The parks and recreation board, at the request of Austin City Council Member Will Wynn, has given its blessing to a new site for the house on city park land. The location, next to the Old Bakery on Congress Avenue at Tenth Street, will go before Austin City Council for action March 8, Wynn last night had told the parks and recreation board.
Landmark's plans are to move the house to a temporary site in Brushy Park and then to the permanent site on Congress Avenue. That would open up Landmark's opportunity to begin construction on the 800-room convention hotel by mid-March, Ruben Rodriguez of Landmark Organization had told the board.
"In the ideal situation, we would commence construction work around mid-March," says Rodriguez when questioned about Landmark's time frame. "If our schedule is not to be affected, we would need to move it around that time."
The 800-room, $225-million hotel will be underwritten with bonds from the city-backed non-profit Austin Convention Enterprises Inc. Bond sales have been delayed but current plans are to open the hotel in 2003. When the deal with the city had closed last summer, Landmark had agreed to incorporate the house into the hotel's design, possibly moving all or a portion of it into the hotel lobby after construction to serve as a gift shop. Aftersome study, that plan had been deemed impractical.
Moving and restoring the historic house, which was once The Pit barbecue restaurant, will cost between $600,000 and $800,000, Wynn estimates. Landmark is committing "the lion's share" of the cost of the project, he told the parks board. The city is in the early stages of an agreement with the Texas Historical Foundation to use the house as office space and raise an endowment to underwrite the house maintenance.
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