Atlanta was rather raped and murdered by Interstates. The cities that survived the Interstate system rather intact had natural waterways or Robert Moses or both.
Atlanta, and many other Southern cities had neither. And they are the worse for it. This 1930’s map proves that.
Atlanta, as it exists now, doesn’t make sense. Manhattan does. There’s a humanness to the scale, to the proportions, of Manhattan that just simply works.
My father’s Atlanta, pre-Interstate, was a different universe. You get glimpses of it when you get into downtown proper (you can barely see it even in Midtown). Narrower streets, and interesting architecture, and a walkable scale to everything. Then boom, it’s all interrupted by asphalt. Awful.
(via atlurbanist)
