Visiting Decatur - Sheng Zhao

Another interesting place other than Buckhead is Decatur. Over the labor day weekend, two friends of mine and I took the Marta from North Avenue station straight to Decatur station, the center of Decatur. Downtown Decatur is a great representation of traditional neighborhood. It is a very lively community. It has restaurants and shops on both sides of the street, so there are many people shopping around and dining. And the entire city can be access on foot. There is absolute no need to have a car. In fact, there are plenty of places you cannot access when you have a car, like a street of restaurants.

Old DeKalb County Courthouse in Decatur

These characteristics fit into my initial criteria very well. Most of my criteria are not affected. For example, there needs to be lots of public areas and green spaces, and Decatur definitely did a good job providing these places. There are plenty of benches on the side of the streets and in front of major buildings, like the courthouse. The space in front of the courthouse is a like a mini-plaza where people can gather around and communicate with each other. The only thing I changed is that a great neighborhood needs to have people with different socioeconomic background because that is what going to stimulate communication within a community. Rich people would be sharing their side of opinion and poor people would share their own, so any decision will not be too one-sided. This way the bond of community could also be a lot stronger.

~Sheng Zhao