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Originally Posted by J78704
It's possible for multiple things to be true. OCH is looking out for longevity in the development and frankly, "Austin Historical designation" is not some endorsement of LGBT history in Austin. It's just a building code and plaque! On the other hand, IB will need to relocate.
Other cities have LGBT full-on neighborhoods. Austin has a block of LGBT concentration that some of us gay or lesbian people remember street parking and otherwise dark surrounding neighborhoods and parties between 1995 - 2015. History can set up elsewhere.
That being said, I've been downtown a handful of times over the last 2 months. Basically, everywhere i turned where there used to be a bar / nightlife / fun / food... now it's a hotel lobby, business lobby, or something else not fun. Austin is changing. I love the views but it's getting boring in here. The city needs to focus on preserving the fun, otherwise, ATX will not be worth the heat, IMO!
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I agree fully -- I mean, regardless of what purpose it is, I think every DT building should be functionally required to have some sort of street-level interaction, be it a gay bar or just retail. large pockets of retail/bars/restaurants is a big thing separating the downtown centers of D.C., Chicago, and NYC from places like Houston and L.A. While the latter two might have some, they are still very "9-5" centric. My own condo building downtown is one of the worst offenders of this, though I suppose it was built back in 2006-2007.
Really, with a lot of these buildings I've seen proposed lately, the lobbies are far too large. 4th and Colorado has two lobbies that could easily be half the space, or otherwise placed within higher floors like NYC/Chicago/Tokyo/others commonly do. Even buildings like Block 71 that have some solid street-level interaction also have monstrous office lobbies as well, for very little to no purpose. At least a hotel is somewhat understandable, since it's "required" for checking in and checking out, etc., and they are also generally open to the public and contain restaurants. But most if not all of the 5-floor buildings coming up along east 6th street are far better in this regard -- and that needs to be emulated among downtown as well.
But especially with regards to retail, I get the feeling that most of downtown's retail is shrinking, or at the very least not growing. The only real stretches of retail stores that exist are along 2nd street and along congress -- but many of those have shifted towards restaurants instead. Perhaps it's a demand/business reason, but I always daydream of a system whereby the city requires rent subsidies for the ground level of these downtown buildings, to ensure that they are always occupied with something that makes the area better for more than those who live/work directly in that building.
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I love skyscrapers. That's my fetish. BUT! They seem like they are killing the very thing that attracted them to downtown Austin. When you have a goose that lays golden eggs, you don't kill it. This is why Austin needs a system of selling air rights.
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