ATLANTA — Plans are moving forward to give the well known Jackson Street Bridge in Atlanta a facelift.
To people like Brandon Broadus, the Jackson Street Bridge is a way home. He's lived in the Old Fourth Ward for around five years. To others, the bridge offers an iconic backdrop of the city skyline that's rarely seen anywhere else in Atlanta.
"Every day, there's people out here utilizing the bridge, movie sets, all different types of things," Broadus said. "It's one of the best views in the whole entire city. This is why people frequent the bridge. It's just a great place to be honestly."
Plans to give the bridge a new look and to make it more cyclist and pedestrian-friendly are proceeding ahead. Atlanta City Councilmember Liliana Bakhtiari, who represents District 5, said she secured $300,000 in district funds to made this project happen.
Bakhtiari said the Atlanta Department of Transportation will match those dollars. The $600,000 project has come up before in 2019 and 2021. However, it never got enough funding, through grants or otherwise, to get off the ground.
"You have cars flying through there," Bakhtiari said. "As far as pedestrian safety, we don't have a protective path. There's a sidewalk there, but there isn't a lot of room for bicyclists and cars to share that space."
This time, Bakhtiari said the bridge will soon include an expanded and clearly defined sidewalk, a protected cycle track and seating.
"We spoke with the Downtown Improvement District, we talked to neighbors," Bakhtiari said. "It's been a tourist destination for a really long time. It only gets more dangerous with each passing month. The community has done a very good job championing this as a safety issue, and city design did a good job hearing the community and putting something together. So we'll finish finalizing the funds of ATL DOT, this goes through procurement, put out to bid, and we go from there.”
The goal is for the city to finish upgrading the bridge by the time the FIFA World Cup comes to Atlanta in 2026. There will reportedly be no structural changes to the bridge included in the work being done.
Broadus sees the overall news as a sign of progress, a move past red tape, and a potentially lifesaving facelift for those who want to enjoy the view or just head home.
"This could be a milestone, a real feather in the cap for the city if it's done right," Broadus said. "Let's just hope it gets done right."
11Alive reached out to the Atlanta Department of Transportation about the efforts to upgrade the bridge. Officials issued the following statement on April 10:
The Atlanta Department of Transportation is designing a Jackson Street Safety Improvements project that will deliver multimodal safety enhancements on Jackson Street NE (including the bridge) and Parkway Drive NE between Highland Avenue NE and John Wesley Dobbs Avenue NE. Improvements include a new pedestrian space, dedicated bike facilities, and upgraded ADA curb ramps. Vehicular lane widths also will be reduced to accommodate the bicycle and pedestrian improvements.