As part of ongoing Best of Atlanta 2023 coverage, Urbanize’s Best Atlanta Neighborhood tournament kicked off two weeks ago with 16 places vying for the prestige of being called the city’s greatest.
Now, for each Final Four contest, voting will be open for just 24 hours. Please, let’s keep the tourney fun and positive, as one neighborhood rises above the rest in very public fashion. The quest to crown a champion resumes now!
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(1) Summerhill
Being the No. 1 seed in 2023—as determined by pre-tourney nominations—Summerhill made quick work of Virginia-Highland in the first round and then squeaked by Cabbagetown in the Elite Eight with 52 percent of votes.
This year, Summerhill has hardly been idle, with construction on Atlanta’s first bus-rapid transit line finally ramping up and a fresh beer garden to brag about. The neighborhood’s long-awaited Publix debuted this past summer (before a temporary closure for a parking deck collapse) while another controversial parking deck took shape a few blocks away. Elsewhere, the maturation of adaptive-reuse favorite Georgia Avenue continued in 2023, with stylish townhomes claiming an empty corner, while—for better or worse—top-end housing prices crept ever closer to the $1-million mark. Back in 2021, lest we forget, Summerhill came this close to Best Atlanta Neighborhood immortality by reaching the Finals, but ultimately falling to out-of-left-field powerhouse Mozley Park.
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(13) Reynoldstown
Small-but-mighty Reynoldstown (No. 13) dispatched Decatur in the tourney’s first contest this year, then won by a nose against Grant Park in an Elite Eight contest that saw a whopping 2,232 votes come in over the long holiday weekend.
Across the busy year that 2023 has been, R-town’s most buzz-worthy addition had to be Breaker Breaker, the easy-breezy BeltLine pitstop that’s part of growing Empire Stein Steel. Also along the BeltLine (surprise!) an all-affordable stack of rent-capped homes has recently topped out, while a truly unique motel conversion gets underway for Atlantans who need a boost most. Elsewhere, that penchant for flashy duplexes in Reynoldstown shows few signs of slowing. Longtime followers of this criteria-free contest may recall that R-town valiantly claimed the crown in 2014, as BeltLine hoopla heated up. Could it become just the second neighborhood in history to repeat in 2023? We’ll see.