Construction has begun for a Publix grocery store for residents in Atlanta’s Summerhill neighborhood.

Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms and City Councilwoman Carla Smith joined real estate leaders from the Carter firm Thursday for a ceremony at 572 Hank Aaron Drive, where the store will be built across from the 565 Hank apartments.

Publix is opening the 50,000-square-foot store in an 80-acre redevelopment project spearheaded by Carter in partnership with K. King & Company and Healey Weatherholtz Properties.

Georgia State University in 2017 made a $30 million purchase of the city’s former Olympic stadium, also formerly known as Turner Field, that included the surrounding parking lots where the redevelopment is taking place. Bottoms — who served as executive director of the Atlanta Fulton County Recreation Authority that managed Turner Field’s sale — said the development is bringing “much needed amenities” to the community.

“The community has been waiting on a grocery store, not just for years, but for decades, to come back into this community,” Bottoms said.

Suzanne Mitchell, former president of the Organized Neighbors of Summerhill, said Summerhill fell victim to “blight, crime and neglect,” over time. But she said things are improving in the community.

“Today Summerhill is no longer an FDA food desert,” Mitchell said. “We are making good on old promises and rising, like the Phoenix.”

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By Wilborn P. Nobles III for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

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For Leasing Information, visit summerhillstation.com.