Boulevard (Atlanta)

Boulevard is a street in the Old Fourth Ward neighborhood of Atlanta, Georgia. The street runs east of, and parallel to, Atlanta's Downtown Connector. It is bordered by Ponce de Leon Avenue to the north (past which it continues as Monroe Drive), and McDonough Boulevard to the south. Boulevard is notable for being a center of high crime and drug activity in Atlanta, as well as the location of the highest concentration of Section 8 housing in the Southeastern United States.

It was not always so. In 1895, shortly after Boulevard was built, author Margaret Severance, in her book "Official Guide to Atlanta", described it as: "a beautiful avenue, [which] will be a great pride to Atlanta in years to come. Its height, width and number of magnificent homes, with their spacious lawns, assure every observer a boulevard that any city may point to with pride. This is once of the most desirable residence streets in the city."^[1]

Boulevard remained a white street through the 1910's even as the side streets became increasingly African-American. This trend was due to Blacks moving eastwards from the Sweet Auburn area, seeking to consolidate their businesses and residences into safe, primarily black areas after the traumatic race riots of 1906.

One institution in particular anchored the African-American presence on the neighborhood: Morris Brown College was founded in 1885 at Boulevard and Houston St. (now John Wesley Dobbs Ave.) and in 1922 expanded, acquiring the land at the southeast corner of Boulevard and Irwin St.^[2]. (The college later moved to its present location at the Atlanta University Center).

From the 1920's through the 1940's many of Boulevard's fine homes began to be purchased by prominent African-American "doctors, bishops, ministers [and]...attorneys".^[3]

The flight of better-off residents from Intown Atlanta also affected Boulevard and the fine houses were replaced with apartments, which eventually came to fall under "Section 8".

Many believe that redevelopment and gentrification on Boulevard and the immediately surrounding streets is inevitable, as most areas surrounding it now contain mixed-income or upscale housing^[4].

Notable sites on Boulevard

From north to south:

• Atlanta Medical Center
• Martin Luther King, Jr., National Historic Site
• Oakland Cemetery
• Grant Park, Zoo Atlanta, and the Atlanta Cyclorama
• United States Penitentiary, Atlanta

References

1. ^ Severance, Margaret (1895). Official guide to Atlanta: including information of the Cotton States and International Exposition. Atlanta: Foote & Davies Co.. p. 42. http://books.google.com/books?id=gIw-AAAAYAAJ. Retrieved 2011-01-02. 
2. ^ A history of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, Charles Spencer Smith, Daniel Alexander Payne, p.354
3. ^ Black Atlanta in the Roaring Twenties By Herman Skip Mason, Jr., Herman Skip Mason Jr., p.75
4. ^ Henry, Scott (2009-05-19). "Down on Boulevard: Positive change might finally come to Atlanta’s lawless street". Creative Loafing Atlanta. http://atlanta.creativeloafing.com/gyrobase/down_on_boulevard_positive_change_might_finally_come_to_atlanta_s_lawless_street/Content?oid=827931. Retrieved 2009-06-06.