Bowen Choice Neighborhood

Help Us Plan the Reimagined Community

Atlanta Housing (“AH”) is working with the community to write a plan for the former Bowen site, the adjacent Carey Park neighborhood, and a portion of the Donald Lee Hollowell business corridor that is focused on housing, people, and stronger neighborhoods. As this this work is being made possible with the support of a Choice Neighborhoods Planning Grant from the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development, we are referring to these places collectively as the Bowen Choice Neighborhood area during this planning process.

Whether it’s affordable housing, transportation, jobs, small business resources, programs for youth, more parks, or something else, we want to know what matters most and what makes your community what it is! Your participation and vision for housing, people, and the neighborhood will help us write a Transformation Plan that supports resident and stakeholder priorities, builds on our shared strengths, and addresses community needs. The goal is to build a vibrant community that connects with and complements the existing neighborhood and local businesses along Donald Lee Hollowell Parkway.

This website is a platform for you to share with us and for us to provide information with you. We will be updating this site with the latest news, and a series of activities like an interactive asset map that can be found below. What you share through these tools, will help inform and serve as, the foundation for the plan.

SCROLL DOWN for the latest news. We hope to hear from you soon!

Help Us Plan the Reimagined Community

SCROLL DOWN for the latest news. We hope to hear from you soon!

Storytelling & Memory of Place

Bowen Homes Resident Storytelling Project

How to Participate in this Forum

If you are a former Bowen Homes resident, please share a special story with us! These could include historical or important events, places you would spend time with friends and family, stories about notable individuals who lived in Bowen Homes, and anything else you remember about the community! Some example questions you could answer are:

What would you say was a strength of Bowen Homes?
Is there something about Bowen Homes you would like to see the future development celebrate or preserve?
Are there any facts about Bowen Homes you would like to share, or misconceptions you would like corrected?
What was it like at Bowen Homes when you lived there?

Oral Storytelling

Do you prefer to talk with someone about your experiences? We will be running an oral storytelling project in Spring 2022. Please email us at bowenchoiceneighborhood@atlantahousing.org to sign-up.

You can also attend our in-person January Community Workshop to sign-up! We will contact you with some scheduling options then record our conversations by video, to assemble a Bowen Homes Storytelling collection.

What We've Heard So Far

At our October Return to Community event, we spoke with many former residents who told us about their experiences at Bowen Homes. Some frequent themes, shown in the map below, were:

Chivers Street is where people gathered the most often, with Walden Street being the secondary location for gathering.
The street names are really important to keep in the future redevelopment.
The building orientation with the courtyards made gathering with neighbors easy.
The 1980 daycare explosion is important to honor and memorialized in the redevelopment.
Residents loved the firefighters at Fire Station #38.