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Originally Posted by Fiorenza
I have some anecdotal information that the level of graft and corruption in the Atlanta building permits, is pretty rampant. Anybody else here have thoughts about it? Compared to other big cities?
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From speaking to people in the city, the building permitting system has been one of the hardest parts of the government to reform, both from a "good ol' boy" network and a process perspective. I suspect that the problem is partially because of the boom that the city can't just go in and clean house because neither the city nor developers can afford for the system to be disrupted. Even if the current system is slow and poorly run, it is better than the chaos that would result from a whole new department. When you think about it, development has always been the place with the most opportunities for corruption and Atlanta is coming out of decades of some pretty poor goverance. It's going to take time to get things cleaned up and get the process changed to be simpler and faster. Most everyone wants it to happen but it won't happen overnight. Getting upset and keeping the department under a microscope helps keep the pressure on them and towards more reform.
As far as 2008 goes, I expect supply and demand to often get out of kilter. Unlike suburban subdivisions that typically deliver units in phases (each of which are usually really just a continual delivery of one home after another instead of them all at once), towers tend to deliver units in a short period of time. The lower floors may be released before the upper floors but in general there isn't that long of a gap between the first and last units.
I agree that infill will continue to be a big part of the city's growth. And this doesn't just mean tear downs or squeezing units between lots. Anyone who spends a bit of time looking at existing neighborhoods from above will notice that most neighborhoods have lots of undeveloped fields and pockets. The houses along existing streets might be dense (by the standards of when the neighborhood was developed), there are plenty of gaps where new streets could be added with more houses, not to mention multifamily housing. So far it seems like east Atlanta has been capturing lots of this but I'm amazed at the possibilities in the west and south.
It's also interesting to look at what areas are going to gentrify next. The Bluffs, English Avenue, and Vine City are very rough areas with bad reputations but they're also near downtown and logically would feel pressure towards gentrification. When I was looking up a property over there about a month ago, I noticed that many of the houses were owned by investment companies so it looks like the buy up is already happening.