Austin city council greenlights new pedestrian mall on Congress Avenue
City Council paved the way Thursday for a major state project that will transform three blocks of downtown from roadway into a grass-covered pedestrian mall.
Council voted to give the Texas Facilities Commission the OK to seize control of city right of way on Congress Avenue between 16th Street and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard to construct the “Texas Mall” and the underground parking garage underneath.
The mall is the centerpiece of phase one of the Texas Capitol Complex Master Plan. The plan will also include two new state buildings on Congress Avenue that are expected to serve 3,500 state employees who currently work in leased office space elsewhere in the Austin area. Phase one of the plan will cost $581 million, over $100 million of which will be spent on the mall and parking garage.
The state’s website for the master plan describes the future mall as a “tree-lined, pedestrian-oriented civic event space” that “will serve as a cultural gateway” between the Capitol and a new “museum district” comprising the existing Blanton Museum of Art, the Bullock Texas State History Museum and a yet-to-be-determined future cultural facility.
Read more: https://www.austinmonitor.com/stories/2017/12/council-green-lights-new-pedestrian-mall-congress-ave/
