Original menu image courtesy the Frisco Shop With the Brentwood Tavern and the Travis County Farmer's Market both closing last month, the Allandale culinary scene is certainly undergoing some transition. The Austin Business Journal and the Statesman's Dale Rice report that the Frisco Shop (North Central Austin's haven of pie and artery-clogging comfort food) has found a new home and will not close its doors after learning last year that its location would soon house......

An Austin Business Journal article last Friday assuaged some of our fears about the hike-and-bike trail gap. The article isn't 100% clear on the point, but it sounds like CWS Capital Partners is not going to rebuild the existing structures even if the variance they are seeking is not granted. According to the ABJ, Greg Miller, a VP at CWS, said if the variance is not granted CWS will build one big tower instead......

Apparently our fair city is besting all others when it comes to "cleantech" (green technology) startups. According to the Austin Business Journal, we're home to seven of these forward-looking paragons of environmental innovation, including startups developing wind and geothermal energy technologies, and one working on something mindblowingly called "Internet-controlled irrigation." For those keeping track, we beat out San Jose, Berkeley, Pasadena, and Boston for the top spot. Image courtesy kingjoshdavidon Flickr......

Having suckled at the teet of local residents more than adequately this year, Austin Energy's spitting out a little back next year. Starting January 1st, Austin Energy will cut electricity rates for "most users" by a hefty 8 percent. From Austin Business Journal: The move comes after the city-owned utility earned more than it expected in November when warm weather caused power users to turn up the AC when they ordinarily would've just opened the......

"Heaven…we're in hea-ven…" There are few things we like more than a good massage. World peace, gelato…that's about it, actually. If we could afford it, we'd probably get a professional massage every week. But we've got to budget our money carefully, you know, what with the gelato and all. So, you can imagine how thrilled we were when we read this story in the Austin Business Journal about Massage Harmony. The cleverly titled studio,......

It appears the rumors we’ve been hearing for a few months now are true: Chuy’s (or part of it, at least) has been sold and will be expanding its brand over the next five years with up to 30 new restaurants. The privately-owned restaurant, founded by Mike Young and John Zapp in 1982, has received a bunch of cash from Goode Partners LLC of New York, a private equity group. As part of the deal,......

It took an official study paid for by the Downtown Austin Alliance and City of Austin to conclude the obvious: East Sixth Street has an overabundance of bars. Washington, D.C.-based consultants at ERA/Downtown Works, already working with the city on other downtown retail strategies, recently conducted a survey of the college-friendly span of Sixth Street from Congress Ave to Red River. According to their findings, the five-block-long area has a whopping 57 bars -- most......

The Austin Business Journal reported earlier today that Tiffany & Co, purveyors of fine baubles and other really expensive polished minerals, will join the already swank establishments at the upcoming luxe retail development called The Domain. Opening next March and a mere stone's throw from Dell HQ, The Domain will be a massive 700,000 square foot haven of "luxury, couture, contemporary fashion and restaurant space," anchored by the city's first Neiman Marcus (budget masturbation......

Austin Business Journal reported yesterday that Swedish home goods behemoth IKEA has set out on a massive hiring binge in anticipation of its new Round Rock store opening in just a few months. The bargain-priced furnishings retailer, also home to some particularly delectable soft-serve, is looking to fill nearly 300 positions in all areas imaginable, including interior design, customer service, security, food service, sales, and maintenance. They're offering, in return, pretty nifty benefits: full......

We told you a few months ago about the fight over the sale of Roy’s Taxi to Yellow Cab. From that post in March: Taxi cab drivers and riders spoke and the city listened. Roy's Taxi has been hoping to sell its family business that has been around for over 70 years to Yellow Cab of Houston for several months, but last night the Urban Transportation Commission put an end to that hope. The......

Austin City Council Member Brewster McCracken, former Mayor Kirk Watson and the Texas Film Commission jointly announced today that production of NBC's "Friday Night Lights," which was greenlighted back in February, will be headquartered in Austin. "NBC Universal Television Studio's decision to come here is a big step for us as we capitalize on Austin's reputation as an emerging center for television and film production," says Mayor Will Wynn in today's Austin Business Journal. "This......

Austin Business Journal reports on a new Austin-based website that launched recently called HomeAway, which lists over 60,000 vacation rentals around the world -- their listings span something like 90 countries and [may] eventually include castles, chalets, chateaus, houseboats and yurts. It looks like a good deal for both vacationers and homeowners alike -- for the latter, listing your property costs about $300 per year and seems to take the hassle out of finding prospective......

President Bush recently added three high-profile Austinites to the President's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports, according to the Austin Business Journal: Paul Carrozza, founder of Run-Tex Susan Dell, uber-philanthropist and ironman (ironwoman?) athlete Andy Roddick, Austin Java-loitering tennis champ The members of the council will serve a two-year term, during which they're expected to advise the president on all matters concerning "physical fitness, physical activity and sports activities." Quoth Mrs. Dell, in a press......

Downtown's Frost Bank Tower is up for grabs, according to Austin Business Journal. Cousins Properties, based in Atlanta, is moving onto its next phase in the company's business strategy of developing and flipping properties. Not that this will have much impact on most of us: at exactly 515' 9" tall, 33-stories high and boasting an astounding 524,000 sq-ft of prime office space, the city's highest building is already leased at roughly 81% capacity. A......

Austin Business Journal reported today that, according to rankings published in the latest issue of Business 2.0, Austin comes out in fourth place in terms of projected job growth, among major cities with a population of over 1 million. Their findings, culled from government-collected data and the findings of international research company Global Insight Inc., further predict an astounding 24.7 percent growth in our local job market for the next decade. What's to account......

