Georgia Power plans to test the market for a prime property along the Atlanta Beltline in a move that that could trigger a new wave of dense development on the popular trail.
The utility’s operations center at 760 Ralph McGill Boulevard next to the Historic Fourth Ward Park is one of the largest remaining single tracts along the Beltline’ popular Eastside Trail. It’s long been coveted in the Atlanta real estate community because it touches the trail and the park.
The 10-acre site is just south of the bustling Ponce City Market, which developer Jamestown turned into a thriving technology, dining, shopping and residential hub.
“We plan to place the facility on the market this April to gauge interest, but we have not committed to selling the property,” Georgia Power spokeswoman Ashley West said in a statement.
Georgia Power has engaged international the team of Scott Cullen, Leigh Martin and Mark Lindenbaum at real estate services group JLL to sell the property. A price has not been publicly announced.
About 100 Georgia Power employees work on the site, which is used as a marshaling yard and operations center for power crews. If Georgia Power sells the site, those jobs would be relocated to other operations stations, West said, until a replacement facility is identified.
“We constantly evaluate our properties and a sale of the 760 Ralph McGill facility could address the changing dynamics of the area, including residential redevelopment,” West said in the statement. Georgia Power has had to contend with “increased traffic and reduced access to the facility for our crews due to remodeling of the surrounding businesses.”
In the past several years, a number of apartment projects have been built or have been proposed in the immediate area, including Anthem, Inman Quarter and a redevelopment of the former Masquerade nightclub into luxury apartments.
Meanwhile, developer New City is in the process developing an office tower atop a new Kroger store next to Ponce City Market.
Read more about this story later today at our subscriber website, MyAJC.com, and in an upcoming print edition of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
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