by Arielle Robinson

Monday evening, the Smyrna City Council voted unanimously to remove from the plans the parking deck that was to be built along Atlanta Road as part of its project to redesign downtown. A surface lot is instead planned.

The change is due to financial and city-related project considerations.

Mayor Derek Norton said that the city revisited the parking deck project at its retreat last month. Norton said the line item at the time the project was approved in June 2021 was $3.6 million.

“Now, the cost since then has over doubled,” Norton said. “So we would have been looking at $40,000 plus per [parking] space, and we don’t think that’s a good use of taxpayer dollars. We don’t think you’ll think that’s a good use of taxpayer dollars either.”

Norton said that now, the city will knock down the records building in between Smyrna Second Baptist Church on Atlanta Road and the police station there. An approximately 50 to 60-space surface lot is planned to be there, but the design is not yet finished. 

At a meeting in October 2022, the council voted for the former parking deck to be funded through SPLOST 2022 and to have 198 spaces. It was to be in the surface lot between the community center and police station. This was a change from the original concept design, which was to have 250 spaces spread among a three-story deck.

The new parking lot voted on Monday will still be funded through SPLOST 2022, but now some of the money that was for the deck will go to different SPLOST projects.

“The other consideration is that we have nine acres with [the Smyrna] First Baptist Church property and there may be a better location for a parking structure there so that’ll be determined later,” Norton said.

Arielle Robinson is a student at Kennesaw State University. She also freelances for the Atlanta-Journal Constitution and is the former president of KSU’s chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists as well as a former CNN intern. She enjoys music, reading, and live shows.