The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
City’s Peach Drop rings in the new year at new home
Annual event moves to Woodruff Park for a chilly celebration.
Atlanta has welcomed the new year just as it did the previous 28 years, counting down to midnight for the descent of a giant peach. But Peach Drop 2018 came with one significant difference: a new
location for the city’s largest New Year’s Eve party.
On the cold final night of 2017, thousands gathered Sunday in downtown’s Woodruff Park to watch the 800-pound peach slowly drop from the historic Flatiron Building. The 120-yearold Flatiron, standing 11 stories tall, is Atlanta’s oldest skyscraper.
Officials moved the festivities from Underground Atlanta — not quite 1,200 feet to the south — after the city sold that shopping and entertainment venue to a developer last spring. South Carolina-based WRS Real Estate Investments paid $34.6 million for Underground, with plans for a $300 million mixed-use devel-
opment.
Moving the Peach Drop from Underground to Woodruff, the mayor’s office said, was part of “a continued effort to revitalize downtown.”
The New Year’s Eve activities got underway at 5:30 p.m. with a D J performing on a stage erected in the intersection of Peachtree Street and Auburn Avenue. Crowds were slow to materialize, though, in part because of the cold temperatures. At 6:40 p.m., the giant CocaCola sign at Five Points, just down Peachtree, registered the temperature at 31 degrees — down from 33 just an hour earlier.
“It is very cold,” said 18-year-old Cheyenne Mauldin, who attended her first Peach Drop with her sister, Shawnee, 26. Cheyenne, who wore fuzzy white earmuffs, added, “This will be the coldest Peach Drop on record.”
But the sisters said they wanted to see the event’s new location. “It’s an Atlanta tradition,” Cheyenne said.
Nearby, Reginald McGee sat on a concrete wall, in a spot slightly sheltered from the cold wind. McGee brought his wife and their children to Atlanta from Baton Rouge, La., just for the Peach Drop. He attended the event at Underground Atlanta a few years ago and wanted to see the new location. “I think it’ll be nice,” McGee said. “There’s more space.”
Police said they expected 25,000 people inside the 6-acre park, with another 25,000 on the periphery. Tens of thousands of others converged on downtown Sunday: for the Atlanta Falcons’ final regular-season game at Mercedes-Benz Stadium and for music events at Philips Arena, the Georgia World Congress Center and the Fox Theatre.
Security was tight for all the events, especially at Woodruff Park.
Mindful of the threats of terrorism or other violence, officials blocked numerous intersections with garbage trucks and other barricades. What appeared to be hundreds of police officers patrolled the area on foot, including SWAT officers carrying semiautomatic rifles. People entering the park had to pass through one of four checkpoints, where security officers scanned them with metal detectors — twice. Go to AJC.com for a photo gallery from the Peach Drop, including the celebration at midnight.