The allegedly business-friendly, freedom-minded inclinations of the Texan government fall apart pretty fast when you take stock of our state’s alcohol regulations, a bizarrely complex assortment of laws dating back to Prohibition and informed by, no joke, the 1930s public policy research of a eugenicist think tank. We got a nice reminder of these laws and their general backwards-assedness earlier this month, when…
See the City’s Silent Streets as Austinites Stay Home
Downtown resident Andrei Matei got some attention in the news last week for his candid photos of a bizarrely empty Austin, as the city effectively shuts down to prevent the spread of the ongoing COVID-19 outbreak — and just in time for our new shelter-in-place orders, which took effect in Travis and Williamson Counties last night, Matei has released a new…
Current Events Aside, Downtown Austin’s BBVA Tower Plan Is Extremely Narrow
If keeping up with the news over the last week has you more than a little burnt out, we’re here with a welcome distraction — the 60-story apartment and office tower planned by BBVA USA and developer Ryan Companies at 321 West Sixth Street in downtown Austin is extremely narrow. How narrow, you ask? Very. But you wouldn’t necessarily be able to tell that…
Waterloo Central Office Project Heads for a Shuttered Smoke Shop Downtown
A 39,000-square-foot office and retail project known as Waterloo Central is planned at the former site of the now-closed Gas Pipe (The Gas Pipe? The Gas Pipe!) smoke shop at the southeast corner of East Fifth and Sabine Streets in downtown Austin. Here’s a view of the site from roughly the same perspective as the rendering above. Imagined by local developers…
North Central Development Roundup: Not Quite Central, Not Quite North
Okay, so maybe it’s a stretch to call neighborhoods like Crestview and Allandale part of “Central Austin,” but we also feel weird saying anything south of Highway 183 is in “North Austin.” What’s a blog to do? You probably already figured this out, but we’re running with “North Central.” Here’s some stuff they’re building around…
Preservation Austin’s 2020 Homes Tour Gives Downtown Living Its Due
As tireless advocates for the joys of urban life, we believe everyone in Austin has the right to live downtown. That’s why we support dense development and the growth of diverse housing types beyond single-family homes — it makes that life far more accessible to a wider population. That’s also why we’re so excited to…