“With the success of the Five Points station, one of the greatest challenges has been getting kids down there on weekdays,” he said. Station Soccer’s West End program, which began September 8, is the second of its kind in Atlanta, following the success of the Five Points pitch, which was built on an unused and unsightly section of the station.īut on this side of town, the scene is already more active than its downtown counterpart, according to Fernando Guerena, the Station Soccer operations manager. “He’s playing with his usual team,” West said. Sitting next to Jones, Mechanicsville resident Jessyca West watched her 8-year-old son, Joshua, practice with his pals. Jones’s son will be 10 years old next month, and were it not for the new Station Soccer location, “He’d be at home, doing nothing,” she said. “I was very surprised about it, but I think it’s a wonderful thing they’re doing for the kids,” Jones told Curbed Atlanta. The idea, after all, isn’t exactly mainstream the West End project’s predecessor, which opened at MARTA’s Five Points Station in 2016, was heralded as the world’s first soccer facility in a transit station. Some West End parents, such as Kimberly Jones, were pleasantly surprised to see brand-new AstroTurf fields built alongside the local transit hub. Such is the scene at the West End MARTA Station on a weekday afternoon, where Atlanta’s Soccer in the Streets organization, the Atlanta United Foundation, and the city’s planning department recently opened the newest “Station Soccer” play fields.
Children playing soccer stop and look up to wave at the MARTA trains whirring by overhead.Ī miscalculated kick sends a soccer ball soaring right at a small crowd of parents, some of whom jump as the ball hits the net separating the bleachers from the pitch.Ī young boy, donning shin guards and cleats, jokes to his dad that he’s caught in the protective netting as he makes his way to the field to join friends.
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