Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta is expected to ask the Brookhaven Planning Commission at its Sept. 6 meeting to postpone until Nov. 1 its request to rezone approximately 11 acres along Northeast Expressway for a new office building and parking deck. The delay is needed so CHOA can finalize its master plan for the massive redevelopment it is proposing at its campus at the busy interchange at North Druid Hills Road and I-85. The master plan will be presented at the Nov. 1 meeting, according to a CHOA spokesperson.
The Wednesday, Sept. 6 Planning Commission meeting is at 7 p.m. at Brookhaven City Hall.
The Planning Commission at its July 5 meeting deferred a vote until Sept. 6 on CHOA’s rezoning request for a proposed 8-story office building and 7-story parking deck in large part because CHOA did not have a master plan for its plans for its roughly 45-acre North Druid Hills Road campus. CHOA needs more time to finalize that master plan, according to spokesperson Brian Brodrick.
“When Children’s met with the Brookhaven Planning Commission July 5 to get approval for necessary permits for its support building, the commission asked to review the full campus master plan as part of the approval process at its Sept. 6 meeting. In order to honor this request, we will request a deferral until the Nov. 1 Planning Commission meeting,” Brodrick stated in a written statement.
“After hundreds of meetings with our employees, physicians, community members and patient families, our intent is to be a part of Atlanta’s future not just by healing Georgia’s kids, but by creating a place that provides an inspirational connection for our patients and families to the community we call home,” Brodrick stated. “Children’s leaders continue to be excited about the potential to serve Georgia’s children from a campus in Brookhaven as well as from Scottish Rite, Hughes Spalding and via our neighborhood locations and partners around the state.”
CHOA officials have stated at public meetings with residents living near its North Druid Hills Road campus that it needs the some 11 acres of property so it can build the office tower and parking deck. After the new “support building” is completed, the approximate 1,100 employees working in the CHOA office complex on Tullie Road and Tullie Circle would move to that building. Plans would then be to raze the Tullie Road and Tullie Circle office park buildings and then build a $1.3 billion hospital on that land to replace CHOA’s Egleston Hospital on Clifton Road near Emory University.
Residents living in the area have complained about the expansion only adding to an already notorious traffic problem in the area. CHOA officials argue that because they are only relocating employees to a new building, the density of the area is not seriously affected because the project is dealing with people already in the area.
An 8-story Center for Advanced Pediatrics building is currently being built at the interchange.
As part of the rezoning of the some 11 acres, CHOA is asking Brookhaven to annex the property into the city. The Brookhaven City Council can only consider the annexation request after the rezoning request.
Those irresponsible CHOA is only considering sick children care but NOT for nearby residents about how much they cause trouble in traffic, noise, and environmental inconvenience.
They already tricked Atlanta’s guideline (5 story limit alongside I-85) via rezoning to Brookhaven. Based on their behavior, their master plan of 1.3 bil $ campus in the limited territory may cause lot of unexpected troubles to nearby residents.
I wish Brookhaven councils think wisely and don’t cause any unexpected nightmares to nearby residents and facilities.