Just what you wanted to read about on a Tuesday afternoon, we know. But these toll roads, the gripe of many a Central Texan, seem to be pretty inevitable. The Austin Business Journal says that the TxTag will be the statewide-compatible tags to be used here in the Austin area. The TxTag website has a pretty map of the upcoming Austin-area toll roads and the sites for the future toll plazas. You can even......

A new mid-income housing subdivision in [Far] East Austin was approved by the Travis County Commissioners Court yesterday, paving the way for developers to construct the 1,343-home project that's identical to one already in Pflugerville. The so-called Villages of New Sweden would be so far out in the boondocks (FM 973 and New Sweden Church Road? We've no idea) that surrounding neighbors are worried this first wave of suburban sprawl might "hurt their property......

The Austin Wranglers, Austin's Arena Football League team, is looking into building a 14,000-seat arena. According to the Austin Business Journal, the team recently hired CSL Consulting Inc. of Dallas to do a study on whether the arena would make economic sense. Apparently the results showed that there is a demand for a venue of at least 10,000 seats to be built in the Austin suburbs. The Wranglers averaged just over 10,000 fans a......

Organizers of the Republic of Texas Biker Rally are dead-set on making your ears bleed and the City of Austin is all about it, baby. According to the Austin Business Journal, rally organizer Jerry Bragg has moved to Austin from Addison to focus his energies on making the RTBR one of the three biggest rallies in the country, right behind Daytona Beach and Sturgis. And Bragg has his sights set on a more immediate......

Remember how several weeks ago we told you about about the International Folk Alliance Conference being in town and all? Well, apparently, they were on to something. The Austin Business Journal is reporting that Texas Folklife Resources has received a $60,000 grant. The financial benevolence comes from the Meadows Foundation, a Dallas-Based philanthropy group. [from the Austin Business Journal]The funds will support TFR's marketing and development efforts for the next two years, and has......

Targeting two dozen establishments around the country, nonprofit music licensing outfit ASCAP (the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers) today issued a slew of lawsuits against nightclubs, bars and restaurants for alleged copyright infringements. The two Austin bars targeted were Spill (Sixth Street) and Nasty's (near UT), both now accused of playing "copyrighted works of ASCAP's songwriter, composer and music publisher members without gaining permission, resulting in lost income for the writers and......

Drawing upon the success of last year's art installation in Central Park, entitled The Gates -- the record of which is now displayed in the Austin Museum of Art's Christo and Jeanne-Claude exhibition (from the Würth Museum in Künzelsau, Germany) -- Whole Foods and Austin Green Art are sponsoring a similar art project in town. Only, rather than employing world-famous artists, the "Green Gates" exhibit is having local schoolkids doing the creating (from Austin......

According to a story in Tuesday's Austin Business Journal, Austin offers more free wireless availability than any city in the US except San Francisco. We wish they would have told us this while we were trying to find a place to check our email last week. Austin has 97 free hot spots, while San Francisco has 368, according to JiWire Inc., which ranked cities in the United States and around the world based on......

In their survey on the "state of emergency medicine" among the states, the American College of Emergency Physicians this week rated Texas as decently mediocre. Coming in at a paltry #21, we were nevertheless praised for our "the paragon for medical liability reform," which the Austin Business Journal attributes to our quarter-million dollar cap on noneconomic damages in liability awards and settlements for individual physicians, approved via last year's successful Prop 12. But while......

While construction at the new 825,000-square-foot, $200 million Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) campus on Southwest Parkway is already underway, the site won't be complete until 2007. Ever anxious to expand their dominion - and, we're guessing, to make it harder for the Save Our Springs Alliance to prevent their final move - the semiconductor powerhouse has signed a lease for temporary office space at Travis Oaks, where they're moving 200 employees. When all is......

Third time's supposed to be the charm, but someone forgot to tell Mister Carlin - the foul-mouthed funnyman has cancelled both of tomorrow's shows at the Paramount Theatre, making these the third and fourth appearances he's reneged on since January. From the Austin Business Journal: "We are as frustrated about this as you are," the theater said in an email to its patrons. "We will, however, do everything we can to assist you in......

Austin Business Journal reports that AMD today filed its official site plans for their new Southwest Austin corporate campus, dubbed "AMD Lone Star." The gargantuan 870,000 sq ft, $230 million complex will see the relocation of over 2,000 employees sometime in 2007. Located at the intersection of Southwest Parkway and William Cannon, the facilities will boast "four office buildings, three parking garages and the Lone Star Commons Building, which will include an employee cafeteria,......

The Austin Business Journal reports that The Long Center recently received an influx of $150,000 from international law firm Fulbright & Jaworski and the foundation side of health insurance giant Humana. The legal beagles ponied up $100k, and Humana gave $50k. This brings the Long Center's total committed amount to $67.7 million of the $77 million they need to raise. The Long Center will bring Austin's performance arts community into a whole 'nother realm......

Palos Verdes, California-based Center for Real Estate Studies today released its annual "Forecast of Increases in Apartment Rents and Median Sales Prices." The dryly-named report ranks the nation's top 37 markets for multifamily investing - Austin came in at ninth for growth potential over the next two years. From the Austin Business Journal: Austin's apartment rates are projected to expand at a 2.1 percent rate, making it the ninth-best market. The study projects the......

The local housing market continued its rapid growth last month, increasing over 30% versus the same time last year. Coupled with the slowly rising mortgage rates, Austinist thinks this is potentially bad news for those looking to buy a place in town. From the Austin Business Journal: Keeping in step with an Austin housing uptick, October 2005 single family home sales jumped almost 30 percent over the same period last year. According to the......