The CNN Center in
Atlanta, Georgia, is the international headquarters of the Cable News Network (
CNN). The main newsrooms and studios for several of CNN's news channels are located in the building. The facility's commercial office space is occupied by various units of the former
Turner Broadcasting System, now part of
Warner Bros. Discovery. The CNN Center is located in
downtown Atlanta adjacent to
Centennial Olympic Park
Centennial Olympic Park is a public park located in downtown Atlanta, Georgia, owned and operated by the Georgia World Congress Center Authority. It was built by the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games (ACOG) as part of the infrastructu ...
. The One CNN Center office building was acquired b
CP Group, formerly Crocker Partners, and Rialto Capital Managementin 2021.
History
1970s and 1980s
The building now occupied by the CNN Center opened in 1976 as the Omni Complex, a development by
Cousins Properties. The
Omni Coliseum
Omni Coliseum (often called The Omni) was an indoor arena in Atlanta, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia, United States. Completed in 1972, the arena seated 16,378 for basketball and 15,278 for ice hockey, hockey. It was part of the CNN Center, Omni ...
, an
NBA
The National Basketball Association (NBA) is a professional basketball league in North America. The league is composed of 30 teams (29 in the United States and 1 in Canada) and is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United St ...
and
NHL arena directly connected to the Omni Complex, had opened three years earlier, on October 14, 1972. The Omni Complex office building was largely vacant until CNN moved its headquarters there in 1987 from its
Midtown Atlanta site (old home of the Progressive Club on 1050 Techwood Drive and home to
Turner Broadcasting System).
Over the years, the building had provided office space to various business tenants, as well as foreign consulates. The main floor featured an indoor ice skating rink, as well as a small number of restaurants and a Gold Mine video arcade. Sid and Marty Krofft built an indoor amusement park called
The World of Sid and Marty Krofft, inspired by the creations of these
popular children's television producers. Opened in 1976, this park was the first indoor
theme park in the United States, but it closed within six months. The complex also featured a multi-screen movie theater. For years, the theater offered showings of the 1939 film ''
Gone with the Wind'', which
Ted Turner called "The greatest movie ever made".
During renovations to install a new newsroom for CNN's website operations, the movie theater was replaced. The ice skating rink was filled in and replaced by a mosaic map of the world (the map featured brass markers indicating the locations of CNN bureaus around the world). Prior to moving to the new location, CNN and Headline News were based in a former country club on Techwood Drive in Midtown Atlanta. They shared the facility with WTBS. Since the late 20th century, this facility has served as the campus for nearly all other Turner networks and Turner Studios. During the 1990s, the mansion facade was used as the logo for Turner's theatrical and home video arms.
When CNN networks moved to the CNN Center on July 13, 1987, CNN Headline News (now known as
HLN) was the first network to broadcast a show from it. Their sister channel started live programming at 6.00 a.m. ET of that day.
1990s
On May 11, 1997, the Omni Coliseum closed. Its replacement, Philips Arena (now
State Farm Arena
State Farm Arena (formerly Philips Arena) is a multi-purpose arena located in Atlanta, Georgia. The arena serves as the home venue for the National Basketball Association (NBA)'s Atlanta Hawks. It also served as home to the National Hockey Leag ...
), broke ground on June 5, 1997. The Omni Coliseum was imploded on July 26, 1997, with CNN Center taking on minor exterior window damage due to its close distance to Omni Coliseum. Because of this, CNN Center was expected to be damaged. Philips Arena opened on September 18, 1999.
2000s
On April 4, 2007, Arthur Mann, an employee at the Omni Hotel, shot and severely injured his ex-girlfriend Clara Riddles inside the CNN center. The adjacent CNN.com newsroom was evacuated shortly after the first shots were heard. Mann was confronted and shot by a Turner Security Officer, and both Riddles and Mann were taken to a nearby hospital for treatment. Riddles later died of her injuries. An autopsy showed that Riddles was shot three times by Mann. The motive of the shooting is unknown.
