The Canoe Conundrum

Howard Barnett and his wife have operated Town Lake's canoe concession since 1969, but appear to have been outbid for the contract this year. (Photo By John Anderson)

Hippies, naturalists, and trail-mix munchers, take note: Today, City Council is expected to approve a five-year contract (with two five-year extensions) for freshly formed Zilker Park Canoe and Kayak to run the city's canoe rental concession. If they do, the winning company, an offshoot of rowboat and kayak vendor Rowing Dock, will pull the paddles out from under the city's longtime concessionaire Dec. 19. "We're the ones that started this," said Howard Barnett, proprietor of Zilker Park Boat Rentals. "The city seems inclined to throw away our 36-year marriage for something more shiny and brighter, supposedly."

Barnett's modest business consists of some 60 canoes and 30 kayaks, a cash box, and a small, portable green shed – which sits in the flood plain on the southern side of Town Lake, beneath Zilker parking and a children's playscape – as permanent construction isn't permitted. He has run the private business since 1969, when he took his proposal to the city. When his last concession contract – covering the last 10 years – expired in September, however, he wasn't the only one applying to manage the site. The Rowing Dock's Rachel Thomas was also competing. "There was never anything like it before we started," she said of her own rowing concession across the lake, opened in May of 1999. "We had bid on another site and got this site that had nothing; we had to build all the docks."

Eager to further build on success, Thomas' proposal to manage canoe concessions placed first when graded on the city's five-category matrix; Barnett and his co-founder, wife Dorothy, placed third. "The current concession is a sitting duck" in the city's process, said Barnett, irked that only 10% of scoring is allotted for experience, on which, ironically, Rowing Dock outscored him.

Barnett's proposed revamps to his business – small improvements like a self-guided tour, a weather warning network, and a life vest requirement – were outflanked by the winning proposal. "We know what works and what doesn't," said Barnett, characterizing the winning proposal as outlandish, wishful thinking unlikely to be implemented. To which Thomas responded, "He is speculating, and he has no clue what we have planned." While Thomas' plan was still embargoed when the Chronicle spoke with her, aspects of her proposal have since appeared online in the Parks Department's recommendation for council action; they include placing the site's storage building above flood level, as well as adding a portable floating dock to the creek, electricity to power safety lights, and 10 clear, see-through canoes. "Everything that's in the proposal is going to happen," she said. "The proof is [what we did] at Rowing Dock."

While acknowledging the Barnetts' work over the years, Thomas said, "As a concessionaire, I have to keep up with my business; I have to keep up with things. I understand what the parameters are getting into this. You set up knowing you may only have a number of years. You don't have it for life."

Rosemary Castleberry, chair of the Parks and Recreation Board that recommended the decision, concurred – adding, however, that some on the board were sad to cast their vote. "It's very painful to them to not have been chosen," Castleberry said. "But the department handles [the decision] very carefully; it's a business decision."

Shuffling around Zilker Boats one recent morning, Barnett responded to another criticism – shoddy environmental stewardship. At the creek bed's edge, gnarled tree roots are exposed to the elements, their ground giving way to erosion. Barnett maintains he's done all he can. "This is an artificial thing here," he said, referring to the excavated land running along the creek bed. Barnett implied the city has done little to help him combat the erosion. "This is the most ignored place in the city, but it's one of the most used," he said. "This area has experienced three catastrophic floods in the last four years. We're talking to the base of that tree." He was pointing at a leafless tree standing on a slope some 20 feet above water. He said he's replaced all the gravel to fight further erosion, but lamented, "there's just so much you can do."

"If there is a soul of Austin, the couple that started this are in there," said David Schroeder, a six-year employee of the Barnetts, who was manning the stand that morning. Stubbled and clad in colorful cotton pants seemingly off Oat Willie's rack, Schroeder warned that two-person kayaks cost $5 more at Rowing Dock than Barnett's $10-an-hour rentals. "That place is for the rowers and the yuppies. This is the people's canoe rental," he said.

While Thomas agrees that Rowing Dock has a different atmosphere from Zilker Boats, she says the canoe concession will be "a separate entity. It's not patterned after Rowing Dock. We're keeping the two completely separate."

Aside from the Zilker turf war – competitive rowers vs. everlovin', abiding canoers – the Barnetts' predicament is a microcosm of the city's ongoing quandary of seemingly ceaseless growth, striving to balance innovation with the sacrosanct ideal of Old Austin. No one doubts that demand on the city's waterways has exponentially increased since Howard Barnett submitted his original two-page proposal to PARD. While all the parties involved recognize this, today's decision will, unfortunately, either keep those new plans from docking, or – more likely – send the Barnetts out to sea. "It is what it is," said Barnett, surveying his site. "I've always been able to fight off everybody until now."