Atlanta Warms Up for Its Day in the Sun

The only thing missing is the midway.

As the construction barricades come down and the road crews start to load up their trucks, downtown Atlanta has taken on a carnival atmosphere. Air-conditioned tents have sprouted like mushrooms in every parking lot and cranny. Vendors hawk their wares from street corners. Music wafts from speakers set up in parks.

And everywhere there are people--smiling, harried, scowling, sweating, bustling, milling people. Walking outside, even.

“Almost like in a real city,” quipped one Atlanta resident, a New York native who still hasn’t gotten used to the local aversion to ambulatory locomotion.

How much like a carnival is it?

Isaac Tigret has one of the better views. The balcony outside his private quarters at the old church he has transformed into a temporary House of Blues nightclub overlooks the new Centennial Olympic Park. The other day he identified the crazy quilt of circus-like tents to a visitor.

“That big red tower is part of the Coca-Cola attraction,” he said, pointing out the 12-acre theme park the beverage company has set up. “Over there is the thing AT&T; has going. That big tent there is Budweiser. That big blue one is. . . .”

At night during the Olympics, magnified images of sports competitions will be projected onto the sides of the giant AT&T; tent, on either side of the stage where a continuing lineup of singers will perform. Every night, after the performances, Olympic medal winners will be paraded out before the cheering masses.

“It’s city-as-theme park,” is how Charles Rutheiser put it. “Downtown is halfway between a Southern county fair and Epcot.”

Rutheiser, a Georgia State University anthropology professor, has written a book called “Imagining Atlanta: The Politics and Place in the City of Dreams.” Like many locals, and more than a few visitors, he takes a cynical view of what is taking place.

“This is really a city that’s built on a lot of hype and hot air,” he said. He is doubtful that the Olympics will bring lasting change and maturity to a city that even boosters acknowledge is in its infancy, still searching for identity, still looking for its place in the world.

Civic leaders have talked for six years about how the Olympics would transform Atlanta. How lasting the changes will be remains to be seen. But for the time being, and for at least until the Games end Aug. 4, this is--for better or worse--a different place, a city transformed.

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Atlanta 1996

* Sports: American sprinter Michael Johnson, at left, is almost out-of-this-world class. He is favored to win gold in the 200 and 400. See C1

* Life & Style: The Olympics open Friday, but decisions about how U.S. athletes will dress made long ago. And it wasn’t easy. See E1

* Calendar: Atlanta’s Centennial Olympic Cauldron is a magnificent sculpture, says art critic Christopher Knight, and an imposing presence. See F1