For the City of Alpharetta, 2019 was another extraordinary year. As our nation’s economy grows, the State of Georgia continues to provide an outstanding business climate, and unemployment levels remain at historic lows. Alpharetta has also grown and evolved in ways we could have only imagined just a few years ago.
Downtown Alpharetta offers an exciting place for our community to come together. An area many people once considered a ghost town in the evening has become a place filled with people, music, and laughter. Nearly every week, new restaurants and shops open, and now that the second parking deck has been completed on the west side of downtown, there is plenty of room for people who want to join in the fun.
In 2020, we are excited about the opening of the new Innovation Academy High School in the heart of downtown (where Milton High School once stood), which will provide unique opportunities for Fulton County students to focus on the fields of study that interest them. And just around the corner, the new hotel being built on Milton Avenue promises to bring even more tourists and activity to our vibrant city.
Also, North Point Mall will begin creating Alpharetta’s next great place to live, shop, work, and play during 2020. Adapting to the “age of online,” the vast sea of asphalt where Sears used to be will be broken up for green and play spaces in a unique environment designed to attract shoppers, diners, and people from all over the region.
Of course, Alpharetta’s evolution reminds us that redevelopment of our City roads, parks, walking trails, and infrastructure is critical to not only support our growth and advancement but to also preserve the balance that made our community so desirable in the first place. For such reasons, we look forward to completing the first section of the Alpha Loop this year, which will connect downtown Alpharetta to Avalon, following along the creek bed that runs parallel to Thompson Street.
Once completed, the City already has plans to continue the Alpha Loop through green spaces along Haynes Bridge Road, and we are currently exploring ways to cross over Georgia 400 to connect to the Big Creek Greenway, which the City anticipates extending all the way to Forsyth County in the near future.
Lastly, Alpharetta’s first community center on the east side of Georgia 400 will open. The facility will be housed within the Ed Isakson/Alpharetta Family YMCA building, conveniently located off North Point Parkway along the Greenway.
So, while 2019 was an exceptional year for Alpharetta, we expect 2020 to be even better. Thank you for your tremendous support of our community. May you and yours have a wonderful new year.
to your business!