Atlanta is making way for new public housing

ATLANTA — In 1936, Atlanta built Techwood Homes, the nation’s first housing project. By the 1990s, a greater percentage of the city’s residents were living in housing projects — sprawling red-brick barracks that pockmarked the skyline — than in any other city in America.

Now, Atlanta is nearing a very different record: becoming the first major city to knock them all down. By next June, officials here plan to demolish the city’s last remaining housing project, fulfilling a long and divisive campaign to reduce poverty by decentralizing it.