Atlanta Unbound

Enabling Sprawl through Policy and Planning

Carlton Wade Basmajian

Looking at Atlanta, Georgia, one might conclude that the city’s notorious sprawl, degraded air quality, and tenuous water supply are a result of a lack of planning—particularly an absence of coordination at the regional level. In Atlanta Unbound, Carlton Wade Basmajian shows that Atlanta’s low-density urban form and its associated problems have been both highly coordinated and regionally planned.

Basmajian’s shrewd analysis shows how regional policies spanned political boundaries and framed local debates over several decades. He examines the role of the Atlanta Regional Commission’s planning deliberations that appear to have contributed to the urban sprawl that they were designed to control. Basmajian explores four cases—regional land development plans, water supply strategies, growth management policies, and transportation infrastructure programs—to provide a detailed account of the interactions between citizens, planners, regional commissions, state government, and federal agencies.

In the process, Atlanta Unbound answers the question: Toward what end and for whom is Atlanta’s regional planning process working?

Reviews

"Rendering the opaque and superficially bland language of regional planning into a comprehensible and compelling narrative would be a daunting task...(b)ut studies like this--which delve deeply into the internal working of plans and planning, without genuflecting to the assumptions of the participants--offer valuable insights." — Planning

"(A) welcome addition to the literature. In examining how federal rule changes, geography, and competing stakeholders interacted with the imperatives of metropolitan growth, Basmajian illuminates and evaluates processes that too often remain obscure. Atlanta proves a worthy case study.... Among the important contributions of this study is its success in making visible the considerable impact of federal programs...there is a larger lesson here as well. As much as historians have described the uneven effects of urban restructuring over the last half century, it is difficult to appreciate just how those effects came about without the kind of multilevel accounting of public power that Basmajian provides." —Journal of American History

"Atlanta Unbound is in effect a history of the Atlanta Regional Commission’s planning efforts between 1970 and 2002.... (Basmajian's) exhaustive research into what he admits is often 'boring' material illustrates, on the one hand, the considerable political effort and skill it took to establish any type of meaningful regional planning apparatus in a conservative political climate such as Georgia, and, on the other hand, the utter inability of this regional planning mechanism to challenge received development priorities.... (The) book illustrates the value and future potential of meticulously researched explorations of activities of state and quasi-state institutions in illuminating spatial processes and policymaking, whether the activities in question are covert or merely opaque." —Perspectives on Politics

"Basmajian explores how regional planners engaged with Atlanta and post–World War II expansion.... (He) has masterfully charted the course of the Atlanta Regional Commission.... Threaded with both thoughtful analysis and rambunctious newspaper accounts.... Atlanta Unbound provides a powerful resource for considering an evolving relationship between ideology and material landscapes." —American Studies

"Atlanta Unbound offers a compelling historical overview of regional planning in Atlanta. Using painstaking archival research, interviews with key actors, and an assessment of the intent and quality of ARC (Atlanta Regional Commission) plans produced over the years, Basmajian has authored a powerful book that ultimately pokes holes in the simplistic idea that regional planning can be the means to promoting fiscally sound, equitable, and environmentally sensitive development outcomes…. Atlanta Unbound is a rich, quality study of an important regional planning case.... For those professionals who work in or are interested in the Atlanta region, this book is certainly a must read. More important, for planners who see only benefits in the empowerment of regional planning bodies, there is an abiding lesson to be learned from Basmajian's excellent book: It is not the quality of the vehicle that guarantees you reach your destination, but the quality of the driver." —Journal of the American Planning Association

About the Author(s)

Carlton Wade Basmajian is an Assistant Professor of Community and Regional Planning at Iowa State University.

In the Series

Urban Life, Landscape, and Policy

The Urban Life, Landscape, and Policy series, edited by David Stradling, Larry Bennett, Davarian Baldwin, and Yue Zhang, was founded by the late Zane L. Miller to publish books that examine past and contemporary cities. While preserving the series’ foundational focus on the policy, planning, and environmental issues so central to metropolitan life, we also join scholarly efforts to push the boundaries of urban studies. We are committed to publishing work at the shifting intersections of cultural production, community formation, and political economy that shape cities at all scales, from the neighborhood to the transnational. Proposals may be submitted to Temple University Press Editor-in-Chief Aaron Javsicas or the series editors at the email addresses linked above.

In honor of Zane Miller, the late founding editor of our series, Urban Life, Landscape, and Policy, we invite first-time authors to apply for a grant of up to $2,500 to help advance the careers of scholars from underrepresented communities with limited financial resources. For more information, Zane L. Miller Book Development Award