Downtown/Castleberry Hill Wish List

1) “As crazy as this sounds, I’ve been wishing for years that the Department of Driver Services would move out of that little trailer near Turner Field and move into Castleberry Point. I’m eager to bring professional services and businesses that draw a daytime crowd to the neighborhood. For DDS, Castleberry Hill should be a slam dunk. We’re nearly equidistant from three MARTA stations and have plenty of parking and great access to I-75/85 and I-20.” — Allison Parker, 41, Secretary, Castleberry Hill Neighborhood Association

2) “My greatest wish for Castleberry Hill is for the regional transportation hub to actually be built in the ‘gulch,’ to a standard that it becomes a transformative project on the order of Millennium Park in Chicago. This would spill over positively in every direction, including Castleberry.” — Marcia Wood, owner/executive director, Marcia Wood Gallery

3) “To fill in the gaps — look at the impact of GSU on Broad Street. It has brought retail back to life on a small but pleasant scale in the middle of downtown. I wish we could expand that to include Marietta Street from Five Points to CNN Center.” — Harvey Newman, 67, professor emeritus, Georgia State University

4) “The structural bones are ideal for Fairlie-Poplar Historic District, Underground, and south downtown to re-emerge as a culinary, retail, and nightlife mecca. The walkability, authenticity, and human scale offered by these landmark buildings are really unrivaled in the entire city. The addition of just a few thousand more privately owned student housing units and the conversion of office buildings to residential could be a spark that starts a wildfire of activity.” — Dan Williams, 30, membership manager, Central Atlanta Progress Inc.

5) “There has been a lot of sidewalk improvements to make the city more pedestrian-friendly, but it is still not the best. Improved walkways and even some cycling lanes would help.” — Tom Andrews, 57, president, St. Joseph’s Mercy Care Services