Austin | Historic Images & Postcards - Page 63

H2O · #**1241** Posted **Jul 1, 2021, 7:10 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Urbannizer

awar fourth 2 by Bill Arbon, on Flickr

That is a huge crowd gathered around to admire my old Fiat 850 Spider.

Urbannizer · #**1242** Posted **Jul 15, 2021, 4:42 PM**

Austin in 2007

https://www.flickr.com/photos/everyt...er/51296867106

Urbannizer · #**1243** Posted **Jul 20, 2021, 1:31 AM**

Loop 360 under construction, 1980

https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comm...ion_site_1980/

drummer · #**1244** Posted **Jul 20, 2021, 3:08 PM**

Obviously not cost-efficient, but it would've been cool to have tunnels through that hill instead of slicing the top off.

KevinFromTexas · #**1245** Posted **Aug 9, 2021, 3:28 AM**

February 1978.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comm...h_from_4th_st/

Urbannizer · #**1246** Posted **Aug 17, 2021, 4:08 AM**

23rd & Guadalupe, early 1970's

P1110572 by Bill Arbon, on Flickr

the Genral · #**1247** Posted **Aug 17, 2021, 4:33 PM**

Ahhh, loved the baby blue and white cop muscle cars with the rotating roof rack lights.

Armybrat · #**1248** Posted **Aug 17, 2021, 8:04 PM**

And the HD trikes with the boxy trunks.

migol24 · #**1249** Posted **Aug 18, 2021, 6:47 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by KevinFromTexas

February 1978.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comm...h_from_4th_st/

Anybody here old enough to remember eating at that steak house?

This photo is really something. Austin looks different. I just don't know how to put it. The streets look much wider too.

KevinFromTexas · #**1250** Posted **Aug 18, 2021, 6:57 AM**

^The one glaring thing I notice that is different is the absence of trees. It's the one thing point I always bring up with people whenever they say the old Austin was better. I don't know about you, but that street doesn't look fun at the hottest part of the day in the summer. And you gotta remember, there were fewer skyscrapers then shading the street. Notice the One American Center is missing. The Bank of America Center on the right was the tallest in the city at the time. It was the only 300 footer on Congress back then.

drummer · #**1251** Posted **Aug 19, 2021, 3:12 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by KevinFromTexas

^The one glaring thing I notice that is different is the absence of trees. It's the one thing point I always bring up with people whenever they say the old Austin was better. I don't know about you, but that street doesn't look fun at the hottest part of the day in the summer. And you gotta remember, there were fewer skyscrapers then shading the street. Notice the One American Center is missing. The Bank of America Center on the right was the tallest in the city at the time. It was the only 300 footer on Congress back then.

Yeah, that's one thing I always notice with old photos of Austin - especially along the river. I never enjoy walking along asphalt and concrete canyons in other cities with absolutely no trees. Grateful for that part of Austin.

Lobotomizer · #**1252** Posted **Aug 19, 2021, 5:17 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by migol24

Anybody here old enough to remember eating at that steak house?

This photo is really something. Austin looks different. I just don't know how to put it. The streets look much wider too.

I used to eat at Ted's Greek Cafe in that same spot in the 90s. I think there was an Oscar Snowden's Appliance store next door.

We vs us · #**1253** Posted **Aug 19, 2021, 5:32 PM**

Pics of 70's downtowns are always fascinating because they're arguably one of the last times you could see downtown main streets functioning as a place of commerce for people of all socio-economic backgrounds. Stores and restaurants for everyone, really. In that pic you've got the Uniform Center, office furniture with a cool marquee sign, an Army Navy store next to the House of Jeans, banks further up near the Capitol, and of course the Steak House across the street, that I guarantee was more of a greasy spoon than a Capital Grille.

Dunno if you can truly call them egalitarian, but main streets really were still where everyone got their daily errands done.

Armybrat · #**1254** Posted **Aug 19, 2021, 10:55 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lobotomizer

I used to eat at Ted's Greek Cafe in that same spot in the 90s. I think there was an Oscar Snowden's Appliance store next door.

Oscar Snowden built a nice house on Parker Lane in Southeast Austin sometime in the late 1960s or early 1970s.
My kids went to school with some of his grandkids in NE Austin in the 1980s.

In the 1950s & ‘60s, the downtown Congress Avenue place to eat while out shopping with Mom was the Piccadilly Cafeteria.

Urbannizer · #**1255** Posted **Aug 25, 2021, 5:13 AM**

3rd & Lavaca, October 1983

Tom Burke Photo Missouri Pacific Freight Station Lavaca and 3rd Street Austin TX October 1983 by Tom Burke, on Flickr

4th Street looking east, 1983

Tom Burke Photo MoPac Street Trackage Looking East on 4th Street Austin TX October 1983 #2 by Tom Burke, on Flickr

MoPac Street Trackage Looking East on 4th Street Austin TX October 1983 #1 by Tom Burke, on Flickr

KevinFromTexas · #**1256** Posted **Aug 25, 2021, 5:38 AM**

See. Now, I just don't get it when some people pine for those times. Sure, I loved the 80s, but that looks pretty blah. When people say Austin was beautiful back then, I'm not sure they were talking about physical appearance. It also looks like there was hardly anyone around, so I'd wager it wasn't too popular. The favorite hangout spots back then were far less widespread than they are now. There were a lot more spaces in between where people just didn't go, not even because crime was high, which it sort of was, but more because there just wasn't anything there. That was back when the warehouse district really was a warehouse district.

H2O · #**1257** Posted **Aug 25, 2021, 1:17 PM**

That is actually 3rd Street. That is La Pena building in the foreground on the corner, and the Whitley Printing Plant at 3rd and Brazos (now the Whitley Apartments).

The ATX · #**1258** Posted **Aug 25, 2021, 1:22 PM**

That was back when malls were the place to be. Glad things reversed.

drummer · #**1259** Posted **Aug 25, 2021, 2:26 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by KevinFromTexas

See. Now, I just don't get it when some people pine for those times. Sure, I loved the 80s, but that looks pretty blah. When people say Austin was beautiful back then, I'm not sure they were talking about physical appearance. It also looks like there was hardly anyone around, so I'd wager it wasn't too popular. The favorite hangout spots back then were far less widespread than they are now. There were a lot more spaces in between where people just didn't go, not even because crime was high, which it sort of was, but more because there just wasn't anything there. That was back when the warehouse district really was a warehouse district.

I'm with you. Though I can't say that from experience....wasn't alive in '83. Pretty close-ish.

KevinFromTexas · #**1260** Posted **Aug 26, 2021, 1:04 AM**

Oh, yeah, I forgot that was 3rd and not 4th. The old train depot used to be at 3rd & Congress. Long gone before my time, but that's where it was - southeast corner of that intersection. I remember us going to see the Southern Pacific engine number 786, which would become the Hill Country Flyer. That would have been about 1990 I'm guessing? We have a video of us going somewhere on VHS.