Community members gathered at the Agape Youth and Family Center on Saturday morning March 7 to imagine the future of the former Chattahoochee Brick Company site in northwest Atlanta. The land on the east bank of the Chattahoochee River has sat vacant since 2011, when the last of the Chattahoochee Brick Co.’s buildings were demolished. Now the community is deciding how best to use it.

In the lobby of the Agape Youth & Family Center, easels displayed renderings of the proposed Chattahoochee Brick Company Memorial and Park, maps of the potential Atlanta Riverlands Trail alignment and historical context of the site.

While the future of the proximate Chattahoochee Brick Company land seemed bright on the sunny morning of the community meeting, the site’s past is notoriously dark. Doug Blackmon’s book “Slavery by Another Name,” published in 2008, uncovers the history behind the bricks manufactured by Chattahoochee Brick Co. and used to pave much of the city: years of prison labor forced upon Black men, sometimes causing their deaths.

Norfolk Southern leased the property from Lincoln Energy Solutions in 2020, planning to build a rail transfer facility. The development was met with protests and vehement community opposition, which eventually resulted in Norfolk Southern abandoning the project. 

After about a year of negotiations, the City of Atlanta purchased the land from Lincoln Terminal in 2022. 

Doug Young, director of the City of Atlanta’s Office of Design, introduced the project to the audience and read a vision statement: “The Chattahoochee Brick Company Memorial and Park, along with the Atlanta Riverlands Trail, will reflect on the past, restore the land and reconnect communities to the Chattahoochee River.”

Garry Long, an active Atlanta resident and a member of the City’s Stakeholder Advisory Committee, explained that the committee was created to ensure that the project reflects the priorities and lived experience of the community.

The gathering on March 7 was the second in a series of community meetings that began on Nov. 8 to include the community in the design of the space.

Lesley Grady, a principal at Chrysalis Lab, said the firm is working to center community-driven design to foster ownership and stewardship of the land, perform respectful investigations and transparent communication about archaeology methods and findings, protect natural and community assets and honor the site’s history. 

Toole Design led the group in a generative activity to help explore potential trail alignments. “Map Your Own Riverlands” asked participants to draw trails on a map of the site and imagine where the trails could connect to existing parks and neighborhoods. The maps were collected at the end of the exercise to inform the final design.

Mass Design Group Principal Jha Amazi said public memory can be embedded in the built environment to inscribe history into the space. She calls this “spacializing memory.”

“Public memory can actually be a force for healing,” Amazi said. 

She led the group in an activity designed to collect feedback on how the community wants to experience the site. Each participant was given an image bank: a brown envelope filled with images of things you might be able to see, do and feel at the future memorial and park. Participants were instructed to glue the images onto a worksheet and reflect on their own hopes for the space.

The next community meeting about the Chattahoochee Brick Co. Site and Atlanta Riverlands will take place on Saturday, April 25, with time and location still to be determined. At the April meeting, participants will be able to share their own oral histories and information about the site.

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