Image: The Trail Foundation
The East Austin park improvement initiative formerly known as Holly Point but now sporting the broader (but slightly less memorable) label of Holly Project represents the first step towards upgrading the large tract of shoreline city parkland on the north banks of Lady Bird Lake commonly referred to as Holly Shores.
This area, its size exceeding a whopping 90 acres and containing individual parks including Edward Rendon Sr. Park at Festival Beach, Fiesta Gardens, the Manuel And Robert Donley Pocket Park, and Metz Park, will also eventually contain an additional nine acres of parkland on the site of the decommissioned Holly Power Plant.
The area currently being upgraded by the Holly Project is the peninsula containing the baseball fields directly to the right of the bridge seen at the center of the image, which carries the Hike-and-Bike Trail over the park’s lagoon area. Image: Bing Maps
The vision for improving the long-neglected Holly Shores region into one of Austin’s premiere downtown and downtown-adjacent parks is a long time coming, with the city allocating funds for the master plan’s initial conception a solid decade ago — and with the help of the Trail Foundation nonprofit and its snazzy new Corgan Canopy Fund, the first piece of the puzzle is almost in sight, with the project possibly entering the construction planning and actual permitting stage by mid-2020.
A view of some of the Holly Project area, looking roughly southwest towards the water.
The Holly Project, now in its design review and community engagement phase, will create an ADA-accessible realignment of the Hike-and-Bike Trail along the waterfront in this area (you can see in the above image that the trail’s currently set back pretty far from the water), build additional recreation spaces, and restore the wetland habitat along the shoreline itself. At a community engagement meeting held last weekend, the Trail Foundation and Austin’s Parks and Recreation Department presented two design options for the Holly Project to the public for review, and that means you folks get to take a look at them too and decide which one tickles your fancy and so forth.
Holly Project: Concept A
Click for a larger view. Image: The Trail Foundation
In addition to a scenic overlook space at the southwestern tip of the peninsula, you’ll notice another focal point of this plan is the cluster of picnic tables on a deck installed around one of the area’s large oak trees. Pay attention to these two features, because they’re the ones that get a different spin in Concept B. If you squint at the map above, you’ll see a black arrow indicating the viewpoint of the concept sketch below, which might be the single most helpful thing included here:
Image: The Trail Foundation
Hey, not bad! We wish we could get a better view of the scenic overlook area or central shade garden, but maybe that comes later. Onward to Concept B!
Holly Project: Concept B
Image: The Trail Foundation
The two big changes in Concept B are the feature at the tip of the peninsula and the shade garden/picnic table space in the center. Instead of a scenic overlook, here we’ve got a stone pergola, a word that’s very fun to say and like a lot of fun words is derived from Latin, in this case the noun pergula, which depending on context can refer to a booth, hut, arbor, overhanging roof, or oddly enough, a brothel. Anyway, fun word.
The second major difference in this configuration is the layout of its central shade garden — instead of circling its picnic tables on a deck around a single tree, it distributes them throughout the grove and does away with the deck entirely. Remember to look for the small black arrow on the above map so you can tell the perspective of the sketch below, but it’s pretty obvious what we’re looking at here:
Image: The Trail Foundation
The foundation also included a second, more detailed concept sketch for the pergola structure seen in the sketch above — plus a human for scale:
Image: The Trail Foundation
You’ll notice that neither of these concepts do anything to threaten the existing baseball fields at the site — so please don’t get mad and email us about that. Instead, channel that energy towards filling out the Trail Foundation’s brief survey on the project’s design and let them know which of these two concepts you prefer. We’re torn on a favorite, since we love the pergola from Concept B most of all but also think the elevated deck in the shade garden from Concept A is pretty cool. Kinda makes you wonder, why not do both? That’s what the survey’s for, partner.
