(updated 7/29/10)
There are few times a year when college football takes center stage at the Georgia Dome in downtown Atlanta, GA. When you’re tailgating for Georgia Dome games you have to make a choice. Do you wanna have a traditional vehicle based tailgate or do you wanna try your hand at the urban tailgate?
Urban Tailgate: Stay at hotel near a Marta rail station. The hotels in Buckhead near the Buckhead or Lenox stations are ideal. When you’re at the hotel there are plenty of bars and restaurants within walking or short cab distance. Take the train down with a small disposable cooler, a flask, or a wad of cash. You can get off at the Peachtree Center station and grab your first beer at Hooters, Sidebar, or Ted’s Montana Grill or you can just walk through Centennial Park on your way over to the CNN Center and the festivities. You can also get off at the Five Points Station and transfer to the west line and get off at the Dome Exit. The CNN Center will be your home base for the pregame. This a large food court where several fast food restaurants serve 32oz beers for $5. Your welcome to drink them wherever you want inside the food court but taking them outside and walking around the Dome enters risky territory.
The CNN center also houses some more traditional sports bars and restaurants. Dantana’s and adjoining Philips Arena Taco Mac are your traditional televisions everywhere sports bars. The other restaurants have televisions but I wouldn’t expect them to have ESPN Gameplan.
Also near the CNN Center is the Stats Sports Bar (sound) which is ginormous and just a block west on Marietta St. It’s about the size of a ESPN Zone but without any space being wasted for non-television entertainment. They also have a couple of booths where you have a beer tap in your table and can serve yourself. Stats is located in an area now called the Luckie Marietta District that has several new restaurants and parking decks.
For some games there have been various beer stands outside of the stadium on the North Side between the Dome and the World Congress Center and on the East Lawn between the Dome and Philips Arena.
Traditional Tailgate: You have two options for driving to the game. If you’re just looking to park, you can take the 75/85 connector and generally follow Google Maps and park anywhere. If you’re looking to tailgate, you’re best bet is to take Northside Dr exit on 75 and follow that South directly to the Dome. Along the right side of Northside Dr. extending about a mile north of the dome are several private parking lots which are more than suitable. Personally I like to use either the Blues Lot on Northside or the Yellow Lot on Jones Ave. parking lot map. Both are big asphalt lots that I’ve used about 20 times for Falcons and SEC Champ/Peach Bowl games. But spots aren’t guaranteed.
Once tailgating, do whatever you want. You may want to pour your beers into a cup in the parking lot but I wouldn’t say it’s necessary. You definitely need to load all of your belongings back into your car before the game.
If you have other questions please leave them in the comments.
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