PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE
said, “then you can spend the night in the office.” “MARTA it
is,” I replied.
Resentfully, I bundled up and headed out. I made it to the
Dunwoody Station in a few minutes, figured out how to buy a
Breeze Card, walked upstairs to the platform where I joined
many other riders, and boarded the train after less than 10
minutes waiting. My attitude improved. I gazed smugly at
the cars strewn about all over Georgia 400 and I-85 as we
zoomed smoothly to Midtown. “Why didn’t those people
just ride the train?” I thought. When I got to the Arts Center
Station, Betty called and said she could not get out of the
neighborhood. I walked home with no problems. The whole
trip took less than an hour.
Most of the rest of the folks in my firm were not so lucky. You
know the horror stories because they happened to many of
you. One spent the night in the office; one abandoned her
car after midnight and was taken in by a stranger; one slept in
her car in the Kroger parking lot; one got home at 3:00 a.m.;
and one walked home some seven miles in dress shoes with
plastic bags over his socks to keep the snow out. One other
person took MARTA, but that was only because he got stuck
in traffic for over an hour in front of the Dunwoody Station
before he thought of it.
I have two takeaways from this experience.
First, listening to my wife worked out so well that I am thinking
about doing it again.
Second, we all need to get on the transportation train. By
this I mean that we as lawyers, as leaders, and as citizens of
Atlanta need to become advocates for transportation and the
public and private investment that it requires.
The reason Atlanta is here is first and foremost because
of transportation. In 1836, a railroad engineer determined
Atlanta’s location because he thought it was the best place for
a train to stop, and “Terminus,” the first name of our city, was
born. From the beginning, people came to Atlanta because
of the railroads, and because it was a crossroads for this
region and the nation. Our tradition from the beginning was
to welcome all visitors, with one notable exception in 1864,
but even General Sherman came here much for the same
reason as everyone else. The railroads crossed here.
made airport expansion, especially for international flights, a
priority. Atlanta would not be the economic center of Georgia
and the southeast if not for the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta
International Airport.
The third advance of transp