Moved & Made in the Logistical Fix of Clayton County
Denson, Lynesia
Citations
Abstract
Clayton County is Georgia’s third smallest, but sixth’s most populated county, home to about 300,000 residents. Clayton is also the most Black of Metro Atlanta counties at 70 percent, and one of the poorest, with roughly 16 percent of its population living below the poverty line. But the county has recently experienced an “economic renaissance,” particularly in the logistics sector, where the total number of warehousing establishments more than doubled from 23 in 2020 to 48 in 2023, leading to increased traffic and air pollution. Apart from a 2023 moratorium established in Commission District 1, industrial development continues with little environmental redress for the industry-adjacent communities near Fort Gillem. While historically underdeveloped, this paper examines the causes and implications of the county’s decision to prioritize logistics as the primary means of economic development, as captured by the slogan “Moved and Made” in Clayton, where we observe a racial-spatial-logistical fix.
