REYNOLDSTOWN — Last year's closure of Tech High School at 1043 Memorial Drive SE added yet another vacant Atlanta Public School building to the city's list of empty properties. APS had already closed several schools last year following the redistricting drama that gripped the district last year, including Cook Elementary in Capitol Gateway and East Lake Elementary. APS officials have explored alternative uses for Cook and East Lake Elementary is the temporary home of Coan Middle School students. Tech's closure wasn't redistricting-related, but school officials said it APS' funding formula for…

It's a head scratcher. The structure at 30 Moreland Ave. SE at the intersection of Wylie St. SE, just can't stay in business. It had been a Church's Chicken fast food outlet for a while before closing down. Then it became Goodfellas, a pizza, pasta and wings place. But that was short-lived, too. It's curious that a quick service restaurant couldn't make a go of it when Moreland is a highly trafficked state road and Wylie is fairly busy, as well. What's more, that intersection is sandwiched between two bustling neighborhoods, Edgewood and Reynoldstown. It seems, then, that it should do well as…

For years, some of my longtime neighbors have lamented the peach-coral colored buildings at 606 Flat Shoals Ave. off Newton Avenue in East Atlanta. Home to what had been Paradise Living, an assisted care group home, its residents were somewhat of a problem for the neighborhood. Some of the inconveniences were minor; there was the one resident who would go to the Village go to restaurants, order breakfast or lunch, only to have no money to pay for what she ordered. Others were more serious. In January of 2008, my disabled neighbor shot one of the residents of that facility when that man, who …

With its LED sign flashing daily specials, Buffalo China has been a Moreland Avenue landmark for years. It's outer, gritty appearance notwithstanding, the Chinese restaurant in Ormewood Park, has quite a loyal following. And as the Southeast Atlanta neighborhoods it serves have changed, so, too, is Buffalo China. The restaurant will soon be moving into new digs a couple blocks north on Moreland, near the McDonald's. That will leave its old location empty. That southwestern corner of Moreland and Glenwood avenues is ripe for redevelopment. The graffiti-laden 525 Moreland Ave., site of the old …

On a recent trip through the Kirkwood neighborhood, I pulled off onto Rogers Street and headed toward DeKalb Avenue. For the 12 years I've lived in Atlanta I've always heard and read stories about the Pullman Yard, once part of a thriving enterprise that fell into bankruptcy and now is state-owned. The 100-year-old, 28-acre swath of real estate always seemed to be under "the next big thing" status. After all, Atlanta spent the final years of the 20th century and much of the first decade in the 21st under bevy of construction crane, redevelopment and renaissance. A lot of those efforts helped …

Inman Park is known for its well-kept homes, protection of its architectural history and attention to streetscapes and development. But then there's this building at the southeast corner of Edgewood Avenue and Krog Street. This graffiti-covered building seems to get more tags weekly and stands out because it's so out of character. How should it be redeveloped? What's your vision for this vacancy?

The property at 1078 Moreland Ave. is quite tricky. SpaceMax Storage wanted to build 90,000 square feet of self-storage at the site, which is just north of the East Confederate Avenue. But a portion of the land, which remains vacant, falls within the city limits of Atlanta. The vast majority of the property is in unincorporated DeKalb. SpaceMax Storage, which has outlets in Virginia-Highland and Midtown, needed to get approval from DeKalb County on the proposal in addition to going through the approvals process for the city of Atlanta. But the company nixed its plans for the site. What's more…

The Edgewood Avenue corridor of the Old Fourth Ward has seen quite a resurgence in the last few years. On any given weeknight and on the weekends, college kids, hipsters and old-timers are out and about, sampling the food, drink and ambiance of the many restaurants that have opened up and built a good following of fans. There's the Thumbs Up Diner, Sister Louisa's Church of the Living Room and Ping Pong Emporium, Cafe Circa, Edgewater Corner Tavern, Miso Izakaya and Space 2 at Sound Table, just to name a few. There's also some new ones slated to open like Ammazza which is making its home in …

East Atlanta's old Fire Station No. 13 at 447 Flat Shoals Ave. served the community well for decades. But as anyone who has lived in EAV for any length of time, that old, one story, 6,227-square-foot building is long passed its prime. Bits of tarp cover parts of its leaky roof and its walls have been marked by graffiti. The firefighters of No. 13 left that building for a new, two-story home at 431 Flat Shoals about two years ago. The old building, built in 1955 and still owned by the city, remains in shabby shape, empty save for the occasional rats that you can spy scurrying about the …