East Austin Homes For Sale
-
$690,000
2008 Tillotson Avenue
Austin, TX -
$650,000
3303 Kay Street
Austin, TX -
$815,000
1119 Tillery Street
Austin, TX -
$1,249,000
1017 Juniper Street N
Austin, TX -
$925,000
3012 Webberville Road #A
Austin, TX -
$774,900
2909 E 5th Street
Austin, TX -
$774,900
2907 E 5th Street
Austin, TX -
$650,000
1215 Taylor Street
Austin, TX -
$765,000
2311 E 10th Street
Austin, TX -
$795,000
2501 E 10th Street
Austin, TX -
$2,700,000
1212 Haskell Street #A
Austin, TX -
$650,000
2932 E 13th Street #1
Austin, TX -
$699,900
2002 E 7th Street #248
Austin, TX -
$750,000
1704 Garden St. Unit C
Austin, TX -
$728,000
1903 Sl Davis Avenue #B
Austin, TX -
$1,495,000
2002 E 9th Street #1
Austin, TX -
$699,900
1601 Miriam Avenue #100
Austin, TX -
$500,000
2235 E 6th Street #219
Austin, TX -
$949,000
1511 Holly Street
Austin, TX -
$3,100,888
680 Ramos Street
Austin, TX -
$575,000
1010 Gunter Street
Austin, TX -
$430,000
1800 E 4th Street #301
Austin, TX -
$650,000
1707 Ulit Avenue #2
Austin, TX -
$629,000
1906 New York Avenue #B
Austin, TX -
$784,900
2014 Willow Street #A
Austin, TX
-
$690,000Lot Size5,271 sqft
Home Size1,037 sqft
Beds3 Beds
Baths1 Bath
-
$650,000Lot Size7,205 sqft
Home Size1,689 sqft
Beds3 Beds
Baths2 Baths
-
$815,000Lot Size12,385 sqft
Home Size1,485 sqft
Beds3 Beds
Baths1 Bath
-
$1,249,000Lot Size1,351 sqft
Home Size2,807 sqft
Beds4 Beds
Baths5 Baths
-
$925,000Lot Size4,339 sqft
Home Size1,934 sqft
Beds3 Beds
Baths3 Baths
-
$774,900Lot Size6,796 sqft
Home Size884 sqft
Beds1 Bed
Baths1 Bath
-
$774,900Lot Size6,752 sqft
Home Size652 sqft
Beds2 Beds
Baths1 Bath
-
$650,000Lot Size2,889 sqft
Home Size528 sqft
Beds2 Beds
Baths1 Bath
-
$765,000Lot Size5,768 sqft
Home Size1,175 sqft
Beds3 Beds
Baths1 Bath
-
$795,000Lot Size3,921 sqft
Home Size983 sqft
Beds2 Beds
Baths2 Baths
-
$2,700,000Lot Size14,998 sqft
Home Size1,800 sqft
Beds3 Beds
Baths3 Baths
-
$650,000Lot Size3,050 sqft
Home Size1,004 sqft
Beds2 Beds
Baths3 Baths
-
$699,900Lot Size968 sqft
Home Size1,162 sqft
Beds2 Beds
Baths2 Baths
-
$750,000Lot Size7,009 sqft
Home Size656 sqft
Beds1 Bed
Baths1 Bath
-
$728,000Lot Size7,972 sqft
Home Size1,091 sqft
Beds3 Beds
Baths3 Baths
-
$1,495,000Lot Size5,794 sqft
Home Size2,211 sqft
Beds4 Beds
Baths4 Baths
-
$699,900Lot Size2,788 sqft
Home Size1,404 sqft
Beds4 Beds
Baths3 Baths
-
$500,000Lot Size872 sqft
Home Size1,003 sqft
Beds1 Bed
Baths2 Baths
-
$949,000Lot Size6,247 sqft
Home Size550 sqft
Beds2 Beds
Baths1 Bath
-
$3,100,888Lot Size8,800 sqft
Home Size4,283 sqft
Beds7 Beds
Baths8 Baths
-
$575,000Lot Size6,709 sqft
Home Size960 sqft
Beds3 Beds
Baths1 Bath
-
$430,000Lot SizeN/A
Home Size682 sqft
Beds1 Bed
Baths1 Bath
-
$650,000Lot Size2,575 sqft
Home Size931 sqft
Beds2 Beds
Baths2 Baths
-
$629,000Lot Size7,928 sqft
Home Size848 sqft
Beds2 Beds
Baths2 Baths
-
$784,900Lot Size6,831 sqft
Home Size1,295 sqft
Beds2 Beds
Baths1 Bath
Leave a Reply