As part of ongoing Best of Atlanta 2021 coverage, Urbanize’s inaugural Best Atlanta Neighborhood tournament is kicking off with 16 places vying for the prestige of being called the city’s greatest. (Note: Seeding from 1 to 16 was determined by reader nominations this month, so no pitchforks, please.)
For each Round 1 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 eliminations begin now!
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KIRKWOOD (7)
Highest home sale of 2021: $1,025,000 expansion in May
Lowest: $140K two-bedroom condo
Median sales price increase year-over-year: 34 percent
For better or worse, 2021 was the year that million-dollar housing became somewhat normal in Kirkwood, a historic neighborhood that not too long ago was known by unsavory nicknames pointing to urban decay. Like many of its eastside counterparts, Kirkwood has been dotted with new-home construction and renovations for years, but it still offers a variety of housing (in smaller packages) that can be had for less than $200,000. Having largely survived the pandemic intact, Kirkwood’s charming commercial core plays host to a diverse array of businesses, but the year’s blockbuster news came on Kirkwood’s eastern fringes. That’s where Van Gogh: The Immersive Experience made its North American debut in May, alongside a food park and the Pratt Pullman District’s first brick-and-mortar restaurant. At the opposite end of that 27-acre property, the three-building Broadstone Pullman apartments materialized in 2021, bringing the first residents to the former industrial complex in its century of existence.
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ORMEWOOD PARK (10)
Highest home sale of 2021: $1.35M five-bedroom on Glenwood Park’s largest lot
Lowest: $195K one-bedroom townhome
Median sales price increase year-over-year: 31 percent
This was a year of significant change in leafy, hilly, BeltLine-hugging Ormewood Park, especially along the Moreland Avenue corridor. That’s where tongue-in-cheek icon “Iffy Grocery,” a vacant landmark for years, fell to backhoes for a 22-unit townhome venture that will rise next to another new pocket of townhouses, The Ormewood. Meanwhile, after years of planning, mixed-use project The Lodge has begun claiming blighted property at a key intersection, incorporating a repurposed Masonic Lodge—and 100 percent workforce housing—next to finally, mercifully realigned Glenwood Avenue. 2021 also saw Ormewood Park move closer to having its own paved section of the BeltLine's Southside Trail in old railroad corridor, but the year’s most celebrated addition of alternate-transportation options came just to the north: That’s where the BeltLine debuted protected bike lanes with beautiful plantings in Ormewood's Glenwood Park community, resulting in Atlanta’s most eye-pleasing means of keeping non-drivers safe.
