I live about a mile from there and have been in Atlanta

for about 25 years. I'll echo the other comments in that it is a good school with a great reputation. It straddles several neighborhoods, all of which are good so there should be no concerns with respect to safety or convenience to the rest of metro Atlanta. It's not very close to a MARTA train station, but it is on the MARTA bus route, and Emory has their own bus system, too. Assuming no significant traffic, it's probably 10 minutes to the Virginia-Highland neighborhood (by car), 10-15 minutes to downtown Decatur, 20 minutes to Midtown, 20-25 minutes to Buckhead, and 45 minutes to/from the airport (probably $50 cab fare from the airport). The kids are apparently pretty lame as there are no (zero, zip, nada) bars adjacent to campus, and barely any pizza joints.