Downtown Atlanta Downtown Atlanta is the central business district of Atlanta, Georgia, United States. The larger of the city's two other commercial districts ( Midtown and Buckhead), it is the location of many corporate and regional headquarters; city, county ...

, the Downtown Connector or 75/85 (pronounced "seventy-five eighty-five") is the concurrent section of Interstate 75 and

Interstate 85 Interstate 85 (I-85) is a major Interstate Highway in the Southeastern United States. Its southern terminus is at an interchange with I-65 in Montgomery, Alabama; its northern terminus is an interchange with I-95 in Petersburg, Virginia, ...

through the core of the city. Beginning at the I-85/ Langford Parkway interchange, the Downtown Connector runs generally due north, meeting the west–east

I-20 Interstate 20 (I‑20) is a major east–west Interstate Highway in the Southern United States. I-20 runs beginning at an interchange with I-10 in Scroggins Draw, Texas, and ending at an interchange with I-95 in Florence, South Carolina. Betwe ...

in the middle. Just north of this is the Grady Curve around Grady Memorial Hospital. Continuing north, the terminus of the Downtown Connector is the Brookwood Interchange or Brookwood Split in the Brookwood area of the city. The overall length of the Downtown Connector is approximately . Since the 2000s, it has been officially named James Wendell George Parkway for most of its length, although it is still designated the Connector in the mainstream. It also has unsigned designations State Route 401 (I-75) and State Route 403 (I-85) along its length, due to I-75 and I-85 having 400-series reference numbers.

Route description

I-75-I-85 NB at Fulton Street-Central Avenue

The Downtown Connector carries more than 437,000 vehicles per day at its busiest point — just south of 10th Street in Midtown, while the least traveled portion carries 243,000 vehicles per day — just south of Fulton Street, near the interchange with

Interstate 20 Interstate 20 (I‑20) is a major east–west Interstate Highway in the Southern United States. I-20 runs beginning at an interchange with I-10 in Scroggins Draw, Texas, and ending at an interchange with I-95 in Florence, South Carolina. Betwe ...

. The area around the connector and associated interchanges are considered one of the ten-most congested stretches of interstate in the U.S. Due to this fact, many motorists often compare Atlanta to

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world ...

, which is also known for its notoriously-congested freeway system. The highway is fully instrumented with Intelligent transportation system (ITS) devices. There are more than 25

closed-circuit television Closed-circuit television (CCTV), also known as video surveillance, is the use of video cameras to transmit a signal to a specific place, on a limited set of monitors. It differs from broadcast television in that the signal is not openly tr ...

cameras between the Langford Parkway interchange (south end) and the Brookwood Interchange (north end). Additionally, the Downtown Connector has three large overhead electronic message signs, and four smaller HOV-dedicated message signs on the median barrier wall. Traffic flow data is gathered through a video detection system, using pole-mounted black-and-white cameras spaced every on both sides of the roadway. All video and data is fed into the GDOT's Transportation Management Center (TMC), via

fiber optic cable A fiber-optic cable, also known as an optical-fiber cable, is an assembly similar to an electrical cable, but containing one or more optical fibers that are used to carry light. The optical fiber elements are typically individually coated with ...

located under the shoulders of the roadway. Virtually all entrance ramps are metered, with the exception of the freeway-to-freeway connection ramps from I-20. As with every other freeway inside the Perimeter, the Downtown Connector is lined with streetlights mounted in the center median, with high-mast lighting at major interchanges. Atlanta's

skyline A skyline is the outline or shape viewed near the horizon. It can be created by a city’s overall structure, or by human intervention in a rural setting, or in nature that is formed where the sky meets buildings or the land. City skylin ...

, both

Downtown ''Downtown'' is a term primarily used in North America by English speakers to refer to a city's sometimes commercial, cultural and often the historical, political and geographic heart. It is often synonymous with its central business district ...

and Midtown, can be seen from the highway, especially at the northern and southern ends.

History

Planning and initial construction

On December 14, 1944, the Georgia State Highway Department, the predecessor agency to the

Georgia Department of Transportation The Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) is the organization in charge of developing and maintaining all state and federal roadways in the U.S. state of Georgia. In addition to highways, the department also has a limited role in develop ...

(GDOT), collaborated with the city of Atlanta, Fulton County, and the Bureau of Public Roads (BPR), the predecessor to the

Federal Highway Administration The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) is a division of the United States Department of Transportation that specializes in highway transportation. The agency's major activities are grouped into two programs, the Federal-aid Highway Program ...

(FHWA) to work on a plan to improve traffic and connectivity within the Atlanta area.

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = List of sovereign states, Count ...

