This morning, on my way to work I watched numerous police cars with lights blazing and sirens blaring speed past me, while I sat at an intersection. They peeled into this shopping center that’s not terribly far from my home; but while only one of the cars went into the center itself, two of the cruisers literally drove into the grassy area and my girlfriend observed cops running upon exiting their vehicles.
As I resumed driving, wondering just what the heck was going on at this location not far from my home, several more police cruisers came flying down the road, headed to the scene of the incident. My last count was seven cop cars in total that were seen heading there, and I couldn’t help but think that such necessity for police presence would had to have been something along the lines of armed robbery, hostages, or any other scenario that could only be construed as “very dangerous.”
Given the fact that such an incident was happening close to my place of residence, it goes without saying that I’m interested in knowing what it could possibly be. When I got to work, I immediately started visiting all of the websites of the local media, hoping to get some answers. WSB, FOX Atlanta, 11 Alive (NBC), CBS46 and even the oft-criticized Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Surely, one of them should have some sort of coverage of an incident that necessitated a large quantity of police presence.
Nope, nada. Not a single one of them had any mention of any sort of incident that might’ve been the one near my home. I then went to looking through every one of their Twitter accounts, and their Facebook accounts, hoping that, since it was still relatively fresh, perhaps a blurb or a mention of an incident down in South Fulton county. Nope, nothing there either.
11 Alive had plenty to say about the University of Georgia’s spring football practice. FOX really wanted their readership to be sure to tune into the season finale of Empire tonight. And every single one of them found it imperative to let all inquiring Atlantans to be aware that the Popeyes chicken on Ponce and Boulevard had suffered a small fire.
Needless to say, I had no choice but to come to the conclusion that as far as Atlanta news priorities go:
Popeyes chicken > Potentially severely dangerous criminal incident
As it stands right now, I still have no idea to what happened at the shopping center near my house. With seven cop cars at high alert, I have to assume it was something very perilous, at least involving firearms, violence and some probably very dangerous individuals. Obviously, I hope that there were no innocent casualties, harmed officers or any other costly collateral damage.
But I still have no clue to what happened. Although it’s safe to assume that it’s probably something else to associate negatively to my part of town, and one more reason to why my property value is beneath 50 tons of crap, and why I’ll never get my head above water as far as it’s concerned.
Because Atlanta prioritizes the reporting of minor fires at Popeyes over what could be lethal situations.
Because, of what the title of this post clearly states, Atlanta doesn’t give a shit about the south end of the city. Everything south of Interstate 20, simply doesn’t matter. If not for the existence of the airport in College Park, I-20 would be the de facto unofficial border of Atlanta.
The frustration that I feel, and I certainly hope I’m not the only one, isn’t solely because of this one incident. However, this one incident did serve to further justify my beliefs that the city doesn’t care about its south end, because of just how blatantly they ignored what was probably a very serious situation where lives could have and might have, been in danger.
But seriously, the city of Atlanta doesn’t give a flying fuck about the south side of the city. The city would probably be happier if the south end didn’t exist. It’s not like they already don’t act like the south side doesn’t exist, because they totally do. Traffic reports on the news and radio only focus on regions of the metro area that are north of I-20, regardless of the fact that northbound traffic coming from the south side into the city is consistently the worst on a daily basis. News outlets will cover stories from Duluth, Lake Lanier all the way to Floyd County, before they’ll even mention anything south of I-20, unless it’s a positive story in which the Atlanta name can be slapped onto to usurp any form of good credit from.
The sad thing is that there’s nothing that will ever happen on the south end of the city that is ever going to change this. Sometimes, when thoughts like this swirl through my head, I get a grandiose time that I should take it upon myself to become somewhat of an ambassador for the south side of Atlanta, and try to put this place on the map. But then I remember the truth of the matter, which is simply the fact that I don’t really even like where I live anymore. And that’s sad.
I love my house itself, but I’m frankly over the neighborhood I live in, the county it resides in, and the region of the city in which it exists. Living in the south end of the city is shitty, and it’s clearly a mistake that I clearly acknowledge and understand, and would implore anyone to not make the same one.
Land values are low on account of unfortunate things that occur here, the city is racist and says everything possible without simply stating they don’t care about (the predominant) black population, and none of it is more obvious than the actions, or lack of, as it pertains towards any modicum of effort towards any part of the city south of I-20.
I get tired of living in an area that is the butt of jokes, judged solely on zip code or town name, if anyone even knows where it is in the first place, and is so often unfairly lumped into the more affluent parts of town that knows what success tastes like. This is not a situation where I feel the need to take it upon myself to try and change things, because frankly, I don’t want to be here any longer than I need to be.
I don’t necessarily blame the city for its blatant and obvious ambivalence towards the south side of town, but I do think it would go a tremendous way if the city made even the smallest effort to show a little bit of, not even love, but acknowledgment to its existence. I’m not saying Forest Park could become the next Sandy Springs, or Newnan could become the next Alpharetta, but in sheer terms of available land for expansion, the south side of Atlanta is a potential wealth of space begging to be tapped, if only the city and its people could overcome perception and fear and take the plunge.
But I’m not going to hold my breath on this happening. I really don’t like it when I feel the words swirling in my head, but god damn, there are quite a few times where I really fucking hate this city.
