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Agencies want answers to traffic problemsMon, 08/14/2006 - 8:44am
By: Ben Nelms
Every motorist traveling the roads of South Fulton County can attest to the tremendous increase in traffic congestion in the past few years. A prime example of that congestion is the intersection of I-85 and Ga. Highway 74. A new effort to tackle current and future congestion sprang to life Thursday with the South Fulton Freight Mobility Tour. A local effort initiated by area resident and long time South Fulton community activist Sandra Hardy brought representatives of the Atlanta Regional Commission, Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson Airport, CSX Railroad, MARTA and others together to visit areas of congestion in South Fulton and discuss the need for a formative dialogue to combat what will otherwise become continuous gridlock in coming years. “The reason to have this meeting today was to educate the participants, because they did not know and do not know what we are facing right now and what we will be facing in the near future,” Hardy said. “Addressing this issue today is an important part of controlling our own destiny.” Beginning at the CSX Intermodal facility in Fairburn and traveling along Oakley Industrial Boulevard and the Hwy. 74 Corridor, participants got a taste of the congestion facing local residents in Fulton, Fayette and Coweta counties. The tour continued up Ga. Highway 92, through the rolling hills of South Fulton and on to Fulton Industrial Boulevard, home to many distribution centers and the large Norfolk Southern Intermodal facility. “Some of the things we must address are the environment and safety, the traffic that is impacting us and the roads in this area so we can move the tractor/trailer trucks invisibly from the CSX and Norfolk Southern facilities. This means that we are going to have to lobby for funding for exit ramps and better roads so we can move those vehicles to the different distribution centers,” Hardy said. “And we’re talking about the whole region. The South Fulton area is sandwiched between Norfolk Southern and CSX. That was the main reason for going over to Fulton Industrial today, so the people doing the study could see what was happening to us, like on Highway 92. (Le Jardin’s) Brian Jordan doesn’t realize what will happen to the front of his development and Martha Stewart’s development because the traffic from Norfolk Southern will come and is coming from Fulton Industrial Boulevard and is going right and in front of their developments. Because the two companies exchange cargo, they go from the large Norfolk Southern facility to CSX here in Fairburn or south on I-85.” Adding to the growing number of 18-wheelers are those that service the increasing number of large distribution centers that continue to dot the landscape in and around the I-85 corridor in South Fulton. “If we don’t address this problem today it’s going to be very gnarly in the future,” Hardy said. “I’m not a fortune teller, but I predicted six years ago that this would be a major concern and everybody laughed at me. And now look at the major concern we’ve got today. Nobody’s laughing any more.” Hardy gave the example of the intersection at Oakley Industrial and Ga. Highway 74. Six years ago, she said, there were no hotels, no fast food restaurants, virtually nothing at all. Today, the intersection is teeming with increasing businesses, increasing truck traffic from mega-distribution centers, all with no end in sight. “CSX really brought the centers here. Warehouses and distribution centers need to be close to something like a rail intermodal,” Hardy said. While doubtless complicated, the solution to the freight congestion problem both today and tomorrow, she said, will require the combined efforts of elected officials, Atlanta Regional Commission, Georgia Regional Transportation Authority, MARTA, and the Georgia Dept. of Transportation. The failure to address this issue will result in even greater problems that no one wants. “If we don’t address this issue we will be in as much gridlock at what we see today in northeast metro Atlanta,” Hardy said. login to post comments
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