-based H.W. Lochner & Company, a transportation engineering firm which had been formed earlier that year, was hired to provide a comprehensive transportation plan for the region, using data conducted by the BPR and the state highway department from 1936 to 1945, and future growth projections. The report, which was released on January 10, 1946, recommended a total of six radiating expressways be constructed in the city, with the intent of being integrated into what later became the

Interstate Highway System The Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways, commonly known as the Interstate Highway System, is a network of controlled-access highways that forms part of the National Highway System in the United States. T ...

, which at the time was expected to eventually be authorized by Congress. The report recommended that four of these expressways converge into a single north-south route through downtown, which was referred to at the time as both the "Downtown Connector" and the "Downtown Connector Expressway". Work of the first section of the Downtown Connector, located between Williams Street and the Brookwood Interchance, as well as the approximately stretch of what is now I-85 north to Peachtree Street, began in September 1948, and was dedicated and opened to traffic on September 25, 1951. The stretch from Piedmont Avenue to Williams Street opened on May 5, 1959. Work on a southern stretch of the Connector, a section between University Avenue and Richardson Street, began in March 1955, and was dedicated and opened on July 25, 1957. Construction on the final stretch, the stretch between Richardson Street and Piedmont Avenue, including the interchange with I-20, began on February 26, 1962, and was opened to traffic on September 18, 1964. A ribbon-cutting ceremony for the Downtown Connector, attended by Governor

Carl Sanders Carl Edward Sanders Sr. (May 15, 1925 – November 16, 2014) was an American attorney and politician who served as the 74th Governor of the state of Georgia from 1963 to 1967. Early life and education Carl Sanders was born on May 15, 1925 in ...

, FHWA administrator Rex Marion Whitton, and Atlanta mayor Ivan Allen Jr. was held inside the

Georgia State Capitol The Georgia State Capitol is an architecturally and historically significant building in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. The building has been named a National Historic Landmark which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. As ...

on October 15, 1964. Initial construction of the highway displaced parts of Techwood Drive and Williams Street in Midtown Atlanta. It also destroyed street grids east and south of downtown, dividing

Sweet Auburn Sweetness is a basic taste most commonly perceived when eating foods rich in sugars. Sweet tastes are generally regarded as pleasurable. In addition to sugars like sucrose, many other chemical compounds are sweet, including aldehydes, ketones ...

in two and the interchange with

leveling the northern part of the Washington-Rawson district. The proposed I-485 was originally planned by the

to carry some south–north traffic through the eastern side of the city, but most of this was canceled in the 1970s by the then-governor of Georgia,

Jimmy Carter James Earl Carter Jr. (born October 1, 1924) is an American politician who served as the 39th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he previously served as th ...

. Parts of that road are now

I-675 Interstate 675 may refer to: *Interstate 675 (Georgia), a connection south of Atlanta, Georgia *Interstate 675 (Michigan) Interstate 675 (I-675) is an auxiliary Interstate Highway in the US state of Michigan. The freeway is a loop route th ...

and SR 400.

Reconstruction

The highway was heavily reconstructed during the 1980s as part of GDOT's Freeing the Freeways program to widen Atlanta-area freeways, with most of the Connector's width being doubled from three to six or seven lanes in each direction. The project included work to increase lanes from six to eight on

, I-75,

I-85 Interstate 85 (I-85) is a major Interstate Highway in the Southeastern United States. Its southern terminus is at an interchange with I-65 in Montgomery, Alabama; its northern terminus is an interchange with I-95 in Petersburg, Virginia, n ...

, and I-285 ("The Perimeter"), as well as ten lanes on the downtown connector, involving 126 total miles and was phased over 13 years between 1976 and 1988. The improvement campaign also included elimination of sharp curves and grades, left-hand exits, excessive interchanges, and short acceleration/deceleration lanes. So as to offer a bypass around construction through the center of the city, the perimeter road (I-285) was completed first. The radiating expressways were then upgraded, and the last phase was reconstruction of the depressed sections through downtown Atlanta. By June 1983, some $252 million in discretionary funds had been used to complete most of the highways save for some major interchanges and the downtown section. The eight miles of the downtown section, which includes the 4.4-mile long downtown connector, was the most complicated section of the entire reconstruction. Work was started on it in 1984, and it included redesigning the massive interchange between I-20 and I-75/85 at Memorial Drive where much of the mileage was on structure. The downtown connector was to be widened to ten lanes, and this required quite a bit of right of way acquisition. Many bridges, including the 55 over the connector portion alone, had to be designed and built. In addition to the general-purpose lanes, provisions for high-occupancy vehicle (HOV) lanes and dedicated on-ramps at Williams Street, Piedmont Avenue, and Memorial Drive were built, and were subsequently converted to HOV usage in 1996.

