New Life for Seaholm Power Plant?

The long-empty Seaholm Intake Building and surrounding park space is one step closer to a new lease on life.

On Monday, the Austin Parks Foundation, The Trail Foundation, and the city’s Parks and Recreation Department released their design recommendation for the lakefront hub. The proposed plan incorporates elements from the three options presented by Studio Gang, the architecture and urban design firm hired to produce an adaptable, long-range, and sustainable planning study of the property. The final design seeks to make the space usable for day-to-day activities and community events with landscape improvements, flexible lawn space with an event pavilion and amenity porch, water access points, trail improvements, and a outdoor amphitheater. The plan preserves the building’s historic roots, and the three entities said they remain committed to working with the community and local experts to restore and diversify the area ecology.

Built in the Fifties as the Seaholm Power Plant’s pump house, the city decommissioned the intake building in the mid-Nineties. It has sat vacant ever since, though transforming the building and surrounding area for parkland and community space has been the city’s long-term goal. Studio Gang’s $450,000 study was conducted over the last year and included site research, review of former planning efforts, more than four dozen community workshops and open houses, and over 1,000 online survey responses. The city said on Monday that early phase work – such as safety requirements and code compliance improvements – could begin soon, but the majority of work will happen over the coming years. Various city commissions and boards are expected to review the proposed plan this summer.