Atlanta metropolitan area

According to the 2000 census, the 28 county Atlanta, Georgia metropolitan area has a population of 4,247,981, making it the eleventh largest metropolitan area in the United States. The 2005 Census estimate shows 4,917,717 people living in the area. Atlanta proper is only the 38th-largest city in the country, largely due to Atlanta's patterns of urban sprawl, and the city's inability to annex as have such cities as Charlotte, Houston, San Diego, and Phoenix. Atlanta's combined statistical area or CSA had a population in 2000 of 4,584,234. As of July 1, 2005 the CSA is estimated to be at 5,249,121.

According to the ranking of world cities undertaken by the Globalization and World Cities Study Group & Network (GaWC) and based on the level of presence of global corporate service organizations, Atlanta is considered a "Gamma World City."

Counties

Current Population Estimates In ()*

* Barrow County(59,954)
* Bartow County(89,229)
* Butts County (21,045)
* Carroll County(105,453)
* Cherokee County(184,211)
* Clayton County(267,966)
* Cobb County(663,818)

* Coweta County(109,903)
* Dawson County(19,731)
* DeKalb County(677,959)
* Douglas County(112,760)
* Fayette County(104,248)
* Forsyth County(140,393)
* Fulton County(915,623)

* Gwinnett County(726,273)
* Haralson County(28,338)
* Heard County (11,346)
* Henry County(167,848)
* Jasper County(13,147)
* Lamar County(16,378)
* Meriwether County(22,919)

* Newton County(86,713)
* Paulding County(112,411)
* Pickens County(28,442)
* Pike County(16,128)
* Rockdale County(78,545)
* Spalding County(61,289)
* Walton County(75,647)

Cities

Government and politics

Georgia has the smallest average county size of any state which operates county governments. While this does bring government closer to the people it must represent, it has also allowed some greater conflict between jurisdictions. The first significant intergovernment agency in metro Atlanta was the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority, which runs MARTA. Alongside other factors, problems associated with the inner city of Atlanta (crime, poverty, racism, poor public school performance, etc) influenced Cobb, Gwinnett, and Clayton county voters to refuse MARTA into their respective counties during the 1970s, decisions which have permanently alterted the region-wide transportation network and community demographic ever since.

The Atlanta Regional Commission is so far the closest that the area has come to a metropolitan government. It only approves projects deemed to have an impact beyond the immediate area in which they are placed. The Georgia Regional Transportation Authority is somewhat of a cross between ARC and MARTA, searching mainly for alternative transportation such as buses and trains. GRTA also operates Xpress buses from counties that have otherwise refused to join in public transport initiatives, and could operate commuter rail service in the future.

Business and commerce

Transportation

Metro Atlanta is served by six major interstate highway routes to and from the city. I-75 is the busiest and carries a great deal of truck traffic, running south-southeast to Macon and onward to Florida and northwest to Chattanooga (and I-575 to Canton). I-85 runs southwest to Montgomery (and I-185 to Columbus), and northeast to Greenville/Spartanburg and Charlotte (and I-985 to Gainesville). I-20 runs east to Augusta and Columbia, and west to Birmingham.

I-285 encircles the city, and is called the Perimeter. I-75/85 is joined through downtown Atlanta, called the Downtown Connector. I-675 joins I-75 in the south metro to the southeastern end of I-285. Georgia 400 runs north to Alpharetta, then somewhat northeast to Dahlonega in the mountains. The GDOT had originally planned to connect 400 and 675 as I-475, but this was cancelled, as was east-west Interstate 420 and Interstate 485

MARTA operates rapid transit in Fulton and Dekalb counties, while Gwinnett, Cobb, and Clayton counties operate their own buses with no current rail transit. Plans are underway for commuter rail and bus rapid transit (BRT), though these are some years away. The first commuter rail line would run south of the city, eventually extended to Lovejoy and possibly Hampton, Georgia near Atlanta Motor Speedway. The Northwest Corridor HOV/BRT project from GRTA aims to add HOV lanes to I-75 and I-575 for cars and BRT, adding new lanes and exits, as well as lanes for tractor-trailers only.

There are many historic roads across the area, named after its mills and early ferries, and the bridges later built to replace the ferries. Pace's Ferry is perhaps the best known.

Currently, I-75 is 15 lanes wide at the Windy Hill Interchange (8 northbound, 7 southbound), and as such, is the widest freeway in the world. There are plans to expand the freeway from I-285 northward to the Wade Green Interchange to 26 lanes (13 lanes both northbound and southbound). Construction costs are expected to be about 10 billion dollars and it should take about 15 years to complete

The intersection of I-285 and Georgia 400 (a freeway running from Atlanta to Cumming and Dahlonega) is slated to become the biggest stack interchange in the world, which will encompass Collector Distributer lanes, as well as 130 foot flyover lanes, from 285 to 400, and from 400 to 285. Construction costs are expected to be around 2 billion dollars.

