Austin | ATX Tower (321 West 6th) | 675 Feet | 58 Floors | Complete

[The ATX]

I marked this complete because move-ins have started - despite the fact that they look to be replacing falling window glass for quite some time.

[BrBlu]

Well maybe we should be thankful the railings were changed to metal haha

[Urbannizer]

I believe glass came off the building today even though they removed the scaffolding here recently. Street is currently taped off to traffic and pedestrians.m

Edit: Just walked by and there’s glass shattered across the entire area in front of the building.

[chinchaaa]

What a joke! This contractor should never get another gig in Austin again.

[Urbannizer]

Originally Posted by chinchaaa

What a joke! This contractor should never get another gig in Austin again.

This is the 6th occurrence and residents now live in the building. I think the city should really press the developer to come up with a permanent fix for this issue.

[ahealy]

I can't believe an ugly VE'd tower is falling apart. what ! ?

[Nickelplate]

Originally Posted by ahealy

I can't believe an ugly VE'd tower is falling apart. what ! ?

For the safety of the masses at street level and to continue the ve theme glass removal is required. Continue the garage screening all the way up. Embrace the imprisoned vibe. Or even better block it all in and paint it eggshell. I mean safety comes first people!

[ahealy]

Originally Posted by Nickelplate

For the safety of the masses at street level and to continue the ve theme glass removal is required. Continue the garage screening all the way up. Embrace the imprisoned vibe. Or even better block it all in and paint it eggshell. I mean safety comes first people!

tbh I wouldn't put it past the city to green light something like that. They'd just put a mural on it and call it a day.

[Urbannizer]

PNC Bank moving it's Austin HQ into the building; gets signage rights.

https://www.bizjournals.com/austin/news/...x_testVariant=cx_21&cx_artPos=1#cxrecs_s

[clubtokyo]

That is awesome! Love that we will have a lighted PNC logo.

[Apankow]

CBS Austin just ran a news hit on multiple other issues in the building.

Originally Posted by ahealy

I can't believe an ugly VE'd tower is falling apart. what ! ?

[ahealy]

Originally Posted by Apankow

CBS Austin just ran a news hit on multiple other issues in the building.

Good. This whole project is unacceptable. Kudos to the residents for documenting everything and going to the news....I've found 311 to be mostly useless, though issues should still be properly filed with them.

Time for Austin City Council to tighten the belt on what gets approved. Jesus.

[wwmiv]

Originally Posted by ahealy

Good. This whole project is unacceptable. Kudos to the residents for documenting everything and going to the news....I've found 311 to be mostly useless, though issues should still be properly filed with them.

Time for Austin City Council to tighten the belt on what gets approved. Jesus.

Austin governance is a complete and total disaster. Literally nothing (311 included) actually functions or follows through outside of 911.

Furthermore:

I think this is yet another piece of strong evidence that the city needs to shape up its act AND that the city needs to put its foot down on poor construction quality and design—it becomes a public safety hazard when buildings are constructed at this quality at this size en masse

… which is something that the private market is never going to solve.

If it was correct for northeastern cities to step in and prevent the types of slums that developers created in the 1890s-1920s, then it’s time we step up and prevent the types of shanties that developers are creating now in the 1990s-2020s.

[ahealy]

Originally Posted by wwmiv

Austin governance is a complete and total disaster. Literally nothing (311 included) actually functions or follows through outside of 911.

Furthermore:

I think this is yet another piece of strong evidence that the city needs to shape up its act AND that the city needs to put its foot down on poor construction quality and design—it becomes a public safety hazard when buildings are constructed at this quality at this size en masse

… which is something that the private market is never going to solve.

If it was correct for northeastern cities to step in and prevent the types of slums that developers created in the 1890s-1920s, then it’s time we step up and prevent the types of shanties that developers are creating now in the 1990s-2020s.

You are totally correct about all of this.

I think this building might be the fever break though. For far too long, Austin has been desperate for development of any kind. "look we have a super tall -- the skyline has grown leaps and bounds, blah blah blah". None of that matters in the long run if the finished products are made of shit / look like shit.

I just hate the idea of our downtown aging horribly compared to Dallas / Houston / SA in 20-30 years.

[wwmiv]

I’d love to go back and find all of the pushback against this idea on this forum over the years and make a grand post quoting every single other forumers’ thoughts against this and simply ask, given the new reports:

And you still think I’m wrong?

But that would be hundreds of posts across dozens of flash points—hours of work that would end up being pointless: pointless because you can’t convince a scared ostrich named Plato to see anything other than the dark walls of the burrow it has shoved its head inside of.

[Riverranchdrone]

In all reality. This problem is not unique to Austin. This happens in every city. A quick google search for glass falling from buildings just this year alone has happened in Houston, San Francisco, Chicago, Toronto. Yeah, this building has a lot of problems. But it seems more like its localized to a single shotty building rather than an entire city of Austin problem.

[Apankow]

With so many towers going up at once I think we had a higher risk for issues like this. It is hard to train so many tradespeople on this unique construction style at once.

Originally Posted by Riverranchdrone

In all reality. This problem is not unique to Austin. This happens in every city. A quick google search for glass falling from buildings just this year alone has happened in Houston, San Francisco, Chicago, Toronto. Yeah, this building has a lot of problems. But it seems more like its localized to a single shotty building rather than an entire city of Austin problem.

[paul78701]

Originally Posted by ahealy

You are totally correct about all of this.

I think this building might be the fever break though. For far too long, Austin has been desperate for development of any kind. "look we have a super tall -- the skyline has grown leaps and bounds, blah blah blah". None of that matters in the long run if the finished products are made of shit / look like shit.

I just hate the idea of our downtown aging horribly compared to Dallas / Houston / SA in 20-30 years.

To me, this sounds more like an issue with poor workmanship than having anything to do with what the city approved. It would also seem that the issues outlined should have been caught during the post-build inspection process, which again, should have little to do with what the city approved.

[ahealy]

Originally Posted by paul78701

To me, this sounds more like an issue with poor workmanship than having anything to do with what the city approved. It would also seem that the issues outlined should have been caught during the post-build inspection process, which again, should have little to do with what the city approved.

Maybe I'm wanting to place blame somewhere? I suppose I don't know exactly how the sausage is made when it comes to CC saying "whoa whoa whoa, this project is lacking and won't be green lit as-is".

Ugly towers aren't exclusive to Austin, I just wish our limited remaining lots had quality stunners sprouting.

[Riverranchdrone]

Who is responsible for the inspections? How many times before the build was completed should this have been caught? There is a blame here. Someone failed. Multiple people failed at their intended job.