Austin | Symphony Square | 374' | 33-Stories | U/C

[The ATX]

Velocity Credit Union owns about three blocks at their downtown HQ.  They filed site plans to develop two parcels with with mixed use towers up to 45-stories.  This area is largely covered with Capitol View Corridors which have prevented high-rise development.  But now that downtown Austin land is so valuable developers are planning skinny, angled towers that can poke up in between the various CVCs.  Here's the link to the site plan for 610 East. 

 

Here's a location drawing from the site plan.

 

Here's the location from Streetview.  This part of downtown is seriously underdeveloped and rundown.  But it would look amazing if the 11 towers proposed for this small area of just a few blocks get built.  At the far right of this photo is the hospital on the Brackenridge tract that will be part of a big demo to make way for seven of the towers.

[The ATX]

The Planning Commission approved the zoning change to Central Business District to clear the way for an "up to 45-story" tower.  But the developer will still need to obtain a density bonus based on the tower's design and the "community benefits" of the project in order to get the F.A.R. increase needed to build that tall.  This is located near the just approved Hotel Mirabeau project and is part of the burgeoning NE Downtown corridor

[The ATX]

We have some renderings.  But these are only visionary at this time.  Velocity Credit Union is currently located on the site, and they got the site up zoned to allow for a ~45-story building.  Now that they have the zoning in place they are looking for a developer partner.

Link

[Dr. B.]

Better looking project for the area. Looks like they drew inspiration from Bosco Verticale.

[The ATX]

Hopefully the final version ends up being as nice as this vision.  This future of this area is hard to predict right now.  The 10 towers planned are a pretty good mix of uses.  It could go mostly residential like much of downtown or it could end up being predominately office with the Brackenridge tract and proximity to the U.T. Dell Medical Center.

 

[The ATX]

Here's another rendering...

Link

[The ATX]

Here are some more renderings from Gensler.  This is only a vision - no specific proposal has been announced.  The final version could be much different and taller.  The zoning allows for something possibly in the neighborhood of 45-stories - if it ends up being hotel or residential.

Gensler

[The ATX]

It's been a year since we had an update about this project, but we now know something big is planned due to recent permit filings.  The credit union (Velocity) occupying the site filed a site plan to build a new credit union across the street from the site which means they will be vacating this site.  Also, a zoning change request for an adjacent site goes to the Planning Commission on 03/12  to be re-zoned Central Business District.  In that zoning change request, the applicant states that their site will be part of the Velocity project and that the Velocity project will be office, hotel and residential.  So that's likely a significant tower.

[The ATX]

A site plan was filed a few days ago.  Based on how info is typically added to site plans, we should have more details in about three weeks.  But based on the sketchy info available it looks to be a residential and office tower with a small hotel component next to the tower.   The name appears to be Symphony Square now rather than the previous Velocity tower.

[The ATX]

More info was released today on the city's utilities website.  The tower portion of the project will be mostly residential with 33 occupied floors and 379' tall.  But the site is on a slope.  So it looks like it will have 35 occupied floors and be over 400' when measured from the opposite side of the block.  The lower levels will include office, hotel and retail.  Here's the site map - it's 3/4 of a block.

 

AULCC

[The ATX]

A formal site plan for this project finally went into review this week.  The project has gotten bigger and may reach 500' IMO.  The uses may have changed a bit, but there is conflicting info in the site plan.  This is what it appears to consist of:  

364 Condos (previously described as apartments)
The Co-Living Hotel may have changed to 87 Live-Work units
~140K Sq. Ft. office space (up from ~130K)
~13.2K Sq. Ft. retail (up from around ~12K)

The best thing in the filing is that the developer wants to fast track this project through the City permitting process.  That costs more money and adds legitimacy to the project.

[The ATX]

An updated site plan was posted on a city website.  The project was trimmed from 35 to 33 floors.  But it could still be a 400 footer.

[The ATX]

Towers located some elevations.  The site has a pretty good slope and a Capitol View Corridor running over it.  So we get basically a short tower and a tall tower on a shared podium.  The tall tower is apartments and the small tower is office and live-work units.

 

[The ATX]

This project has started - or at least another project related to this project has started.  The site being cleared is for a small bank building that will be replacing their current bank on the site of the Symphony Square tower located next door.  Once the banking operations are moved into the new building, demo will start of the Symphony Square tower site.  The U/C tower is the Alexan apartment tower.

Photos by corvairkeith

[The ATX]

New elevations for this project were released on Friday, and it gained 27' in height.  F the virus.

AULCC