Like much of Southwest Atlanta, Westview was walloped by mortgage fraud and the Great Recession’s foreclosure crisis—at one point, roughly 25 percent of the neighborhood’s 1,200 houses were vacant. However, recent years have brought a rebound in myriad ways. This year, an expected surge in homegrown retail options should boost walkability.

Nestled next to Interstate 285, Avondale Estates, and North Decatur, the DeKalb County community of Scottdale has brandished the tagline “Atlanta’s next success story” for years, and recent changes are helping validate that claim.

Riverside is a little neighborhood with big ambitions. Home to about 600 eclectic residences, it joins neighbors Whittier Mill Village, Bolton, and Hills Park in an effort to rebrand this wedge of Atlanta between Interstate 285 and Buckhead as the “Upper Westside”—intown’s front porch to the Chattahoochee River.

Anyone who mentions “Cascade” could be broadly referring to a number of Southwest Atlanta neighborhoods where the housing styles vary as much as the terrain rolls. About 15 minutes from downtown, Cascade offers an abundance of recreational options and home prices generally cheaper than the just-OTP, gated subdivisions on this side of town.

Nestled between Candler Park and Decatur on Atlanta’s leafy east side, Lake Claire has no actual lake. It’s the kind of place where neighbors congregate at the marquee greenspace, Lake Claire Park—where the now-towering playground underwent an impressive renovation last year—to hoist cold ones during Friday happy hours as their kids frolic.

Leaders of Gwinnett’s county seat (population: roughly 32,000) decided several years ago to steer away from Lawrenceville’s vehicle-centric past in favor of a more pedestrian-friendly hub. With a variety of early 20th century storefronts and existing restaurants and boutiques, the bones were in place to create a sort of OTP Decatur.

Atlantans might not associate East Cobb with urban-style walkability, but a closer look reveals a place like Princeton Lakes, where shopping, a local school, and entertainment are steps away.

They don’t call it Pine Hills for nothing. This rolling, forested section of northeast Atlanta was mostly comprised of large farms until homebuilders descended after World War II. Later, as Atlanta’s population exploded, key thoroughfares girding Pine Hills underwent expansions and zoning changes that allowed for the condo and apartment complexes that dot the neighborhood’s edges today. Despite the development, the pines and hills remain.