Monday Musings #13: Is San Antonio a Prisoner of its Past?

Is San Antonio always going to be a city where the future is seen as an unwelcome intrusion on the past?

The question has never been more relevant. Last week, the San Antonio Conservation Society filed a lawsuit against the City of San Antonio and UTSA in an effort to block the demolition of the now-vacant building that housed the Institute of Texan Cultures (ITC), a museum which UTSA intends to reimagine in a new building closer to the tourist-dense Alamo Plaza.

The Conservation Society’s lawsuit, if successful, would stop Project Marvel, the city’s proposed multi-billion investment in Hemisfair, the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center and the Alamodome. At the core of that vision are negotiations to bring the San Antonio Spurs back to Hemisfair in a new $1.5 billion arena, the centerpiece of a walkable sports and entertainment zone that would help create a vibrant Hemisfair-Southtown connection.

Before its 2024 closure, the ITC drew few visitors beyond students on field trips. One reason was its badly-dated exhibits documenting regional peoples and cultures. Another reason was the general inaccessibility and uninviting nature of the brutalist concrete building originally built as the Texas Pavilion for Hemisfair ‘68. 

Most cities retain some physical remembrance of past World Fairs, be it the Unisphere in New York or the Space Needle in Seattle. San Antonio is not content to live with the Tower of Americas to recall its 1968 fair. The Conservation Society wants all remaining edifices from the fair preserved, even those that would require tens of millions of dollars to rehabilitate, a financial burden exceeding any potential return.

San Antonians dedicated to building a more vibrant downtown have long awaited the rebirth of Hemisfair. The nearly 100 acre-site was San Antonio’s most under-utilized urban space for nearly a half-century after the fair closed in 1968. Its redevelopment was first seriously proposed by then-Mayor Phil Hardberger toward the end of his 2005-2009 time in office. Since then, Yanaguana Garden and Civic Park have attracted hundreds of thousands of locals and visitors, while The ‘68, a privately developed residential tower, and a growing number of restaurants, cafes, and a beer garden have brought the park back to life.

Yet two problematic buildings built for the fair – the ITC and the former John H. Wood Federal Courthouse, a former theater – dominate the park’s southern edge along César Chávez Boulevard. Both would require tens of millions of dollars to rehabilitate them at their present size, with no practical use going forward. Thus, they are of little or no interest to private developers. 

The Conservation Society supports preservation of both buildings. The City now owns the former courthouse and intends to invest tens of millions of dollars to convert the former courthouse into some sort of event center. When I asked Conservation Society Executive Director Vincent Michael some years ago exactly what future role the ITC could play in a more vibrant downtown, his answer was “a Target.” The courthouse, he said, could become home to live theater.

Downtown does not need a suburban box store. A live theater venue? San Pedro Playhouse sits empty for the majority of the year. Yet there seems to be no real interest on the part of the city or the Conversation Society to see the properties be redeveloped for their highest and best use. 

The future of Hemisfair’s is not a fight between developers and preservationists. We live in a city that boasts UNESCO World Heritage recognition for the Alamo and the four Spanish colonial missions, where San Fernando Cathedral still serves as the center of the historic center city, and where countless 19th and early 20th century commercial buildings and residences have been preserved. Developers are, often enough, the ones preserving these structures. Yet to argue that everything is historic is an argument for countering that nothing is historic. 

Other preservation efforts often triggered by community protests also hold back the city from more ambitious downtown and near-downtown development.

Cattlemen Square on the city’s near-Westside has sat vacant and underutilized for decades.  When developer David Adelman sought to demolish two early 20th century buildings deemed beyond repair that he owns there, the city’s Historic Design and Review Commission sided with the protestors. The area is characterized by blight, homelessness, and drug activity. Officials making these decisions often seem to ignore market realities when issuing their preservation rulings.

The vision for further redevelopment of Hemisfair and its surroundings is the most ambitious public-private partnership since Weston Urban, The City, and Frost Bank entered into a 2014 private-public partnership to redevelop much of western downtown. A decade later, that ambitious project has added hundreds of residential units, with hundreds more coming on line later this year and many more on the drawing board. The new Frost Tower became the first new high-rise on the downtown skyline in decades. A new ballpark for the San Antonio Missions is coming soon.

Yet Weston Urban was vilified for plans to demolish the shabby Soap Factory apartment complex, which consists of 300-plus units spread over nine acres of prime downtown real estate that could become home to thousands of individuals and families in both market rate and workforce housing.

San Antonio, its civic leaders claim, is a city on the rise. And there is ample evidence to support that boosterism. But the impediments to rising faster and better, while still protecting the significantly historic structures, prevent us from realizing even greater progress.

It’s no wonder that most developers in the city are content to busy themselves with our ever-expanding suburban sprawl. The cost of building a better downtown remains far too high.