clock menu more-arrow no yes mobile

Filed under:

In Midtown, Norfolk Southern’s $575M HQ is officially under construction

New, 41 comments

Top dignitaries celebrate wooing the Fortune 500 railroad company to Atlanta

A rendering of the planned hq development.
The Norfolk Southern project will comprise 750,000 square feet of office space spread across two towers.
Renderings courtesy of Norfolk Southern

Railroad giant Norfolk Southern’s $575 million Midtown headquarters officially broke ground Tuesday, as emphasized on site by some of Georgia’s most powerful names.

Scoring the Fortune 500 company from northern Virginia was a considerable win for the state and the city, stressed Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp and Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms.

“This relocation is not only a testament to Atlanta’s thriving, inclusive business community and talented workforce; it exemplifies the power of public-private sector teamwork in our city,” said Bottoms, according to a press release.

“It’s a great day in Georgia when a Fortune 500 company returns home to its Atlanta roots and breaks ground on a beautiful new headquarters building in Midtown,” said Kemp, nodding to previous incarnations of the NS brand, such as the Southern Railway Company.

Norfolk Southern’s relocation means 850 new jobs—average salary: $105,000—are bound for Atlanta, and in a place with a solid recruiting pool, Tech Square.

The new headquarters campus will be rising on a 3.4-acre parcel bordered by Midtown’s Ponce de Leon Avenue and 3rd Street. Fresh renderings lend a clearer perspective on what’s planned and how the project would relate to the street.

For the railroad company, the finished product would be a glassy, two-tower building spanning some 750,000 square feet. At least one of the towers would stand 22 stories.

Taking up most of Cousins Properties’s 1 million-square-foot development on the site, the HQ is expected to feature 13,000 square feet of retail, as well as a “food hall-style dining facility,” sprawling green spaces on rooftops and at street-level, and a 24/7 fitness center, officials have said.

Cousins will be overseeing construction of the new HQ, which officials say is slated to open its doors in mid-2021.