The City of Woodstock has recently begun its pedestrian plaza project downtown on Elm Street, and officials are calling it transformational.

A recent study by the real estate brokerage Redfin showed it may soon be more expensive to live outside the Atlanta Perimeter than within it.

Cities including Alpharetta, Roswell, and Woodstock are experiencing significant growth — and with that growth comes new projects.

As more people move to Woodstock, the city is adapting to the demands of a growing downtown.

"This city has a really extraordinary, for a city its size, notion about making things more convenient and that sort of thing," said Woodstock resident Walter Forehand.

Elm Street in the city's downtown was closed to traffic at the beginning of March.

People like Forehand and Ruth O'Donnell are already using the closed street as a pedestrian crossing.

"The more pedestrian-friendly it is downtown, I think it's easier to get around, and brings business in, although it's pretty busy here," O'Donnell said.

Woodstock Deputy City Manager Coty Thigpen said Elm Street will be transformed.

"Just imagine, we'll have the pedestrian crossing feeding right into the plaza, pavers, seating areas, lights, art, all sorts of things to activate this space so it's a place people that people want to gather," Thigpen said.

She said the project had been floating around for a while until recent grant funding sped up the timeline.

"We are not only wanting to improve pedestrian safety of this actual crosswalk, but the pedestrian plaza project, which is phase two. We wanted to allow, kind of start over again and allow another opportunity for public input to allow for citizens to help us imagine and think through what this plaza could be," Thigpen said.

The U.S. Census Bureau estimates Woodstock's population has grown from a little over 35,000 people in 2020 to just over 39,000 people as of July 2024. That's an increase of 12.2%.

"All the different pockets of the city are growing, and, especially here in downtown, we see growth on either side of the train tracks," Thigpen said. "So another really important part of this project is that we just finished our parking deck across the street, which allows for over 600 people to park for free, and this pedestrian plaza will give them a gateway right from the parking deck to the other side of downtown."

Lauren Yeomans owns Gather and Bloom, which is just up the street from the planned Elm Street Pedestrian Plaza. She is excited for the project to be completed.

"I think it's a great idea as far as safety because there's so much foot traffic that happens down there, and then just excitement," Yeomans said. "I think anytime we can have even just like — I have children, I have dogs, we're down here all the time. So having places to congregate and hang out in a safe way in downtown Woodstock is just amazing."

The city said once phase one of the project is complete, it will move into the design phase with input from the public.