Braves Opening Day: Traffic Nightmare Won’t Happen, Cobb Officials Say

ATLANTA, GA — Imagine making your way to Ground Zero of the very worst part of the notorious metro Atlanta traffic, where busy Interstates 75 and 285 converge. Then imagine adding thousands of more cars to the mix during a maddening evening rush hour.

That’s the nightmare scenario some fear as Opening Day nears and the Atlanta Braves kick off the 2017 season at their new Sun Trust Park next month. The issue of traffic has been a contentious one since the Major League Baseball team announced in 2013 that it planned to uproot from its previous home at Turner Field in downtown Atlanta for the more preferred amenities of Cobb County’s Cumberland area.

But David Connell, the president and CEO of the Cobb County Chamber of Commerce, sounded confident that he and other local officials have developed a cohesive plan to deal with the traffic challenges that lie ahead in a densely populated area that lacks mass transit connections.

“It’s my belief that we are not going to see anything like the disasters some people are predicting,” Connell said. “We are in really good shape.”

His assurance will soon be put to the test as Sun Trust Park will hold its first exhibition game on March 31 when the Braves host the New York Yankees, although attendance for that contest figures to be considerably lower than any regular season game. Atlanta opens up the regular season with a two-week road swing, meaning that the anticipation for the April 14 home opener against the San Diego Padres might be even greater than usual. Sun Trust Park can seat a maximum of 41,000 fans, according to the Braves website.

But the Cobb County Police Department and Cobb County Department of Transportation and their partners have come up with a Traffic Management Plan (TMP) they believe will help avoid the horrendous gridlock foreseen by pessimists.

Chief among the provisions are the 14 major points of access to Sun Trust Park that offer entry to the stadium from all directions. There will also be an exit off I-285 into the Battery Atlanta area that features numerous shopping, dining, entertainment and living areas in addition to Sun Trust Park.

Traffic signals in the area will be coordinated, while Cobb County Police will oversee 30 intersections around the ballpark to ensure the smooth flow of vehicles. A Braves shuttle will also be available to move fans to and from the stadium, while a much-debated pedestrian walkway will be available for fans coming from the Galleria side of I-285, Connell said.

The idea behind the plan was to minimize the impact of traffic on daily commuters.

“We have already analyzed and forecasted traffic flow through every corridor entering our development,” Braves President of Development Mike Plant told local TV station 11alive.com last month.

“While we know this plan will continue to evolve, we couldn’t be more pleased with where we are at this time.”

The Braves’ partnership with Uber and the Waze navigation app should also help mitigate traffic and potentially reduce the number of cars on the road. Additionally, Connell noted that the majority of Braves season ticket holders live north of downtown Atlanta, meaning fewer of them would likely need to take the interstates to the stadium.

Those who do drive to the stadium will have 11,000 parking spaces from which to choose from around the Battery Atlanta area, some 9,000 of which are exclusively dedicated to game day parking. Cobb County has also set up a permitting process for owners who wish to host parking in their lots.

Cobb County Transportation Director Jim Wilgus said he likes what he’s seen so far as Opening Day inches closer. He emphasized that all parties involved are standing by to make adjustments as needed.

“It’s been a lot of moving parts and we still have a lot of things in motion,” he said this week, “but we think we have a sound plan right now. I’m very confident.”

But not everybody is quite as sold just yet.

Sandy Springs Mayor Rusty Paul said that he remains “cautiously optimistic” that things will work out favorably.

“We’ve done everything we can,” he said. “We’ve been operating on theory up to this point. In a couple of weeks, theory meets practice.”

Paul’s chief concern has always been that the main arteries into the stadium will be jammed, sending additional traffic careening through Sandy Springs neighborhoods. The Braves’ partnership with Waze has only heightened those concerns, although the team is not officially directing drivers to such routes.

Paul expressed some disappointment with the fact that Sandy Springs “had a seat at the table, but not a lot of decision-making abilities” in the initial talks about local infrastructure upgrades needed.

Now it’s just a matter of waiting as everybody gets better acclimated to their new surroundings over the the first few weeks of the season and making adjustments on the fly.

Connell didn’t sound all that concerned.

“This isn’t going to be like a lot of people expected it to be,” he said. “There are a lot of smart people working on this.”

»Image via Patch file photo