As advocates for economic development in Austin, it’s tough to see iconic local businesses struggling with the city’s current growing pains — between sky-high land values, labor shortages due to our festering housing crisis, and a municipal permitting bureaucracy largely unchanged since the 1980s, it takes increasingly deep patience and pockets to keep the lights on. That’s why we’re thrilled…
historic preservation
Erwin Center Demolition Work Could Start Next Month in Downtown Austin
The reveal last month that the University of Texas is pursuing a $2.5 billion partnership with the MD Anderson Cancer Center to construct a cancer treatment and research hub in downtown Austin was fantastic news for the city’s emerging Innovation District — and bad news for the Frank C. Erwin Jr. Center, the infamous drum-shaped concrete arena set to be demolished in the near future…
Brush Square’s Back in Downtown Austin
The current heat wave hasn’t made it easy to notice, but fences are finally down at Brush Square in downtown Austin. After a year of construction and roughly five years of planning efforts, the first phase of improvements to this longtime downtown public space at 409 East Fifth Street are substantially complete. Although you can go check it out…
See Downtown Austin’s Capitol View Corridors in Eye-Popping 3D
You can’t fully understand the growth of downtown Austin without understanding Capitol View Corridors — the invisible walls protecting views of the State Capitol dome from all over downtown and other parts of the central city. But the only way to really visualize these corridors outside of looking at a big PDF file is by using a custom Google Maps overlay, or a slightly fancier (if outdated) plugin…
Demolition Underway at Avenue Lofts
The Avenue Lofts condo building at 410 East Fifth Street is officially coming down. Demolition is currently underway by construction firm AAR Incorporated this week at the 0.8-acre property at the northeast corner of East Fifth and Trinity Streets, only a bit more than a year after the 2022 buyout of this 38-unit downtown condo community by local developer Wilson Capital. Representatives…
The Hanger Project Brings Apartments to a Former North Loop Industrial Site
An apartment development planned for a sprawling former industrial tract could bring approximately more than 400 new residences to the edge of the North Loop neighborhood in Central Austin, according to site plan documents currently in review with the city. The project by local real estate development firm Seco Ventures would raise two adjacent five-story apartment structures…