Atlanta BeltLine Inc. CEO Brian McGowan on April 19 called on the city’s international community to help spread the word around the globe about the 22-mile trail and transit loop transforming the city.
“We need to do a better job at getting our story out around the world, so anything you can do to help us, we’re willing to do what we need to,” Mr. McGowan said at Beltline event hosted by Global Atlanta and the Georgia Council for International Visitors. Two members of the diplomat corps were in the audience: Canadian Consul General Nadia Theodore and Honorary Consul General of Hungary John Parkerson.
The Beltline has already been a destination for urban planners, sister-city delegations and even some mayors from outside the country, but the $5 billion project hasn’t yet set down a specific plan for global outreach.
Two events within about a week of each other, held at separate breweries on opposite sides of the ring, however, showed the latent potential of its global story.
Diplomats on a VIP tour hosted by the state of Georgia convened at a brewery on the Westside Trail, and a week later, the Global Atlanta event brought Mr. McGowan to the rooftop at New Realm Brewing, an $18 million landmark creating 150 jobs.
After networking, some 40 of the nearly 100 attendees (mostly GCIV members and Global Atlanta readers) joined a “global Beltline crawl” down the Eastside trail to the Beltline offices of two of the city’s premier international organizations.
Staff from GCIV, which welcomed 667 delegates from 126 countries to Atlanta last year, handed out King of Pops popsicles that members of the procession took on a nearly two-mile stroll to Global Atlanta, which has an office situated in Studioplex. GCIV Executive Director Farah Amir provided welcome remarks and plugged the organization’s annual International Consular Ball, a fundraiser to be held May 12.
Mr. McGowan said in his remarks that New Realm is an example of the vitality spurred by the Beltline in a formerly derelict area.
“This was an abandoned, kudzu-covered, crime-ridden corridor. Nobody went, nobody looked in this part of the city,” he said.
At the same time, he added, the project’s challenge will be to foster inclusive growth by spurring transit development and affordable housing.
Learn more about Mr. McGowan’s global vision for the Beltline in this Global Atlanta interview.
Learn more about GCIV here.
View photos from the event on Facebook.
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