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Your A-List, Biggest Eyesore

By Michael Barnes | Wednesday, November 19, 2008, 06:16 PM

Sometimes at Your A-List, a category is created just for write-ins. Such is the case with Biggest Eyesore. And the five-way tie for the top spot indicates that people are irritated, but we aren’t exactly sure at what.

The Monarch, for instance, is a high-rise apartment executed in a safe, almost bland modernist style. The only possibly offensive elements are the wing-like structures on the top. Are they really eyesores? Given the context of other Austin high-rises, are the wings so out of character?

Another write-in: “empty strip malls, including the Arboretum.” Empty strip malls are usually sadder than full ones, sure. But is the Arboretum empty? Not the last time I checked. And even if it ever became so, how could you tell with its recessed shops and landscaped perimeters?

One reader wrote in “empty house near the dog park at Interstate 35 and Riverside.” That would be the historic Norwood estate, stripped of its ornaments and mothballed by a well-meaning group hoping to salvage it. It’s a mess now, but it’s really “in storage” until someone restores it.

Still another decries the condos going up behind Shady Grove. Fine, you are mad that the mobile homes and some trees are gone. But there’s no building there yet. How can a temporary construction site be a permanent eyesore?

The final “winner” is the most interesting: the Holly Street Power Plant. Here’s a decommissioned utility structure destined to be gutted and replaced with something more neighborhood friendly — a park. Why expend a vote on a dead building on its way out? Unless its simply to continue the political discussion of why it was built and maintained there in the first place. I suspect that’s the case.

You have spoken, but the message remains unclear when it comes to defining “eyesore.”

Photo: City council member Mike Martinez, left, and former Austin Energy general manager Juan Garza, right, look over an artist rendering of suggested park space that will eventually replace the Holly Street Plant

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By Chad

April 2, 2009 1:55 PM | Link to this

I believe because the Monarch changes all those horrid colors. Interestingly it is supposed to resemble the Monarch butterfly, which does not change colors and is one of the most basic colored butterflies.

By rob

November 19, 2008 7:56 PM | Link to this

What about the upper decks on I-35? Or I-35 through downtown? A disgrace to the city and the state, not to mention extremely dangerous.