On March 14, 2008, an EF-2 tornado passed through downtown Atlanta, damaging the CNN Center and leaving water and dust in the upper floors. The ceiling of the atrium was also damaged, allowing water to pour in and partially flood the food court. CNN's library was damaged, although it was not immediately known how much of its archives were damaged. Numerous injuries and widespread damage were reported overall. The Omni Hotel, attached to the CNN Center, was evacuated as a precaution, and more than 400 rooms had to be emptied of occupancy for two weeks.
2010s
On June 13, 2014, a car crashed into the CNN Center, causing minor structural damage. The driver of the car claimed to have fallen asleep at the wheel, and was charged with
driving under the influence
Driving under the influence (DUI)—also called driving while impaired, impaired driving, driving while intoxicated (DWI), drunk driving, operating while intoxicated (OWI), operating under the influence (OUI), operating vehicle under the infl ...
(DUI) and possession of
marijuana
Cannabis, also known as marijuana among other names, is a psychoactive drug from the cannabis plant. Native to Central or South Asia, the cannabis plant has been used as a drug for both recreational and entheogenic purposes and in various tra ...
.
Disinvestment from Omni Hotel
In 2016, the
chief financial officer
The chief financial officer (CFO) is an officer of a company or organization that is assigned the primary responsibility for managing the company's finances, including financial planning, management of financial risks, record-keeping, and financ ...
(CFO) Pascal Desroches of Turner said the company would divest its 50% stake in the center's Omni Hotel in favor of redeveloping its Techwood campus in Atlanta. This is where other Turner broadcast operations are based.
2020s
On May 29, 2020, the CNN Center became the scene of rioting in response to the
murder of George Floyd in
Minneapolis,
Minnesota, four days earlier, as the building also houses a Zone 5
police precinct for the
Atlanta Police Department. Rioters graffitied the CNN logo in the front of the building and caused property damage to the building's entrance glass
curtain wall and APD vehicles; the front lobby was damaged, though protesters never breached into the core common area of the building, with the logo sign repainted shortly thereafter.
[Archived a]
Ghostarchive
and th
Wayback Machine
On June 29, 2020, exactly a month after the incident,
WarnerMedia announced plans to sell the CNN Center. Once sold, WarnerMedia will continue to lease their existing space for several years until the Techwood WarnerMedia campus is expanded to accommodate CNN's Atlanta operations.
On November 21, 2020, a group of
right-wing
Right-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that view certain social orders and hierarchies as inevitable, natural, normal, or desirable, typically supporting this position on the basis of natural law, economics, authorit ...
activists organized by the
WalkAway campaign
The #WalkAway campaign is a social-media campaign that was launched ahead of the United States 2018 mid-term elections with the stated purpose of encouraging liberals to leave the Democratic Party. The campaign, which also organized events to ...
gathered in front of CNN Center. In the
2020 presidential election,
Joe Biden won the state's 16 electoral votes, the first
Democrat to win the state since
Bill Clinton in
1992
File:1992 Events Collage V1.png, From left, clockwise: 1992 Los Angeles riots, Riots break out across Los Angeles, California after the Police brutality, police beating of Rodney King; El Al Flight 1862 crashes into a residential apartment buildi ...
. The protesters were inspired by unfounded claims of
voter fraud.
Features
The CNN Center also houses an
Omni Hotel and features a large atrium
food court
A food court (in Asia-Pacific also called food hall or hawker centre) is generally an indoor plaza or common area within a facility that is contiguous with the counters of multiple food vendors and provides a common area for self-serve dinner. I ...
frequented by local business employees, tourists, attendees at
State Farm Arena
State Farm Arena (formerly Philips Arena) is a multi-purpose arena located in Atlanta, Georgia. The arena serves as the home venue for the National Basketball Association (NBA)'s Atlanta Hawks. It also served as home to the National Hockey Leag ...
and
Mercedes-Benz Stadium
Mercedes-Benz Stadium is a multi-purpose stadium located in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. Opened in August 2017 as a replacement for the Georgia Dome, it serves as the home stadium of the Atlanta Falcons of the National Football League (NFL) ...
events, and conference attendees from the nearby
Georgia World Congress Center.
