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Fort Worth City Hall Changes Address

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#1 John T Roberts

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Posted 24 January 2017 - 07:20 PM

I was on the City's website today for work and I noticed that tonight's City Council Meeting was listed as meeting at the Fort Worth City Hall at 200 Texas Street.  I did a little investigating and I found out that as of January 1st, the city changed the address of our City Hall to avoid confusion.  Previously the "new" City Hall and the "old" City Hall (now the Public Safety and Courts Building) had the same address of 1000 Throckmorton Street.  Now the buildings will have two different addresses and the physical address of the building will direct visitors to the south side of the building.  The address has been changed on the website.



#2 gdvanc

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Posted 25 January 2017 - 11:13 AM

Unfortunately the south side of the building isn't any more attractive.



#3 John T Roberts

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Posted 25 January 2017 - 11:52 AM

No, it is not, but the building was designed by a famous architect, Edward Durell Stone.



#4 Doohickie

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Posted 25 January 2017 - 04:38 PM

No, it is not, but the building was designed by a famous architect, Edward Durell Stone.

 

Fame can't save that building's aesthetics.  (Just my uninformed opinion.)


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#5 Bonfire98A

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Posted 26 January 2017 - 09:38 AM

If you Google Edward Durell Stone, you'll see he had quite a few designs that I think most of us would agree are far more interesting and aesthetically pleasing.  He was the primary architect for Radio City Music Hall of all places (though Donald Deskey was in charge of the art-deco interior).  

 

Considering what used to be on the site, the old 1896 Post Office (search the Jack White collection for pics), it's only karma that we ended up with the pile of crap that's there now.  It isn't even all that original; it's simply a scaled-down and simplified version of Boston City Hall.  

 

I used to work there too -- the building is very inefficient in how it's laid out; the ground floor is practically all atrium with relatively little usable space.  In fact, I always used to hear that the design and layout were originally intended for an art museum.

 

P.S.  One more thing -- City Hall's entry on the main site describes the "City Place Cafe" on the third floor.  This restaurant closed some years ago (it was more of a lunch line for city employees, though anyone could eat there).  I don't know if it was ever reopened, but you may want to confirm its status before updating the FWA page.



#6 JBB

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Posted 26 January 2017 - 02:44 PM

Someone refresh my memory: when there was discussion about addressing the city's space issues downtown a few years ago, wasn't there a proposal to fill in the atrium space with offices?



#7 gdvanc

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Posted 05 February 2017 - 01:50 PM

Wasn't Stone's later work less modernist? I don't hate modernist architecture in general, but I've never liked anything about that building. I may just be uneducated, though.



#8 John T Roberts

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Posted 05 February 2017 - 03:51 PM

Bonfire, I have deleted the listing because I haven't been able to confirm if the café is open or closed. 

 

JBB, there was discussion to fill in the atrium with two floors.  I believe it was determined that the area below the atrium was used as a return air plenum and would not allow the installation of columns within that space, and the existing structure was not sufficient to support the installation of trusses between the existing columns.  Therefore, that idea has been scrapped.

 

Gdvanc, I believe that you are correct about some of Stone's later works.  Don't feel bad about not liking the building. Several of Stone's modernist buildings in New York were some of the most disliked.  A few of them have been significantly remodeled to remove the Mid-Century Modern appearance.



#9 double

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Posted 28 February 2017 - 07:15 PM

What happened to the parking around City Hall? Was there a discussion at a council meeting about back-in parking? Or has a traffic engineer decided to experiment? I don't get it.

#10 John T Roberts

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Posted 28 February 2017 - 08:39 PM

The streets were resurfaced and the one way direction of Jennings was changed.  All of this occurred during the month of February.  Here's a link to the city's website letting us know about the changes:

 

http://fortworthtexa...king-City-Hall/



#11 Austin55

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Posted 02 March 2017 - 04:52 PM

I really like the new striping. Makes sense and seems good for Walker's and drivers alike.

#12 JBB

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Posted 06 March 2017 - 07:37 PM

My daughter had a cheer competition at the convention center on Saturday afternoon and I took advantage of the nearly vacant free parking on the newly striped Jennings Ave. to avoid the $20 parking in the CC garage.  So, it gets an A+ from me.  The striping at the intersection of Jennings-10th-Throckmorton was a little confusing from a pedestrian standpoint, but there was no foot or car traffic at all.



#13 John T Roberts

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Posted 06 March 2017 - 08:36 PM

I walked through the intersection of Texas, Jennings, 12th, & 13th on Friday night when I went to the Near Southside's Annual Banquet at the Omni Hotel.  I parked on 13th Street, next to the City Hall Parking garage.  I thought about parking on Jennings, but it appeared all of the spaces were taken.  I will get up to 10th and Jennings soon.



#14 John T Roberts

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Posted 04 June 2018 - 12:49 PM

More improvements are coming to the City Hall Building.  New vehicle barricades which will also double as benches will replace the concrete planters.  These benches will also be shaped like "Molly", the city's logo.  Channel 5 did a story on these changes, and below is a link to that story.

 

https://www.nbcdfw.c...-484481981.html



#15 Doohickie

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Posted 04 June 2018 - 04:02 PM

improvements are coming to the City Hall Building

 

There's no improving that sorry excuse for a building.  Ugh.


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#16 John T Roberts

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Posted 04 June 2018 - 06:23 PM

The last part of the article did state the city is considering building a new City Hall, and funding it with a bond election.







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