I found this picture in the master plan for the new Seaholm development.

It’s interesting to me because it shows the Austin I remember and not the one that I always hear people waxing nostalgic about. I visited Austin in the late 80s and early 90s and moved here in 1996. I remember it as lots of empty lots that you had to drive past to get to the beautiful places. If it wasn’t developed it was a weed filled lot or someone’s ranch that had been stripped of trees. You can see that downtown is mostly just one story buildings and abandoned lots in the picture.
Has there been a lot of development in West Austin over the aquifer that has been environmentally destructive? Absolutely. But a lot of that nature dates only as far back as the 1980s and is a serious tribute to the environmental movement that emerged around that time. In the 70’s west Austin held a lot of ranch land as you can see in the pictures on this site.
There’s a lot of nostalgia in this town for a past that never was.

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Comments

Ashley

2010-05-29T07:23:45.000Z

I don’t think people are thinking of the downtown corridor when they say Austin used to be more beautiful. I remember those empty lots downtown too. 5th and Lamar was ugly, there were parking lots and car dealerships downtown -and it was a ghost town. But I also remember when driving 360 was like a drive through the country and the hills were covered with scrubby cedars and not big houses. I think that might be the Austin that people miss seeing. I was excited when the former Whole Foods (now anthropologie) was built because the architecture seemed so right and so what Austin should look like. To me, Austin’s beauty has always been more natural and wild and less manicured like Dallas. I like the direction Austin has taken and I love the central infill.

Mark

2010-05-29T08:44:05.000Z

I blame John Aielli.

Ashley

2010-05-29T09:05:43.000Z

LOL Mark!

Tim

2010-05-29T09:28:46.000Z

You see, Austin was a dream. A vivid dream where I was drinking saltwater. It tasted familiar. We all come from the salt water… the ocean.

Ashley

2010-05-29T09:35:28.000Z

“I will now play some songs about oceans. And from there we will segue to songs about salt”