CNN's multi-channel output to the world is broadcast on large screens around the center. Studio tours are available and include demonstrations of technologies, such as
Chroma key and teleprompters, as well as visits to viewing galleries overlooking the newsrooms and anchors of
CNN International,
HLN,
CNN 10, and
CNN en Español.
The atrium escalator used to transport visitors on the CNN tour has been listed in the ''
Guinness Book of World Records
''Guinness World Records'', known from its inception in 1955 until 1999 as ''The Guinness Book of Records'' and in previous United States editions as ''The Guinness Book of World Records'', is a reference book published annually, listing world ...
'' as the "longest freestanding (supported only at the ends) escalator in the world"; it is long. Built for the theme park that once occupied the building, this escalator is part of the building's original structure, making it very hard to remove.
MARTA
Marta may refer to:
People
* Marta (given name), a feminine given name
* Märta, a feminine given name
* Marta (surname)
:István Márta composer
* Marta (footballer) (born 1986), Brazilian professional footballer
Places
* Marta (river), an ...
rail service is provided to the CNN Center at the
Dome/GWCC/Philips Arena/CNN Center station. Access to the Red and Gold lines may be gained by a ten-fifteen minute walk to Peachtree Center Station.
List of tenants
*
Arby's
*
Atlanta Police Department
* AT&T Store
*
BurgerFi
BurgerFi International, LLC (doing business as BurgerFi) is an American hamburger restaurant chain aimed at the "better burger" sector of the market. The first location was opened in February 2011 in Lauderdale-by-the-Sea, Florida.
History
...
*
Cartoon Network
Cartoon Network (often abbreviated as CN) is an American cable television channel owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. It is a part of The Cartoon Network, Inc., a division that also has the broadcasting and production activities of Boomerang, Car ...
Store
*
Chick-fil-A
Chick-fil-A ( , a Word play, play on the American English pronunciation of "wikt:filet#Pronunciation, filet") is an American fast food restaurant chain which is the country's largest which specializes in chicken sandwiches. Headquartered in Coll ...
* China Breeze
* CNN Store
* Dantanna's Downtown
*
Dunkin' Donuts
Dunkin' Donuts LLC, also known as Dunkin' and by the initials DD, is an American multinational coffee and doughnut company, as well as a quick service restaurant. It was founded by Bill Rosenberg (1916–2002) in Quincy, Massachusetts, in 195 ...
*
Great Wraps
Great Wraps is an American quick serve restaurant founded in 1974 with 51 locations in over 18 states, primarily in food courts. Its menu consists of hot, wrapped sandwiches (including their signature Gyro Wrap), cheesesteaks, rice bowls and froz ...
*
McCormick & Schmick's Seafood Restaurants
*
Moe's Southwest Grill
Moe's Southwest Grill, referred to informally as Moe's, is an American fast casual restaurant franchise chain that was founded in Atlanta, Georgia, in December 2000FOCUS Brands press release, FOCUS Brands to Acquire Moe’s Southwest Grill', April ...
* Natural's Ice Cream, Yogurt & Smoothies
* Roman Delight
*
Starbucks
Starbucks Corporation is an American multinational chain of coffeehouses and roastery reserves headquartered in Seattle, Washington. It is the world's largest coffeehouse chain.
As of November 2021, the company had 33,833 stores in 80 c ...
*
Subway
Subway, Subways, The Subway, or The Subways may refer to:
Transportation
* Subway, a term for underground rapid transit rail systems
* Subway (underpass), a type of walkway that passes underneath an obstacle
* Subway (George Bush Interconti ...
* TJ's Sandwiches
*
U.S. Postal Store
*
Wells Fargo Bank
* Fresh to Order
References
External links
CNN.com websiteCNN Center Studio Tour websiteCNN StoreOmni Hotel at CNN Center
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cnn Center
Mass media company headquarters in the United States
Mass media in Atlanta
Office buildings in Atlanta
CNN
Mass media museums in the United States
Telecommunications museums in the United States
Museums in Atlanta
Warner Bros. Discovery
Office buildings completed in 1976
1976 establishments in Georgia (U.S. state)
Brutalist architecture in Georgia (U.S. state)