Groundbreakers Finalist

One steamy July morning, in the dining room of a spacious Inman Park home, a group of longtime neighborhood residents strategized over muffins and coffee about how to combat the unpleasant problem of root-busted sidewalks. And how to address the fact that Inman Park is home to nearly 4,300 people and a multitude of pricey luxury apartments but not a single residence classified as senior housing.

Not long after the Clarkston’s community center opened, the staff recognized that older refugees face unique hurdles in adapting to a different culture. “They’re the last [in the family] to get any kind of services,” says director Cindy Bowden. “They’re the last to learn English. They’re the last to get involved in the community. It’s important to offer them an avenue to belonging.”

The $600 million project, which will eventually consume 86 acres off Georgia 400 in Alpharetta, has been flashy from the start (the grand-opening gala last October lasted four days). And Toro’s mission—to break the mold of traditional suburban cul-de-sacs and strip malls in favor of a dense, walkable “urbanburb”—has clearly struck a chord.

As evidence for the maxim that one person can indeed make a difference, consider that, all by his lonesome, arts enthusiast Louis Corrigan gave more money to local arts groups last year than the entire Atlanta Office of Cultural Affairs. Corrigan, a successful investment firm research analyst, is the majority funder of Flux Projects, which sponsors creative installations and performances around the city, and he provides about 40 percent of the backing for professional dance troupe gloATL. But he’s not simply a modern Medici seeking a tax write-off; in keeping with his financial background, Corrigan leverages his assets so the grassroots community gets the biggest bang from his bucks. Through his nonprofit foundation, Possible Futures, he targets grants to enable arts journalism websites artsatl.com and burnaway.org to cover and promote local goings-on. Through Flux and his support for gloATL, Corrigan underwrites public arts projects in such highly visible venues as Freedom Park and Centennial Olympic Park, with the aim of reaching audiences that might not otherwise seek out experimental visual art, photography, or dance.

As you read this, programmers hover over laptops and lattes at the Technology Square Starbucks, designing the Next Big Thing. It has never been so easy (or so cheap) to turn a good idea into a global product. So they devise apps to entertain you, devices to save you energy and time, and stuff you won’t know you need until they invent it. Technology Square is the heart of Atlanta’s start-up community and site of the Advanced Technology Development Center (ATDC) of Georgia Tech. Stephen Fleming, a former venture capitalist, runs this incubator and the overarching Enterprise Innovation Institute.

Nuri's urban farms bring fresh food to areas of Atlanta where rubble, history, and poverty are cross-pollinated.

Turning vacant lots into urban farms is nothing new, but a few innovators are taking intown agriculture to another level. Micro­enterprises such as Widdernshins Urban Farmstead in East Point operate on just a fifth of an acre.

As founder of JPX Works, Portman has raised more than $200 million since launching the company with Bruce Fernald in 2011. The company’s Inman Quarter mixed-use development remade the commercial core of Inman Park, and Jarel says profits from its $72.5 million sale were poured into JPX’s ongoing ventures: the Lilli apartments and luxe condos called Emerson under construction in Buckhead, with unit prices starting at $2.2 million.

Since 2007, the ArtsBridge Foundation has helped more than 240,000 students and teachers from Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, and South Carolina experience the performing arts, with free or low-cost performances, field trips, and even Broadway master classes.

Five hundred people showed up for the first Art on the Atlanta BeltLine lantern parade in 2010. Carrying homemade lights, they tromped up the dirt path between the dumpsters and hills of kudzu that, not long ago, dotted the Eastside Trail.