Later history

Between 2000 and 2004, the six-lane wide 17th Street Bridge was constructed over the Brookwood Interchange, connecting Midtown Atlanta with the then-new

Atlantic Station Atlantic Station is a neighborhood on the northwestern edge of Midtown Atlanta, Georgia, United States comprising a retail district, office space, condominiums, townhomes and apartment buildings. First planned in the mid-1990s and officially op ...

development. In 2008, reconstruction of the 14th Street Bridge took place in order to accommodate increased traffic flow and pedestrian amenities. This work also included the construction of two new off-ramps: a southbound ramp to 10th Street, and a northbound ramp to 17th Street. This work was completed on May 28, 2010. In early January 2010, a section of the highway between 14th and 17th streets developed an unusual problem dubbed "phantom ice" during a prolonged cold wave that kept temperatures below freezing for several days in the Atlanta region. GDOT engineers believe that heavy rain in previous months raised the

water table The water table is the upper surface of the zone of saturation. The zone of saturation is where the pores and fractures of the ground are saturated with water. It can also be simply explained as the depth below which the ground is saturated. T ...

and caused it to seep upward through joints between lanes, where it subsequently froze. Commuter traffic was stopped briefly on at least two days in order to treat it with deicing materials and inspect the freeway to determine the cause. In January 2016, GDOT started a study of the Downtown Connector. Citing high levels of congestion that occur outside of peak periods, the purpose of the study is to gather data and explore options for reducing congestion. Data collection took place all year in 2016, and the data is being analyzed and options evaluated throughout 2017 and 2018. The study is expected to be completed in 2019. The study has already released their data on thei
website
including nine "Hot Spots", or dangerous and congested points that could most benefit from design improvements, and a detailed analysis of traffic in the whole metro area and how it relates to traffic on the Downtown Connector.

The Stitch

In August 2016,

Central Atlanta Progress Central Atlanta Progress (CAP), founded in 1941, as the Central Area Improvement Association, is a private, not-for-profit corporation, chartered to plan and promote Atlanta's Central Area, that strives to create a robust economic climate for downto ...

announced plans to cover the Downtown Connector, converting it to a subterranean roadway and building a series of greenspaces on top of the road, similar to Klyde Warren Park in

Dallas Dallas () is the third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 million people. It is the largest city in and seat of Dallas County ...

. This project was drafted by Jacobs Engineering Group and is called "The Stitch", as one of the intents of the project would be to "stitch" together roads that had been divided with the creation of the Downtown Connector. As of 2019, the project was still in the pre-construction phase, with an estimated timeline and budget of ten years and $452 million, respectively. In 2021, the Midtown Connector Project (MCP) Foundation released a proposal to build a park over 10 blocks of the Midtown portion of the Downtown Connector from North Avenue to 10th Street.

Gallery

File:Downtown Connector sb Exit 242.jpg, Southern end of the Downtown Connector where I-75 and I-85 diverge File:13 Atlanta.jpg, North end of the Downtown Connector where I-75 and I-85 converge in Midtown File:Atlanta 75.85.jpg, Downtown Connector view of the

downtown ''Downtown'' is a term primarily used in North America by English speakers to refer to a city's sometimes commercial, cultural and often the historical, political and geographic heart. It is often synonymous with its central business district ...

skyline File:Downtown connector nighttime.jpg, Downtown Connector facing south from Fifth Street bridge; nighttime view File:Downtownconnectoratlantaaerial.jpg, Aerial view of the Downtown Connector facing north from downtown File:Atlanta downtown connector south.jpg, Aerial view of the Downtown Connector facing south from downtown File:Bright Atlanta.jpg, Atlanta Downtown Connector at night File:Downtown Connector sb Exit 249A .75 mile.jpg, Downtown Connector at Williams Street looking south File:2005 29 Jan - Atlanta Ice Storm - 75-85 South From North Ave Bridge.jpg, Downtown Connector at Williams Street looking south during the 2005 ice storm File:Downtown Connector sb Exit 244 gantry.jpg, Downtown Connector looking north at University Avenue File:Int75nInt85nRoad-Exit247-Int20ew (34317449042).jpg, Downtown Connector at its interchange with

Exit list

Exit numbers follow the mileposts along I-75.

References

External links

Near real-time traffic image of I-75/85 near Tenth St

Near real-time traffic image of I-75/85 near North Ave/Georgia Tech

Near real-time traffic image of I-75/85 near Grady Hosp

Near real-time traffic image of I-75/85 south of University Ave
{{dead link, date=February 2011
Jack Etheridge Photographs, 1961-1962 of the downtown connector
from the Atlanta History Center Roads in Atlanta Interstate 75 Interstate 85 Transportation in Fulton County, Georgia Freeways in the United States 1952 establishments in Georgia (U.S. state)