A year later, billion-dollar proposal marches forward on ATL's southside

Nearly a year after it initially came to light, an immense mixed-use proposal in an Atlanta Beltline-adjacent hot zone for redevelopment is encountering hurdles but is hardly shelved, according to project leaders. 

Spanning several blocks along Capitol View’s Sylvan Road in Southwest Atlanta, the potentially billion-dollar project could eventually see more than 3,000 residential units and some 716,000 square feet of commercial and restaurant space on industrial-zoned, vacant land, according to filings and interviews with project leaders in early 2025. 

The multi-phase venture would take years to fully design, finance, and build. But the “1313 Sylvan Road Redevelopment,” as backers are referring to it now, would see both rental and for-sale housing spread across 25 acres in hopes of drawing in legacy residents and younger artists, creatives, and entrepreneurs. Pocket parks, improved streetscape design, and open spaces for active and passive recreation would be priorities, as the development team told Urbanize Atlanta last year.  

Leading the project are Atlanta-based Abebe Ventures and its partners at the local offices of Perkins&Will architects, a global firm that’s had a hand in designing many aspects of the Beltline itself. Collectively the properties in question are 3 acres larger than Centennial Olympic Park, for context, situated a few blocks from the Beltline’s Westside Trail corridor. (The first component to rise is a 124-townhome Empire Communities project situated on 4 acres near the center of the Sylvan Road assemblage, replacing a former auto salvage yard.) 

Over the past year, project officials tell Urbanize the Sylvan Road development has garnered “strong regional and community support” while rezoning attempts have been more challenging. 

The Atlanta Regional Commission has completed its Development of Regional Impact review—a requirement for private investments of such scale—and issued a “highly favorable recommendation,” pointing to “the project’s strong alignment with regional goals for housing, transit-oriented development, walkability, and economic opportunity,” a project spokesperson, who requested anonymity, relayed via email this month.

Other bright spots for the development team have included formal approvals and community support from the area’s Neighborhood Planning Unit X and several neighborhood associations, including Capitol View, Capitol View Manor, Sylvan Hills, Hammond Park, and Perkerson, per the official. 

“These neighborhoods have consistently expressed support for the project’s vision, land use approach, and community benefits,” according to the spokesperson. “[It] represents a transformative opportunity for the Southside bringing new affordable and workforce housing, creative spaces, and community gathering areas designed to promote equity, environmental healing, and long-term economic mobility.”

The required Beltline Overlay acreage in Capitol View falls under a light industrial conditional classification now (I-1-C/BL) and would need to be rezoned to mixed residential commercial (MRC-3) to pull off the multifaceted district. 

Rezoning requests have recently been denied at two stages: hearings with the city’s Zoning Review Board and another involving a Comprehensive Development Plan amendment for the properties. 

Both determinations were made late last year. 

According to a staff report, ZRB officials found that rezoning would have “a negative effect on the character of the neighborhood by eroding the existing stock of industrially designated property in the area, which is already significantly limited.” 

Board members also determined that a mixed-use project that managed to weave in light industrial uses or “small-scale specialty manufacturing” would be more appropriate for the Capitol View site. The property appears to have been designated for industrial uses since 1949 and had long provided jobs to nearby neighborhoods, per ZRB officials’ findings. 

Despite the recommendations for denial, the project continues to move through the Atlanta City Council zoning process. That will require approval from the council's Zoning Committee and Community Development and Human Services Committee. 

“Consideration of the legislation was deferred to allow additional time for due diligence on the project’s impacts and benefits,” the spokesperson wrote to Urbanize this month. “The legislation is expected to be considered at upcoming City Council Committee and [full city council] meetings following this additional review.”

According to last year’s Development of Regional Impact filing with the state, the Capitol View project wouldn’t be finished for a decade, with December 2035 being the target date for completion. 

The site is roughly three blocks from a finished section of the Beltline’s Southside Trail. But a proposed Beltline spur trail—dubbed the “Murphy and Oakland City Connector Trail”—that came to light in 2024 would be built alongside the Abebe project for several blocks, with access to the Oakland City MARTA station at one end. 

The assemblage of properties—situated along Sylvan Road, plus Avon and Cox avenues—is located just south of the closely watched Murphy Crossing site, a Beltline-owned property where redevelopment plans led by an Arizona firm collapsed last year, following protracted disputes.  

Abebe counts more than 20 years of real estate development and construction experience, which includes more than 1,000 homes built around Atlanta, Baltimore, and Minneapolis, with 70 percent of those qualifying as affordable housing, per the company’s website. 

Abebe is listed on his firm’s website as “one of the largest private landowners in the City of Atlanta with a concentration of assets in West Atlanta.” He told Urbanize last year his goal was to break ground in Capitol View this spring, at latest. 

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