Westside boom revs up: 8-story mixed-use project in works

An eight-story mixed-use development is slated for Atlanta’s English Avenue neighborhood, a part of the city seeing a wave of investment as Microsoft makes plans to open a campus in the area and construction continues on the Beltline nearby.

Local development firm Windsor Stevens plans to build over 120 residential units and 15,000 square feet of retail space at “The Proctor,” at the corner of Oliver and Wheeler streets, the company announced Monday. It’s just north of Donald Lee Hollowell Parkway and a block from the newly opened Westside Beltline Connector, a path that links downtown to the future Westside Beltline trail.

Economic development on Atlanta’s Westside, especially the historically Black communities around English Avenue, Bankhead and Grove Park, has lagged behind other areas of town over the last several decades, but the area is seeing an influx of attention from private and public investors.

Microsoft is planning a new campus on 90 acres at the new Quarry Yards site about a mile from The Proctor. On Hollowell, some town homes are now going for over half a mil- lion dollars, leading some to worry the wave of new development will cause gentrification and displacement.

Windsor Stevens said it worked with local residents to ensure nearly 30% of units would be affordable for those who live in the area. Fourteen of the rental units will be priced for people making $27,000 or less per year — about $720 to $930 in monthly rent for studio to two-bed- room units. Eighteen of the apartments will be for peo- ple making less than $46,000 per year, ranging from $1,160 to $1,490 monthly.

Though most of the units will be apartments for rent, The Proctor will also offer six live/work “flex units” for sale. Those will have space for both residential and home office units, and are intended to enhance entrepreneurial opportunities for buyers. Those units are expected to cost $245,000. Developers have not said how much they will charge for the apartments not designated as affordable.

Amenities at the complex will also include a fitness center and a rooftop terrace with a pool. The land is currently vacant and borders a commu- nity of new town homes. The firm did not say when The Proctor is expected to open or what its retail options will consist of.