Despite Microsoft’s recent decision to slam the brakes on a Westside campus amid company layoffs and tech-industry turbulence, developers behind a multifaceted English Avenue project that’s been banking on Atlanta’s burgeoning tech scene since day one sound undaunted.
As chronicled on these pages since groundbreaking, Echo Street West has risen a mile and ½ from where Microsoft had been planning a 90-acre mix of company offices, housing, and retail to include a large grocery option the Grove Park neighborhood has long wanted.
Getting from Echo Street West to work at Microsoft would be a breeze, via the Westside BeltLine Connector trail and, eventually, a bridge the PATH Foundation is planning over railroad tracks into the sprawling new greenspace beside Microsoft’s land. But that’s for another day.
Echo Street’s developer, Lincoln Property Company, says the 19-acre “village of ideas” is pushing the throttle—as opposed to the pause button—as the final components of $256-million phase one round into shape.
Most significantly, those include a four-story, timber-built stack of offices called 765 Echo designed to bring work outside. That building topped out in October.
Beside that are common areas, a retail outbuilding, and a smaller loft-office component called 745 Echo.
Meanwhile, the project’s adaptive-reuse Westside Motor Lounge, a food-and-beverage hub, has been open since the fall along Donald Lee Hollowell Parkway. And the 292-unit Vibe apartments have started leasing, with 59 units reserved as affordable housing, per developers. (Rents unlisted online). That apartment building also features 25,000 square feet of retail space along the aforementioned BeltLine connector trail.
Elsewhere, an adaptive-reuse events venue and artist colony opened in 2021 at the northeastern section of the property.
Lincoln officials say the remainder of Echo Street’s phase one will deliver this spring. Here’s where it stands now:
As seen from over Donald Lee Hollowell Parkway, looking north toward Kennesaw and Buckhead, Echo Street West's recently opened Vibe apartments are seen at left, with Westside Motor Lounge at bottom. Offices and retail remain under construction beside that. Courtesy of Lincoln Property Company
Echo Street West’s phase one also includes 300,000 square feet of office space in a four-story building called 765 Echo. This topped out in October. Courtesy of Lincoln Property Company
A courtyard hangout space takes shape between the timber-built offices, at left, and another new building, at bottom, adding to Echo Street West's 50,000 square feet of retail in phase one. The two-story structure at right, 745 Echo, will house loft offices. Courtesy of Lincoln Property Company
Lincoln officials say the office building includes 15 to 20-foot windows and 29,000 square feet of tenant balconies large enough for social gatherings, fitness classes, and conferencing. Courtesy of Lincoln Property Company
How the finished greenspace between retail and offices is expected to look in coming months. Courtesy of Lincoln Property Company
Planned functionality where standalone retail and offices meet new internal streets at Echo Street West. Courtesy of Lincoln Property Company
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