Georgia Power

Georgia Power is an electric utility headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. It was established as the Georgia Railway and Power Company and began operations in 1902 running streetcars in Atlanta as a successor to the Atlanta Consolidated Street Railway Company.

Georgia Power is the largest of the four electric utilities that are owned and operated by Southern Company. Georgia Power is an investor-owned, tax-paying public utility that serves more than 2.25 million customers in all but four of Georgia's 159 counties. It employs approximately 9,000 workers throughout the state. The Georgia Power Building, its primary corporate office building, is located at 241 Ralph McGill Boulevard in downtown Atlanta.

In 2006 the Savannah Electric & Power Company, a separate subsidiary of Southern Company, was merged into Georgia Power.

History

Originally the Georgia Railway and Power Company, it began in 1902 as a company running the streetcars in Atlanta, and was the successor to the Atlanta Consolidated Street Railway Company. In the 1930s, the company published a free newsletter called Two Bells which was distributed on its streetcars; Two Bells was still distributed into the 1960s on the buses of successor Atlanta Transit Company (ATC). From 1937 until 1950, Georgia Power also operated trolleybuses in Atlanta, and in 1950 its network of 31 electric bus routes was the largest trolley bus system in the United States. After the Atlanta transit strike of 1950, the Atlanta Transit Company took over operations. Atlanta Streetcar was formed in the 2000s to establish a new streetcar service along Peachtree Street.