From Rural Railroad Crossing To Suburb

7 July 2004 - 9:00am

The Atlanta Journal Constitution plans to chronicle the birth of the small community of Pendergrass as it grows from a rural railroad crossing to a bustling Atlanta suburb.

"Pendergrass, a speck of a city in Jackson County, is home to fewer than 500 people, a train depot-turned-City Council chambers, a Mexican restaurant and a lot of undeveloped land... Yet a $60 million Toyota parts plant planned for the outskirts of Pendergrass is creating much more than the 125 jobs promised. A new sewer line stretching to the factory will cross through the town, allowing developers to tap into it and build denser housing. Three proposed projects would bring 995 homes."

Full Story: The Birth of a City
Source: The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, July 4, 2004
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All of that only scratches the surface of what's wrong with this study. The idea that complex urban development patterns and human behavior can be meaningfully studied according to one primary criteria — density — is wrong from the start.