Communications

The area is the world's largest toll-free calling zone and has three telephone area codes. 404, which originally covered all of northern Georgia until 1992, now covers mostly the area inside the Perimeter (Interstate 285). In 1995, the suburbs were put into 770, and 678 was overlaid onto both in 1998, requiring mandatory ten-digit dialing even for local calls under FCC rules. Cellphones, originally only 404, may now have any local area code regardless of where in the region they were issued. Confusingly, 470 will be the next area code, overlaid as was 678.

Atlanta enjoys the world's biggest fiber optic bundle, and was America's first city to employ ten digit dialing, which was begun by Bell South right before the 1996 Centennial Atlanta Olympic Games.

Major fiber-optic lines and oil and natural gas pipelines cross the area, running from the Gulf coast, Texas, and Louisiana to the population centers of the northeastern U.S.

Retail centers

Atlanta is a city known in the South for its many shopping areas. The Atlanta area is home to the South's largest shopping mall, the Mall of Georgia, which is located in nearby Gwinnett County.

The other larger shopping establishments in Metro Atlanta include:
*Arbor Place Mall
*Cumberland Mall
*Discover Mills, a large outlet shopping mall located in Gwinnett County
*Greenbriar Mall
*Gwinnett Place Mall
*Lenox Square, a large 3-level shopping center that is home to some 250 retailers and restaurants that is located in Buckhead. The anchors of Lenox Square include Macy's, Bloomingdales, and Neiman-Marcus. [1]
*Mall at Stonecrest
*North DeKalb Mall
*North Point Mall
*Northlake Mall
*Perimeter Mall
*Town Center at Cobb
*Phipps Plaza, an upscale shopping center also located in Buckhead. This mall is considered Atlanta's most upscale shopping center with 100+ stores along with Nordstrom, Parisian and Saks Fifth Avenue as anchors. [2]
* Shannon Southpark Mall
* The Gallery at South DeKalb (South DeKalb Mall)
* The Pavilion in Fayette County (the largest shopping center in Georgia at over 1.8 million square feet)
* Southlake Mall
* Cobb Galleria
* Underground Atlanta
* The Mall West End
* The Mall at Peachtree
* The Mall at Atlantic Station

Natural features

Geography and geology

The area sprawls across the low foothills of the Appalachian Mountains to the north and the piedmont to the south. The northern and western suburbs tend to be significantly more hilly than the southern and eastern suburbs.

An extinct fault line called the Brevard Fault runs roughly parallel to the Chattahoochee River, but its last movements were apparently prehistoric. Still, minor earthquakes do rattle the area occasionally, the last one in April 2003 coming from the northwest in northeastern Alabama. While many people slept through the 5AM quake, it caused a minor panic in others completely unaware of what was happening. A magnitude 4.6 such as this occurs about every 30 to 40 years in the region.

Weather and climate

Atlanta has a temperate climate with four distinct seasons. Winters are somewhat cold and highly variable with January daily lows averaging around 33°F (1°C) and highs averaging near 51°F (11°C), but often reaching 70-75°F (21-24°C). Snow is uncommon, with an average annual snowfall of about 2.1 inches (5 cm), falling mostly in January and early February. Summers, by contrast, are consistently hot and humid, with July mornings around 71°F (22°C) and afternoons around 89°F (32°C), slight breezes, and typically a 20-30% chance of afternoon thunderstorms. Average annual rainfall is about 54 inches (1370 mm) typically with late winter and early spring (as well as July) being the wettest and fall (especially October) being the driest. Despite having far fewer rainy days, average yearly rainfall is higher here than in the Seattle area, especially due to heavy thunderstorms and occasional tropical depressions.

Spring weather is pleasant but variable, as cold fronts often bring strong or severe thunderstorms to almost all of the eastern and central U.S. Pollen counts tend to be extraordinarily high in the spring, regularly exceeding 2000 particles per cubic meter in April and causing hay fever. Pine pollen leaves a fine yellow-green film on everything for much of that month. The rain helps wash out Atlanta's abundant oak, pine, and grass pollens, and fuels beautiful blooms from native dogwood trees, as well as azaleas, forsythias, magnolias, and peach trees (both flowering-only and fruiting). The city-wide floral display runs during March and April, and inspires the Dogwood Festival, one of Atlanta's largest. Fall is also pleasant, with less rain and fewer storms, lower humidity, and leaves changing color from late October to mid-November, especially during drier years.