For years, I've driven by the old Lizzie Chapel Baptist Church and its starch white columns fronting an imposing brick building in Inman Park. For longer than I can remember, the church, located at the corner of Euclid Avenue and Druid Circle, has been for sale. It had me wondering: Who'd be in the market to buy a church and would the buyer have to use it as a church? After all, it's not unheard of to repurpose a church into something else. I've been to a few Protestant and Catholic churches in the Northeast and in France that had been converted into restaurants. And during my days at …

The lot at 2201 Glenwood Ave. near the East Lake Publix shopping center had been the former home of a Goodwill Industries thrift store. Opened in 1972, the site was the first that Goodwill Industries of Atlanta built from the ground up. Besides the store, the facility also included a career center and a donation center. But the Goodwill shut down the sprawling facilty a few years ago. Subsequent to the closure, the building came down. The parking lot still gets use, particulary when there are events at the East Lake Golf Club that require overflow parking. Otherwise, it remains a vacant site…

The northwest corner of Moreland and Ormewood avenues is a little rough around the edges. Home to the Jiffy Grocery, a convenience store that some Ormewood Park residents say is an eyesore, that corner is long overdue for a makeover. Last year, QuikTrip Corp. caused a ruckus when the gas giant tried to put a gas station and convenience store there, to replace the grocery store and the Liberty Tax Service business that sits directly behind it. Though some residents favored the project, Ormewood Park and East Atlanta opposed it and successfully blocked it from getting the final go-ahead from …

By some accounts, it was a given that East Lake Elementary would close in the massive rezoning of Atlanta Public Schools. What East Lake residents feared most is if their neighborhood school were to close, that it wouldn't become a decaying shell of its former self and magnet for crime. On Tuesday, the APS Board of Education voted on a final plan that closes seven schools, including East Lake Elementary. The plan, which will be implemented at the start of 2012-13 academic year, calls for East Lake students to attend Toomer Elementary in neighboring Kirkwood. The East Lake campus itself will …

When it comes to an everyday breakfast place, the EAV can't seem to hang on to a neighborhood favorite. Candler Park has the Flying Biscuit Café; Reynoldstowm has Home Grown; Kirkwood has Le Petit Marché, and Grant Park has Ria's Bluebird. But here in East Atlanta, we haven't been as lucky. First, there was the Good News Café — where My Sister's Room is now. But the couldn't-be-bothered attitude of a mostly surly wait staff, coupled with ho-hum food wasn't a winning recipe for success. So it closed. Then there was Honey's Kitchen in the storefront on the southwestern corner of Flat Shoals and…

The former East Atlanta Icehouse holds a special place for me in terms of special connections. The old music venue at 543 Flat Shoals Ave. — better known to longtime Atlantans as the former Echo Lounge — is the reason I discovered East Atlanta. It sparked my interest in the neighborhood that had a Brooklyn hipster vibe and eventually led me to buying a home in the EAV. My first foray to EAV was with some friends who were really into the Empire State, a band from Athens. I didn't care for Empire State but I really liked the Echo Lounge and neighborhood I've called home for nearly 11 years. In …

When I moved to East Atlanta in 2001, one of the buildings that caught my eye and imagination was the old Madison Theatre at 496 Flat Shoals Ave. With hints of Moorish touches in its architecture and stark white paint, it stands out among the rest of the buildings on Flat Shoals. The Madison, which opened in the 1920s, has been closed for decades now. And though occasionally I hear whispers of it reopening, nothing ever comes to pass. The Madison's most recent use, sadly, was its auditorium, which served as a storage facility for mattresses. Fortunately, I had the pleasure of a sit down with …

Once a week, we'll highlight one property and ask Patch readers their thoughts on what should go there or how the property should be redeveloped. This week's entry is the old John B. Gordon School at 1205 Metropolitan Ave. SE, between Flat Shoals and Moreland avenues. The school operated from 1909 until 1995, when Atlanta Public Schools closed it. The now-defunct Inman Park Properties owned the 41,000-square-foot property with plans for redevelopment that never came to fruition. In the meantime, the building has fallen into a state of neglect. So what would you like to see go there? Should it…