Five years after it was initially proposed, a downtown Atlanta high-rise project geared toward Georgia educators and partially backed by public funding appears to be on the verge of missing another targeted date for breaking ground. 

Teachers Village, planned to rise more than 30 stories near Centennial Olympic Park, calls for a unique mix of workforce housing and retail amidst some of downtown’s most vibrant blocks. Initial designs for the project emerged in early 2021, and previous timelines called for breaking ground in 2024 and again on Oct. 20. 

When the most recent scheduled groundbreaking came and went last fall, officials with New Jersey-based developer RBH Group said the 457,500-square-foot tower would instead break ground in the first quarter of 2026. That ends in less than three weeks. 

This week, project officials pointed to the mixed-use development’s complexity in terms of purpose and financing when asked by Urbanize Atlanta for an updated project timeline and other details. No groundbreaking forecast was relayed. 

“The development is both innovative and truly the first of its kind,” wrote RBH Group spokesperson Lonnie Soury via email. “As such, several components of the project are actively in process. We are proceeding to obtain all the necessary permits and working to finalize the Guaranteed Maximum Price, or GMP. The project’s innovative bond financing structure also requires additional coordination and timing.

“Overall,” Soury wrote, “the project continues to move forward as we advance each component toward successful execution.”

Totality of Teachers Village's Walton Street facade, according to the most recent renderings. S9 Architecture

Overview of the 98 Cone St./0 Walton St. site and its proximity to Centennial Olympic Park. Google Maps

The only recent permitting activity on file with Atlanta’s Department of City Planning dates to late December, when the Teachers Village development team filed for permission to begin work on the tower’s foundation, records show. 

Developers have said the project would see 424 apartments total—a significant housing influx for the area—with none of them rented at market rate, or prices dictated by the open market. 

RBH has described the 375-foot-tall downtown proposal as a first for Georgia, in that all apartments would be marketed to teachers, other school employees, and seniors in Atlanta as relatively affordable living options. The goal is to fill a void of workforce housing downtown and create “a model for shared, intergenerational living where residents share social responsibility and live purposeful lives,” per RBH marketing materials.

In 2021, Invest Atlanta approved a $4-million Tax Allocation District grant and $26 million in tax-exempt bond financing to support construction of the portion of the project meant for teachers. 

At the time, Invest Atlanta leaders pointed to RBH’s success in developing other Teachers Village projects in Newark and Hartford, Conn. that addressed a need for workforce housing.

According to designers S9 Architecture and a building permit application filed in 2023, the tower will stand 33 stories. (RBH officials more recently told 11Alive news the floor count will be 31.) 

The bulk of the tower—227 units—will be reserved for independent living seniors. The remaining 197 apartments will be considered workforce housing, per developers. 

Ten percent of the units, or 23 homes, will be earmarked for renters who make no more than 80 percent of the area median income. The rest will be rented at below 120 percent AMI, project reps previously told Urbanize Atlanta. (Deeply discounted rental housing, in other words, this is not.) 

Teachers Village would replace a surface parking lot on the .92-acre property, while a parking garage currently on site will remain standing, per filings with the City of Atlanta Office of Buildings. The site is bounded by Cone Street, Ted Turner Drive, and Walton Street downtown, a block from Centennial Olympic Park in the Fairlie-Poplar Historic District.

Roughly 23,000 square feet of retail fronting Walton Street is also in the works across two stories, aimed at adding vibrancy to the district with restaurants and shops. 

A revised look at the Teachers Village project's planned retail space where Ted Turner Drive, at left, meets Walton Street.S9 Architecture

Glimpse at planned Teachers Village interior common spaces. S9 Architecture

According to earlier Special Administrative Permit filings, plans call for topping the building with a rooftop swimming pool and sun deck, while other outdoor amenities would include landscaped terraces above the new parking podium. The minimum 43 bike parking spaces required would be included in eight racks.

The higher floors would be reserved for apartments geared toward teachers, while lower floors would see the senior independent living units. Those two variations of rentals would be accessed through separate lobbies at ground level, according to SAP filings. The range of expected rents has not been specified. 

Plans also call for 371 parking spaces.

As of August, RBH’s construction schedule called for delivering Teachers Village in 2027. That doesn’t appear realistic now, given the project’s scope. 

Should it come to fruition, the Teachers Village tower would join two other residential high-rises nearby that claimed former parking lots and low-rise structures in recent years. 

The site is roughly a block from a 32-story student housing tower by Landmark Properties and AECOM-Canyon Partners that opened in 2023. Also within a block, the 22-story Margaritaville resort condo building by Wyndham Destinations opened with 200 suites and two floors of retail three years ago.

Find more context and imagery in the gallery above. 

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