ATLANTA (AP) — For the Braves, abandoning downtown Atlanta for the suburbs means moving closer to the team's fan base and developing money-making restaurants and amenities.
Team officials say it's simply good business.
Their decision also highlights long-standing disparities over wealth, where people live and transportation. Those facets of life are connected to race and social class in Atlanta. The Braves will be moving from an area that's predominantly black and relatively poor compared to whiter Cobb County — where the team says more ticket-buyers live.
Although it is long past segregation, the hometown of slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King is far from integrated, and the city's politics, business and even sports teams reflect that gap. The Braves said they made their decision was not driven by race or class.

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(Photo: AP Photo/David Goldman)