Marietta, Georgia is a diverse community of various setups from traditional to modern, and it is where I grew up. In 1964, a group of men decided that they wanted to build an excellent golf course and community which is how Atlanta Country Club, my neighborhood, came about. It is located next to the ruins of a confederate paper mill, Sope Creek, and the Chattahoochee River as well as surrounding Macfarlane Park. As a child, I would play in the creek and fly kites in the vast park with my friends who I would meet while swimming in the neighborhood pool, and most of our parents were friends too through involvement in the club with activities such as golfing or tennis. In Atlanta Country Club, all of the houses are of differing structures and colors, and they all have plenty of space in between them. However, as soon as I leave my neighborhood, I am on a collector road as Duany, Plater- Zyberk and Speck classify Johnson Ferry Road. New neighborhoods with homogeneous houses line this road and are very much separate from all other aspects of life like shopping. A car is necessary to go anywhere, and even my school was a fifteen minute drive in the morning. Almost every parent must commute to Atlanta in terrible traffic for work. This environment makes it only possible for middle to upper class to live there.
After reading some of Suburban Nation, I would classify my community as a sprawl due to the way it is laid out as well as the separation of every aspect of life and of social classes. However, Atlanta Country Club in particular does have character which contradicts the idea of sprawl given in Suburban Nation and Blueprint America which classifies sprawl as being filled with bland, ordinary houses. Both of these sources portray that an area is either sprawl or traditional neighborhood, and although I think that is sometimes true, many areas like Marietta have mixes of sprawl and traditional neighborhood. Marietta has historic value, and it even has the Marietta Square even though most of its roads and neighborhoods are of the sprawl description. Therefore, I disagree with the idea that an area is either a traditional neighborhood or not one. I also feel a sense of community in Marietta even when I am in the parts that are considered sprawl. This contradicts the idea presented in Suburban Nation that all sprawl tends to alienate people. I do not agree that all sprawl is bad growth because of my own experiences although it would be nice for everything to be closer so that a car would not be necessary. I have always wanted to be able to ride my bike to areas that are close also, but the traffic makes this too dangerous. In that aspect, I agree with the authors of Suburban Nation.
- Molly Waller
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In my post, I label Nicholson, GA as the place I grew up, but in all honesty I had a very hard time deciding between Marietta and Nicholson. Even though I decided on Nicholson, I still hold Marietta very close to my heart and I therefore can relate in a small way to what you wrote. My neighborhood in Marietta was very similar to yours in that I have trouble determining whether it was purely sprawl or purely traditional and, in the end, I also deem it a little of both. The houses in my neighborhood were all very different from one another and many were very old. My friends and I rode bikes and played at the neighborhood playground and pool. But there is no denying that it was separated by highways from most anything else. I would surely have had trouble classifying my neighborhood had you not suggested that yours was a little of both. Perhaps we lived in traditional neighborhoods which were subjected to the rules of suburbia as the outside world changed around them.
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