The area's geography affects the weather as well. An anticyclone over the Northeastern U.S. will blow cold air over the warmer Atlantic Ocean, forming a wedge or marine layer up against the mountains. This east or northeast wind will often blow down into the metro area in winter or even spring (sometimes fall and very rarely summer), dramatically lowering the temperature and bringing clouds and often fog or mist, along with a swift breeze. The temperature gradient across the sprawling metro Atlanta can be as much as 20°F or 10°C, occasionally even more. In winter this can be a curse, bringing freezing rain to exposed objects on the north and/or east sides of town, and occasionally very dangerously to the ground and roads. Later in the spring however, it can be a great blessing, as it often protects the area from severe thunderstorms and tornados, with the cool air acting like a fire extinguisher to the storms. The wedge may occasionally go the entire way through central Georgia and even into Alabama in the strongest conditions, while still leaving areas to the northwest much warmer than the metro area.

Major events

The highest recorded temperatures at Atlanta were 105°F (41°C) on three days in the extraordinarily-hot July 1980. The lowest recorded temperatures were -6°F (-21°C) and -8°F (-22°C) on January 20 and 21 of 1985, and -9°F (-23°C) on February 13 of 1899. There was also an official record of -10°F (-23°C) in 1985 in Marietta. The rainiest month ever was July of 1994, when Tropical Storm Alberto dumped massive amounts of rain on parts of the state and the south metro area, bringing 17.71 inches or 450mm at Atlanta, over three times a normal July.

Hurricane Opal brought sustained tropical storm conditions to the area one night in early October 1995, bringing down hundreds of trees and causing widespread power outages, after soaking the area with rain for two days prior. The western metro area caught the worst of the storm, gusting to nearly 70 MPH (just over 110km/h) officially at Marietta.

A blizzard caught much of the Southeast off-guard in 1993, dumping four inches (10cm) at the Atlanta airport on March 13, about twice that in the northern suburbs, and many times that in the mountains. Some people were awakened by thunder and lightning in a very rare thundersnow event. The only other recorded storm of comparable severity was in February 1899. Several areas of Northern Cobb County recorded over 15 inches of snow. It is widely regarded as the snow event of the century for Atlanta, and is referred to as the Storm of the Century

Environment and ecology

The area's prolific rains are drained by many different streams and creeks. The main watershed is that of the Chattahoochee River, running northeast to southwest. The further northwestern suburbs drain into the Etowah River via the Little River and Lake Allatoona. The southern suburbs are drained by the Flint River, and the east-southeastern ones by the Oconee River and Yellow River.By 2005, the metro area was using 360 million gallons of water per day (about 80 gallons per person per day).

The massive deforestation brought by excessive land development has had a significant impact on area watersheds. They now flood far more rapidly and to a much greater extent than prior to development. This has pushed many people into flood plains, something they often find out only when it is too late. A very few jurisdictions have begun to implement a stormwater fee, though the fees are not yet based on the actual amount of damaging runoff each property produces, mainly from pavement and lack of tree cover and natural leaf litter.

Flora

The native forest canopy is mainly oak, hickory, tuliptree, and pine, with some sweetgum, particularly on the southside. Underneath, the flowering dogwood is very common, and the black cherry is quite prolific, with mulberry popping up sometimes as well. Shrubby plants include blackberry, horsechestnut, sumac, and sometimes hawthorn. Virginia creeper and poison ivy are common vines. The Yellow Daisy is a wildflower native only to the area around Stone Mountain.

Common garden plants include dogwood, azalea, hydrangea, maples, pin oak, redtip photinia, holly, juniper, white pine, magnolia, Bradford pear, forsythia, liriope (mondograss) and English ivy. Lawns can be either cool-season grasses like fescue and rye, or warm-season like zoysia and bermudagrass which turn brown in late fall.

By far the most notorious introduced species is kudzu, a highly invasive species from Japan. Wisteria has also escaped in some places, and Japanese honeysuckle is quite common. Chinese Privet has surpassed all these as the most invasive non-native, yet it is still sold as a garden plant.

Fauna

Among mammals, the eastern gray squirrel is by far the most ubiquitous, stealing birdseed from the bird feeders which many locals put up. Small brown rabbits are common, but it is relatively rare to hear of them doing any damage. Opossum, raccoons, foxes, and now even small coyotes are sometimes found, especially where the habitat destruction of new development has forced them out. Snakes are rare, but tree frogs are easily heard in early summer.

The most common birds are the American Crow, European (or Common) Starling, House Sparrow, Northern Cardinal, Purple Finch, Carolina Chickadee, Tufted Titmouse, Blue Jay, Nuthatch, and American Kestrel. Various woodpeckers can be seen in forested lots, including the Red-headed Woodpecker, Norther Flicker (also known as the "red-shafted flicker"), Downy Woodpecker and occasionally others. The American Goldfinch is present in winter, and the Ruby-throated Hummingbird in summer.

Atlanta metropolitan area: Encyclopedia BETA

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