1. MARTA hired a team led by the Atlanta office of Perkins&Will, an international design firm, to conduct this planning process with MARTA, DeKalb County, and the community. MARTA is the landowner of the Kensington station (all the land between Mountain Drive to the north, Memorial Drive to the east, Kensington Road to the south, and Covington Highway to the west, except for the office park at Mountain Drive and Memorial Drive). After this plan, MARTA will solicit a development team to advance TOD at the station (see #4 below).
2. This plan aims to meet the vision for the Kensington station area established in the DeKalb Unified Plan, the recent comprehensive land use and transportation plan for the unincorporated parts of the county. Kensington is envisioned as a Regional Activity Center, with a focus on walkable, transit-supportive redevelopment.
3. MARTA is partnering with DeKalb County on this effort. At the end of the planning work in December 2022, MARTA will submit an application to re-zone their property to match the conceptual site plan derived from this process. Re-zoning will eliminate some administrative hurdles for the future developer, allowing them to get started sooner.
4. Once re-zoning is approved, MARTA will release a request for proposals (RFP) to attract developers to redevelop the Kensington station site. The developer will use the conceptual site plan from this process, but they will have some flexibility to make adjustments, assuming they meet MARTA and the community’s goals. Many of the small details for the site design will be worked out between MARTA and the developer as they create final plans and construction documents. It is MARTA’s intent to maintain land ownership and execute a 99-year ground lease with the future developer. If there are homeownership opportunities as part of the mix of housing options, MARTA will explore how best to accommodate the needed land transaction with the future developer. 

Parking decks and on-street parking on most internal streets will accommodate the parking for the redevelopment. In the interim, MARTA will repave many station parking lots, including Kensington.

 Payment structures for new parking decks in the redevelopment will be determined after the developer creates a financing plan and final site plan with MARTA. All conceptual site plans use existing curb cuts to create the internal streets shown. Parking deck entrances will be drafted in the conceptual site plan, but the future developer’s construction plans will determine the final entrances and exits. Conceptual plans from this process will allocate adequate space for replacement commuter and long-term parking. Curbside management plans, which will include trash pick-up and deliveries, will be designed when the developer is brought on board. 

The retail and office mix built in the future will be determined by the developer and the market. We cannot mandate that a certain type of business be built, but we can make suggestions based on what the community desires. Most of the redevelopment will be residential units. A market study has been conducted for this plan, and it indicates the potential demand for the next 5 to 8 years, with a focus on residential units (apartments and townhouses) and some small-scale retail space. We used the market study as the starting point but created a longer-term vision that increases the amount of redevelopment over time.

Concept plans will include enough long-term and commuter parking, balanced with spaces for residential and retail uses. MARTA will take a new approach to parking, which could include shared parking agreements, unbundled parking, and replacement parking based on utilization rates. Better connectivity across all modes of transportation to and from the station will reduce the number car trips needed. 

Unit counts, parking space counts, building heights, and square footage for land uses will be provided once the revised site plan is created. These will be adjusted by the future developer as they work through their financing, but this document will provide a framework. We cannot dictate exact businesses or business types, rather, we can say what may be successful here based on the market study and what the community wants. The developer will be responsible for finding specific businesses and determining the final number of residential units.

The site plan will adhere to all required zoning buffers and transitions of the new zoning district. Streets currently separate the MARTA property from adjacent neighborhoods.

Redevelopment will inherently include more green space because we are replacing parking lots with new uses and streets, which will include small green spaces, street trees, and additional landscaping. Current concepts show a town green, which would be a small publicly accessible gathering space. At this time, exact details are not designed, but it is imagined that residential buildings around it would include retail on the ground floor to activate the space. StationSoccer is a great amenity for the future TOD.  The final concept plan will recommend a permanent location for StationSoccer in the context of the redevelopment, considering multiple options: leaving it where it is, adding it to a central green space, or putting it on top of a parking deck.

The site’s stormwater management is currently handled in a deep, fenced pond on the northwest corner of the site. The current concepts explore redesigning this as a usable park. A stormwater park would provide access to greenspace and could offer education about water quality, stormwater run-off, and environmental stewardship. Imagine a much smaller scale Historic Fourth Ward Park, Rodney S. Cook Park, or Marie Sims Park (all in Atlanta) or the planned detention area for the Chamblee MARTA station, which will become part of the Chamblee Rail Trail extension.

MARTA has implemented Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED), which is a proactive crime fighting technique in which the proper design and effective use of the built environment can lead to a reduction in the fear of and incidents of crime and an improvement in quality of life. It is very important to realize CPTED principals reduce the opportunity for crime; however, crime prevention/social programs should be implemented to tackle the underlying cause of crime. These steps work in conjunction to create a safe environment to work live or play. Public safety also is considered through designing defensible spaces using good urbanism – adding “eyes on the street.” This means that active uses and residences will face streets and public spaces, rather than blank walls and parking lots. Streetscapes and public spaces would include streetlights. MARTA and the developer will collectively define the joint approach to public safety and police presence.

We will produce one document with all the analysis, public engagement summaries, final concept plan, and action plan. 3D site renderings and perspective views will be provided at the November public meeting (details forthcoming) to illustrate ideas in more detail than currently shown. MARTA will use the conceptual site plan and renderings for the re-zoning application.