Demolition is underway on Sparks Hall, Georgia State University’s former classroom building, which has been a fixture at the corner of Courtland and Gilmer streets in Downtown Atlanta for 65 years.
The demolition is part of GSU’s plan to create a campus quad and expand the GSU Greenway to create more connections to its various buildings and facilities. The Sparks Hall property will become a grassy expanse of amphitheater seating that will connect to Gilmer Street and the existing Hurt Park.
The expanded “Panther Quad” will close off a section of Gilmer Street to vehicle traffic to create a greenspace and an area for food trucks, cafés, and study and relaxation areas.
GSU President M. Brian Blake said that by connecting Hurt Park and the Greenway, the quad will become the heart of the campus, helping to realize what he calls a “college town Downtown.”
The campus transformation was bolstered by an $80 million gift from the Woodruff Foundation – the largest in GSU’s history and the largest that the foundation has given to any institution in the University System of Georgia.
The Atlanta Preservation Center, which has been at odds with GSU over the proposed demolition of the century-old former Georgia Power substation building on Edgewood Avenue, said the loss of Sparks Hall was not a positive move for the school or Downtown.
“The loss of Sparks Hall is supposed to be a new beginning, but it feels far more like a current want to define today rather than build upon what has made Georgia State University great,” APC Executive Director David Mitchell said. “It is depressing and affirms that the weight of knowledge is at times far too great for a small group to absorb.”
Sparks Hall was named for Dr. George Sparks, who served as GSU’s president for nearly three decades. You can read more about the history of the building here.