Images: Downtown affordable housing development begins climb

A long-planned development promising more than 200 relatively attainable housing options is starting to make its presence felt in downtown Atlanta.

In planning stages for more than five years, the mixed-use Trinity Central Flats is rising where Trinity Avenue meets Shirley C. Franklin Boulevard (formerly Central Avenue), as one of two planned sizable, affordable housing ventures next door to each other. 

According to project contractor J.M. Wilkerson Construction Co., Trinity Central Flats will deliver 219 affordable housing apartments in a brick and architectural precast structure that will rise nine and 10 stories, topping out at 123 feet. (Two stories have been built to date in one section of the building.) 

Finalized plans also call for 6,721 square feet of retail and indoor and outdoor amenities, with a covered walkway connection to the Government Center Parking Deck to the south for parking. 

Shirley C. Franklin Boulevard “is a Storefront Street, and there are three retail spaces located along that frontage,” reads the contractor’s project description. 

A new crosswalk will also lead to the front entrance of Atlanta City Hall across the street. 

The building’s second level—the primary resident entry lobby level—will house a bike room with exterior access, a computer lab, a placement office, a gym, tenant laundry facilities, and an arts and crafts room, among other perks, according to the contractor. 

Trinity Central Flats officially began construction in November and is now scheduled for completion in February 2028, according to J.M. Wilkerson officials. 

According to Invest Atlanta, all of the units will be offered at below-market rates, capped for renters earning 80 percent of the Area Median Income or less. 

The vast majority—193 apartments total—will be reserved at either 50 or 60 percent AMI, officials have said. No resident will be required to pay more than 30 percent of their income, as Atlanta Housing’s HomeFlex vouchers will be available for supportive housing units. 

The apartments will be within walking distance of South Downtown, Underground Atlanta, and three MARTA stations, as city officials have noted in calling it one of Atlanta’s “most convenient locations.”

Heading the project are Radiant Development Partners and Capitol Hill Neighborhood Development Corporation, a longstanding ecumenical ministry comprised of three churches downtown (Central Presbyterian, the Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, and Trinity UMC). 

Designs by architecture firm SSOE Group also call for an 18,000-square-foot urban garden atop the connected, existing parking deck next door—and the largest solar array on any multifamily building in Georgia. The green, sustainable facets are expected to reduce energy use in the building’s common areas by 30 percent, bringing down residential utility bills in the process, officials have said. 

The development team was picked back in December 2021 following a public selection process. Elsewhere in Atlanta, Radiant is a partner in the Beltline-adjacent The Garson at Overlook project that officially broke ground last month with an affordable housing component near Lindbergh.

The sloping, 1.3-acre corner site had been vacant and fenced-off for well over a decade.

At a site immediately to the east, affordable housing developer Gorman & Company plans to break ground this year on a mixed-income, 15-story affordable housing tower as part of The Sanctuary, a $41.3-million remake of Trinity United Methodist Church’s historic campus. Invest Atlanta in May approved an additional $1 million from the Eastside TAD Ascension Fund to support that project. 

Find more imagery and context for the rising Trinity Central Flats in the gallery above. 

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