and Appalachian Mountains, as far East as Athens, and as far south as the extreme northern county outskirts of Macon.

Although development has become more focused within the city center over the last decade, census tracking shows that the Atlanta metro remains one of the Top 10 fastest-growing metros within the US, and with a majority of the population boom happening in the suburbs.

So my question is..how far can the Atlanta metro suburban sprawl spread?

Will it cross over the Alabama state line, or meet the South Carolina state line at some point? Will the metro end up consolidating Macon? :hmmm:

It will someday encompass the whole state of Georgia!

By 2050, all of the Southeastern United States will be part of suburban Atlanta.

Hasn't a lot of the suburban growth shifted towards the more central suburban counties? Still suburban in form by any standard, but in closer proximity to downtown. Basically lots that have been leapfrogged over by exurban growth are now being filled in with tract housing? Which is now more likely multi-family or on smaller lots than in the past?

Atlanta's CSA previously included the first county over the border in AL to the SW, which includes Valley, AL, but it doesn't any more. That was always interesting to me because the AL border is closer headed west on I-20 than it is heading SW on I-85. I personally think future iterations of the Atlanta CSA are more likely to include Chattanooga than they are Macon. Atlanta is more closely aligned with Chattanooga than Macon.

there's a lot of exurban and rural growth all over the southeast, but i don't know how much of it is directly tied to atlanta...

https://www.arcgis.com/home/webmap/v...57f13c7295893e

:cheers: very cool map! I love maps like that!

maybe crackheads will continue to wreak havoc on the hwy system and there will be a marta ridership revolution! how is that going anyway? honestly, it will spread out as far as people are willing to drive. so how far is that? Detroit arguably wrote the playbook on auto oriented land use and some folks don't bat an eye at 50 mile commutes. according to the Atlanta journal-constitution, Atlanta already has the longest average commute distances in the whole country, 12.8 miles. which sounds pretty reasonable. I bet lots of people are driving more like 40 miles.

truely an impressive urban span.

Which is sprawling faster Dallas/Ft Worth, Houston or Atlanta? All three are massive with seemingly endless suburbs. Dallas' growth favors the northern suburbs and Houston's the north and west. Does Atlanta have a particular direction it mostly follows?

For whatever reason, Atlantians seem to like to think that they can claim Chattanooga, but the reality is that there is still a great deal of sparsely populated wilderness between the two. Chattanooga is very much a sizable self sustaining metropolitan area with a rich history in it's own right, and would remain as such with or without Atlanta's existence.

The share of exurban growth has slowed somewhat, but Atlanta-area growth is overwhelmingly suburban fringe growth.

Does it really matter if it dropped from 100% to 90% greenfield development?

Also, Atlanta is one of those metros where the housing typology doesn't vary that much. New housing 3 miles from downtown probably won't look/function that different than new housing 30 miles from downtown.

North, easily. North is the favored, affluent quarter.

What do you consider the suburban fringe? Just curious.

To add some color to your comments. The Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) has ten central counties that belong to it. I'd consider this the "core" of the MSA and it comprises 34.1% of the land area of the MSA. From 2000-10 it captured 66.3% of the regions growth, however, from 2010-2015 it captured 80.8% of that growth. The inner, most "urban counties", of Cobb, DeKalb, Fulton, and Gwinnett captured 38.1% of all growth from 2000-2010, but 65.3% of all growth from 2010-2015. To wrap Atlanta into this, the city itself captured 0.4% of all growth from 2000-2010 and 10.3% of all growth from 2010-2015 for a land / capture ratio of 6.74.

The majority of suburban development occurring right now is "infill" as people in the metro seek downtown / town center environments. That isn't to say they're moving to the heart of the city, but historic downtowns like Duluth, Norcross, Roswell, Alpharetta, etc. are seeing a surge in popularity and you're seeing large faux-town centers like Avalon & Halycon in Forsyth catering to that desire. Not to imply there isn't your typical suburban cul-de-sac neighborhoods being built, but most construction activity is located in these more relatively dense, suburban areas.

I'm also not sure I agree with your housing comment. 3 miles from Downtown Atlanta doesn't take you very far and comprises most of the urban, intown neighborhoods, where the vast majority of new construction is townhomes and large multifamily projects. Atlanta does have a lot of established, leafy neighborhoods, but for those not built out, new construction in these neighborhoods does not function nor is similar to construction 30 miles out. Maybe I misunderstood the comment?

Anyways, always interesting to hear outside perspective.

CSAs are not a matter of one metro claiming another, they are based on other factors such as percentages of the population commuting between the two areas. My opinion based on a lifetime of living here is that there's much more interplay between Atlanta and Chattanooga than there is between Atlanta and Macon. In any case I was merely speculating, and I don't have any agenda about what Atlanta can and can't "claim".

In 100 years there will be the Charlanta mega-city.

LOL! :haha:

that takes me back.

Paul would be proud.

It will sprawl until it reaches the Atlantic coast and the Gulf of Mexico, at that point Atlanta developers will start filling the ocean with landfill until the entire planet is nothing but one Atlanta MSA. Then the space elevator will be constructed and Atlanta will officially conquer space with floating, detached, poorly built homes until the universe finally ends itself with the thermal heat death. We are all Atlanta, it's humanity's collective story.

Charlanta will become a real thing for sure. The south will have to create more reservoirs/dams and related infrastructure to accommodate the explosive growth.

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