Howell Station residents face off against scrap-metal recycling facility near proposed Beltline park, site of zombie attack
Proposed scrap-metal recycling facility would be across street from historic neighborhood, near proposed Beltline park
Howell Station residents are pushing back against a scrap-metal recycling facility’s proposal to set up shop directly across the street from the historic Westside neighborhood — and adjacent to a proposed Atlanta Beltline park.
According to Howell Station Neighborhood Association Vice President Jennifer Higgins, Stone Metal LLC wants to set up a scrapyard, which would include storing old cars outside an existing building, at 940 Marietta Blvd. To do so requires a special-use permit.
Industrial-zoned land already dominates the area and residents are dreading the prospect of yet another facility taking up the neighborhood’s limited room for green space. What’s more, the proposed site abuts a massive shuttered quarry that’s expected to become an equally massive Beltline park. (Viewers of “The Walking Dead” would recognize the property, which was prominently featured in the zombie series’ first season.)
“We all believe in the vision for this part of town to be a vibrant community full of greenspaces that serve our neighbors and the city as a whole,” Higgins says in an email. “We feel that encouraging this kind of usage of the land does not make sense with the vision of the Beltline and the community development plan.”