Saturday, December 16, 2017

The movers & shakers of Dunwoody break ground for a new Austin Elementary School.

Dunwoody Moms (the true movers & shakers in this community) break ground at new Austin Elementary School with Principal Ann Culbreath.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VOlhMdeqZTw


New school for Austin Elementary with little disruption for construction.
  • New Austin Elementary School will be constructed on space currently used by Dunwoody Senior Baseball.
  • The design of the school is the current "DeKalb Standard design" built is several other locations whereby the capacity of the school will be 900 students.
  • The South entrance (currently DSB) will be for buses only and will facilitate easy drop off, that same bus lane will continue to the back where school field trip buses can drop children at the Dunwoody Nature Center and then have an easy turn around.
  • The North entrance (currently DNC) will be the main entrance to the school and it will be shared by Dunwoody Nature Center as they have different peak times.  Vehicle stacking space of this main driveway should facilitate taking cars off Roberts for drop off.
  • The parking at the Nature Center is improved and there will now be parking for special events at that facility.
  • Transportation improvements may be needed on Roberts due to change (traffic light configuration changes?)
  • Buffering between new Austin and street to South will be assured (as was done in the construction of DES).
Thanks,

John

4 comments:

Rose Gorham said...

I hope it isn't the 'typical Dekalb design'. This would mean it is being built too small. Like at Dunwoody Elementary. More trailers appear every year because of the growing population. It would also mean that the facilities would not be big enough i.e. the gym and the cafeteria.

When will Dekalb learn to make these new schools bigger so they can handle the growing population?

Jay said...

John,
what is the purpose of the Dunwoody government building on N. Shallowford? I'm pretty sure I know which building this is (the one with the glass blocks), but have never figured out what it will be used for.

Just south of the building is a grey block building (owned by Jehovah's?) that has had an erosion fence for over a year. Is there some kind of limitation on how long it can have an ugly erosion fence?

John Heneghan said...

Rose, the capacity of the new school will be 900 - much larger than the current Austin Elementary.

Jay, the City purchased the building and attached five acres of trees in order to extend Peachford Rd across Shallowford to connect through to Dunwoody Park. This extended East / West connection could relieve traffic if the single story office park in that area was ever redeveloped. The building has been leased most of the time we owned it but now it will house public meeting rooms and public open space on the first floor for City activities like possibly karate, music, art - ect. The second floor will house police storage of large items (bikes, tools and other items recovered), training spaces and it will also have a secured parking lot for police recovered vehicles. I hope that helps.

I will ask about the fence?

Jay said...

Thanks, John. I had seen something about that E-W connector, I'm kind of skeptical it would relieve much of anything--although if the offices are redeveloped, I suppose a certain percentage of cars would go 'straight' into the office park.

The Jehovah building is kind of an eyesore. I've never figured out what their plan is for that building. Only once or twice have I seen any cars there.