A view of the Hangar project’s frontage along East Koenig Lane. Image: GDA / Seco Ventures / Nudge Design
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 facing East Koenig Lane on a roughly seven-acre property located near the rail crossing at 403 East Koenig Lane, which until its closure and demolition last year served as the longtime local offices and service yard of natural gas utility company Texas Gas Service.
The site, now cleared of a collection of office and warehouse buildings dating back to the 1960s, has a plan in review with the city for a two-phase residential project known as The Hangar, a reference to the site’s former life as part of the 50-acre Haile Airport in the 1940s. Designed by Dallas-based firm GDA Architects with landscape work from local studio Nudge Design, the project’s warehouse-inspired looks reference the history of its location and are reminiscent of industrial-chic projects like Centro and 1801 East Sixth, which Seco Ventures founder Joshua Needham developed as a former founding partner at local firm Riverside Resources.
A view of the Hangar project’s southern frontage along East 56th Street. Image: GDA / Seco Ventures / Nudge Design
A closer look at what appears to be one of the project’s live-work spaces facing the improved streetscape on East Koenig Lane. Image: GDA / Seco Ventures / Nudge Design
Current site plan documents for the project indicate a unit count of 479 residences, with 344 one-bedroom units, 83 two-bedroom units, and 52 efficiencies. An additional 16,000 square feet of live-work residences would be included on the project’s ground level facing East Koenig Lane, alongside approximately 2,550 square feet of restaurant space near the site’s main driveway entrance.
A view of the roughly acre-sized city parkland dedication planned at the eastern end of the Hangar property, which will serve as a public amenity connected with the adjacent neighborhood and new pedestrian improvements along East Koenig Lane. Image: GDA / Seco Ventures / Nudge Design
Along with the plan’s anticipated streetscape improvements providing public amenities including all-new sidewalks and protected bike lanes along East Koenig Lane, more than an acre on the eastern end of the property near the railroad tracks is designated for dedication as city parkland. It’s certainly an improvement over the current condition of the site, which as a utility company headquarters was — and still is, at the moment — fully surrounded by a cinder block wall and barbed wire.
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