Work continues on Virginia-Highland's mystery hole; builders mum

Construction continues on a controversial self-storage facility project at the doorstep of two marquee, walkable intown attractions, but exactly what it will entail and when it might arrive remain question marks.

The construction timeline is important to parts of Atlanta beyond the Monroe Drive site, and expansion plans for a nearby cultural institution depend on it.

Earlier this year, two low-rise commercial buildings were demolished at 1011 Monroe Drive and 597 Cooledge Ave. that had most recently housed Cantoni Furniture and Illuminations Lighting. The high-profile site is located at the cusp of Piedmont Park and the Atlanta Beltline’s popular Eastside Trail and new Northeast Trail section.

Public Storage, a national self-storage provider, is building a larger facility to replace those structures—a use that has drawn the ire of both neighborhood leaders and Beltline development arbiters. But the company hasn’t clarified exactly what it’s building, or when it plans to deliver.

Multiple inquiries to Public Storage officials regarding timelines and other aspects of the project have not been returned. Signage wrapping the site indicates Rycon Construction is building the project. An interview request to that company wasn’t returned either.

John Craft, Virginia-Highland Civic Association president, says he’s not seen or heard updates, but that progress on the self-storage project does seem slow.

“That tracks with anecdotes I’ve heard on several projects around the state,” Craft wrote in an email to Urbanize Atlanta. “I've seen a lot of out-of-state construction workers staying at hotels in Augusta and Savannah, and hear that there’s been more work than there are workers for the past couple of years.”

On the flipside of Piedmont Park, the Atlanta Botanical Garden’s $150-million expansion project hinges on the Public Storage facility project being finished and open.

The Garden’s 8-acre expansion will consume adjacent land where Public Storage has operated for years. In exchange, the Garden is swapping the Monroe Drive property, which it bought for $13.5 million last year, with Public Storage, so the company can maintain a presence in the area.

The Botanical Garden also bought Public Storage’s facility on Piedmont Avenue, immediately north of the current gardens, for a reported $40 million.

Botanical Garden officials hope to break ground on the expansion in late 2025, with completion sometime in 2027, but that’s all contingent on Public Storage relinquishing their current building on the expansion site. 

Drawings shared by Public Storage representatives in early 2023 with the Atlanta Beltline Design Review Committee—following several design updates—could lend an idea what’s in store for the intown corner. According to those plans, the self-storage project would include office space (and bike racks) with a large, Botanical Garden-themed mural on one wall.

Building permit information indicates the self-storage facility will stand five stories. (A competing business, Extra Space Storage, has long operated another self-storage facility next door on the same block, along Kanuga Street.)

The lack of retail space or residential uses such as townhomes peeved Beltline DRC members last year. They criticized the project in the incarnation presented as “a missed opportunity” and “a use that does not belong on the BeltLine or anywhere near it.” 

Jarrod Yates, Public Storage regional vice president of development, told Urbanize Atlanta in May his team was “working on something to help the community better understand the project.”

Nearly six months later, that something still hasn’t materialized.

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• Virginia-Highland news, discussion (Urbanize Atlanta)