A present aerial view of Hancock Middle and its extraordinarily unhappy car parking zone scenario. Picture: Google Earth
For those who’ve tuned in over the previous couple of weeks, you’ll see we’ve been mulling the subject of Brodie Oaksification round right here — the crackpot fantasy of immediately remodeling one other certainly one of Austin’s sprawled-out buying facilities into a brand new mixed-use improvement identical to what’s presently deliberate at Brodie Oaks, a mission growing the housing and business area of its land with the assistance of dense building whereas additionally clawing again some inexperienced area from acres of underused parking tons.
Austin has roughly a million totally different buying facilities that would use this therapy, however our efforts to slim down the contenders with a number of surveys has lastly paid off. After greater than 750 votes in our final reader ballot, we’re proud to declare that Austin’s hottest strip mall goal for the Brodie Oaks cannon is Hancock Middle by a hair, receiving 35.51 % of the votes versus 34.84 % for Barton Creek Sq. Mall and 29.65 % for Capital Plaza. That’s a reasonably even distribution, which we’re not stunned to see — all three of our finalists have been in style in earlier polls, and that’s as a result of they’re all glorious candidates.
However the 34-acre Hancock Middle tract at 1000 East forty first Avenue has some fascinating stuff in its close to future that may make it a very good location for this type of redevelopment, even when the timeline isn’t precisely swift. For one, the enlargement of I-35 by the Texas Division of Transportation deliberate over the approaching years will take a small chunk out of the buying middle’s japanese edge, displacing stuff like a Wendy’s and a walk-in reasonably priced well being clinic — some actual masters of public relations over there at TxDOT. However the turmoil brought on by the freeway enlargement would possibly simply be the motivation that house owners of websites like Hancock Middle (together with the close by Capital Plaza, even when it didn’t win the ballot) might use to strive one thing new, because the facilities must be modified to make room for the freeway it doesn’t matter what.
The present H-E-B storefront at Hancock Middle. Picture: Regency Facilities
Hancock Middle can also be set to get a couple of modernizing investments within the close to future, together with a deliberate enlargement of its anchor H-E-B grocery and the conversion of its long-dead former Sears division retailer into the brand new $63 million headquarters for county hospital district Central Well being, which has but to disclose its design. Though the longer-term transit enhancements of Venture Join now appear additional out of attain than ever, the potential for rail sometime on the Gold Line features a cease right here. With that future in thoughts, it doesn’t take a lot creativeness to image one thing higher at Hancock Middle, even when we don’t have the facility to vary it in a single day — nonetheless, it’s good to know the place Austinites would level the Brodie Oaksifyer if they may.
