Wal-Mart: The New Urban Legend

Wal-Mart is building a new Supercenter in Northcross Mall that thinks it's "urban." Today's article about it in the Statesman uses the word "urban" in nearly every sentence. Cute, but wrong. Selling gourmet cheese does not make you urban. Encrusting the exterior with limestone does not make you urban (they don't say it will be limestone, but it's a safe bet). Building a second story, while an improvement on single story super sprawl, does not make you urban.

This is the plan. See all that space between the building and the road? That is surface parking. Surface parking between the building and the street = suburban. Urban engages the street. Urban would be right up in the corner of Anderson and Burnet's face with pedestrian entrances, shoving the parking garages to the back. Suburban runs from the street, hiding behind a sea of surface parking, quaking in fear, as shown in the picture.

What happened to the new Commercial Building Design Regs? Isn't this exactly the kind of development prohibited by those regulations?

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By Shawn Shillington in News on November 8, 2006 10:46 AM 0 Comments

Comments [rss]

dan

For anyone who is interested in this (sorry for last minute notice):

Subject: [Allandale NA] Meeting with Wal-mart agent

FYI-The Wooten NA meets Monday evening at Redeemer Lutheran on

Anderson (in the cafeteria). Richard Suttle, the agent for the

Wal-Mart development, will be there to provide info and answer

questions.

The Wooten Neighborhood Association will meet Monday, November 13, at

7:00 pm at the Redeemer Lutheran School Cafeteria, 1500 Anderson Lane

(Burrell side). Agenda items include: Speaker: Lamont Ross from

Capital Metro's Adopt-A-Stop program; Wal-Mart in Northcross; update

on the free tree-planting offer by the City of Austin in the

Wooten/Crestview area; and citizens'communication.

Derek

Here's something even stranger. Why build a three-story parking garage and then keep all that surface parking? Futhermore, the garage faces Anderson, which suggests the north side won't be the front of the Wal-Mart. Which means this puppy -- far from "urbanly" engaging Anderson -- is going to be actively flipping that street off.

Awesome.

Bill

Thank you for the caps!

Is there anything Northwest Austinites can do to prevent this from happening?

JUBCHA

URBAN PARKING IS JUST HORRIBLE. TRY OUT THE WHOLEFOODS DOWNTOWN...WHAT A HORRIBLE EXPERIENCE. I GOT KNOCKED OFF MY BIKE TWICE BY SOME YUPSTER IN A MASSIVE SVU. BUT FIRST I HAD TO CIRCLE THE BLOCK LIKE 19 TIMES BECAUSE THE TRAFFIC WAS SO JAMMED UP. IT MAKE NO SINCE TO ME.

IF YOU HAVE THE SPACE FOR A PARKING LOT AND DUMPSTERS THEN WHAT IS WRONG WITH THAT? IT MAY BE "COOL" TO HAVE NO ACCESS AND NO PARKING LOT, BUT DUMPSTERS ARE NECESSARY. THE FEED THE UNDERBELLY OF YOUR "URBAN" COMMUNITY.

BTW..CAN ANYONE TELL ME IF THEY WILL INCREASE THE NUMBER OF DUMPSTERS IN PROPOSITION #1? I TRIED TO VOTE, BUT I CANT REGISTER.

Luke

wally has to act fast.. what with IKEA and HEB Plus positioning themselves to seriously stomp them out especially in the urban sector. I wonder if the urban wal mart employees will be given urban wages? Or for that matter will they be forced to work through their unpaid breaks and not be fairly compensated for overtime as the corp. is so notorious for? Oops, I forgot one more little non-perk: benefits? what benefits?

It really is time wal mart holds our their wrists for a little ruler slapping and a little "tsk, tsk, tsk.." snarking from the yuppy sect. This venture will be perfect opportunity for it.

Kenneth

And building your store in a refurbished shopping mall 6+ miles from downtown does not make you "urban."

M1EK

Shilli,

Well done. I salute you, sir.

Dan,

Local businesses in strip malls

dan

As the other post said, goodbye Terra Toys. And Zingers. And all of the other great small businesses in the area. This is also going to cause huuuuge traffic problems - Andersen and Burnet are not built for the additional traffic this will add.

ReNerd

I think Rockwood Lane should be renamed Rockwood Expressway in honor of the new revamped Northcross Center (man that just rolls of my tongue so much easier). I can't wait for the "urban" Walmart Supercenter 2 story explosion of savings (hahah). Since I work at Chaparral I am going to have to look at that monstrosity everyday, boo-urns. I think the appropriate words are "there goes the neighborhood". Oh, and the new Walgreens. Great! I was sick to death of the drugs/stuff I was getting at CVS.

genie

Yay! Good post. So close to what I've waiting to hear, from somewhere: economically speaking, wal-mart's not that bad, they're basically screwing the same social class of people who are always getting screwed by somebody, and who don't seem to mind anyway (see: country music). The REAL problem - the wal-mart experience is psychically taxing, starting with their physical manifestation.