DeKalb County has greenlit a $53.3 million private redevelopment of the abandoned Presidential Hotel into 282 market-rate apartments, ending years of highly visible blight beside one of Atlanta’s busiest highway junctions.
County officials issued a land disturbance permit for the adaptive reuse of the 14-story cylindrical tower that has stood empty for more than a decade near the interchange of Interstates 85 and 285, known as Spaghetti Junction.
Reporting on the project describes a roughly seven-acre site with about 150,000 square feet of space. Aramar Investments plans to gut and fully renovate the reinforced-concrete structure into market-rate residences rather than leave another vacant landmark decaying in plain view of hundreds of thousands of drivers.
The unit mix is concrete: 76 studios, 150 one-bedroom apartments, 52 two-bedroom homes, and four penthouses. Two-bedroom units are slated around $1,800 a month. No firm date has been announced for when tenants could move in.
The tower went up in 1973 as the Presidential Hotel. It shut in 1987 after only 14 years of hotel operations.
It later reopened under the Ramada Perimeter Northeast name. A nightclub once operated on the ground floor. The property passed through several owners. Proposals for office and residential uses never stuck.
County officials say construction of the nearby I-285 interchange created access problems and helped push the site into decline. For more than a decade the empty tower has been an unavoidable eyesore for motorists. FOX 5 Atlanta has cited estimates that more than 426,700 vehicles pass the site each day.
Much of the interior has already been stripped back ahead of the full renovation. The concrete shell remains. Private capital is now set to finish the job government process alone never completed.
DeKalb County CEO Lorraine Cochran-Johnson framed the permit as more than paperwork.
"This permit represents meaningful progress toward transforming one of DeKalb County’s most visible vacant properties into a productive residential community,"
She drew a sharp line between investor math and what residents actually see every day.
"For a developer, it may just be an investment, but for DeKalb County and for our residents, it is an eyesore."
District 1 Commissioner Robert Patrick said he spent six years working toward a solution for the site.
"What was once a significant eyesore at the gateway to DeKalb County along I-85 and I-285 north is ready for a new chapter,"
That is the right standard. Empty towers do not house workers, create stable tax activity, or improve the look of a major gateway. Productive private reuse does.
Nearby residents who spoke with FOX 5 Atlanta welcomed the plan instead of mourning the old hotel.
Matt Hunter put it plainly.
"I think it’s great. I mean, I’d hate to see that building go to waste."
Landon Hollingshead pointed to both the structure and the upside for the area.
"It’s a beautiful building, and I feel like it’s gonna be really good improvement for the area."
He added that the project should “open up a lot of opportunities, move a lot of good people in.” Those are the people who live with the consequences of long-term vacancy, not the ones who treated the site as a permanent backdrop.
The plan is market-rate housing on a high-visibility corridor, financed as a $53.3 million private adaptive-reuse project. It is not a call for endless public subsidy to warehouse an empty shell.
DeKalb County’s role here was to issue the land disturbance permit and stop treating the tower as a permanent fixture of decline. Aramar Investments is putting capital into a full interior renovation of a building that has already been gutted down to its concrete structure.
Spaghetti Junction is one of the region’s most traveled choke points. Leaving a 14-story dead hotel beside it for years sent a clear message about neglect. Converting it into 282 apartments, studios through penthouses, sends a different one: put the land back to work.
Officials have not published a firm move-in schedule. The unit count, rent target for two-bedrooms, and project cost are on the record. The eyesore label came from the county’s own leaders. Residents on the ground are ready for the change.
Blight beside a major interchange is not a planning theory. It is a daily fact for the drivers and neighbors who had to look at it. Private redevelopment that turns a long-dead hotel into market-rate homes is the common-sense fix.