Austin Texas is Booming

Austin is situated in south-central Texas, 100 miles north of San Antonio on I-35. The pretty Hill Country is due west, the Gulf of Mexico a few hours east. The Colorado River (not to be confused with the more famous waterway of the same name, the one that eroded the Grand Canyon) forms the southern edge of downtown. Shoal and Waller creeks, both Colorado River tributaries, hem the city to the east and west. Congress Avenue splits downtown in half and ascends to the pink granite state capital dome [www.tspb.state.tx.us/spb/capitol/texcap.htm], a good place to start a visit.

Austin is a progressive town in a largely conservative state. Its recent political past is colorful and has launched several governors to national prominence – or at least national notoriety. In 2009, for instance, Gov. Rick Perry threatened to secede Texas from the union because of the Obama administration’s proposed spending increases, but support for the political stunt came from conservative cities like Dallas – not, as locals are quick to point out, Austin. And one witty former governor, Ann W. Richards, a blue-dog Democrat, famously proclaimed that her successor, George W. Bush, was “born with a silver foot in his mouth.” At the state capitol building, a free tour highlights historically inaccurate but nevertheless compelling oil paintings in the senate and house chambers. Lyndon B. Johnson grew up west of Austin, and his presidential library [www.lbjlib.utexas.edu] is located on the 350-acre University of Texas campus. Designed by Philip Johnson, it is a striking modern building that holds 45 million documents.

Like state government, UT plays a major role in civic life, and not just on the six fall Saturdays when more than 100,000 Longhorn fans wrapped in burnt-orange squeeze into Darrel K. Royal Memorial Stadium. In addition to the LBJ Library, highlights at UT include the architecture and planning library, Battle Hall [www.lib.utexas.edu/apl/battle-hall-0], which like most campus buildings closely follows a Spanish-influenced master plan. Battle Hall is an excellent place to read a book. Guadalupe Avenue (“The Drag”) borders campus to the west, and it’s busy with students ducking in and out of bookstores, coffee shops, restaurants and friendly dive bars like the Hole in the Wall [www.holeinthewallaustin.com]. There are several museums on campus, notably the Harry Ransom Center [www.hrc.utexas.edu], which has a Gutenberg Bible and the world’s first photograph (1826, of a French street, by Joseph Niecephore Niecepe), and the Blanton Museum of Art [www.blantonmuseum.org], which boasts a strong American West collection.

Austin’s music scene is wild. Clubs are scattered across town, and the internationally renowned SXSW music festival [www.sxsw.com] is held every March. Wristbands for the nine-day festival are expensive – prices begin at $550. But country, Americana and blues music are year-round Austin obsessions. Many clubs do not charge a cover, but tipping musicians is encouraged. Street-corner jug bands and rogue drum lines sometimes provide the soundtrack to a stroll up South Congress Avenue. Clubs like Antone’s [www.antones.frontgatetickets.com], Emo’s [www.emosaustin.com], the Continental Club [www.continentalclub.com], the Broken Spoke [www.brokenspokeaustintx.com]and Threadgills [www.threadgills.com] support local acts ranging from Willie Nelson and Dale Watson to Spoon and the Weary Boys. Two newspapers, the daily Austin American-Statesman [www.statesman.com] and the fiercely independent Austin Chronicle [www.austinchronicle.com], a weekly, both have good music listings. KUT (90.5 FM) [www.kut.org] is an excellent local radio station, and Austin City Limits [www.pbs.org/austin] is taped at a new downtown television studio in the W Hotel.

In a city that values good cinema – think “Dazed and Confused” and “Bottlerocket” – as much as roots music, catching a movie at the Alamo Drafthouse [www.drafthouse.com], where you can eat spaghetti and drink microbrews from your seat, constitutes a pleasant Austin evening. There are four locations in town.

Several good museums are located on or near Congress Avenue: the Mexic-Arte Museum, the Arthouse at the Jones Center and the quaint O. Henry Museum. Every fall the Mexic-Arte museum [www.mexic-artemuseum.org] hosts an excellent Day of the Dead exhibit. Across the street, the Arthouse [www.arthousetexas.org] is also worth a visit. Opened in 1998, it highlights emerging Texas artists, while the O. Henry Museum [www.ci.austin.tx.us/parks/ohenry.htm] is a turn-of-the-century home dedicated to the master of the short story. Surprising for a city that values art so highly, the Austin Museum of Art lacks a decent space and a good collection.

If shopping is your bag, then Austin is your town. Just south of downtown is South Congress Avenue, which in the 1990s was one of the first places in town to gentrify. It’s home to boutiques and one of the best vintage antique stores in the country, Uncommon Objects [www.uncommonobjects.com], which divides is collection of aged treasures by color – lipstick red, olive green, navy blue, etc. Allen’s [www.allensboots.com] sells leather cowboy boots, and Friends of Sound [www.friendsofsound.com] sells vinyl records. If shopping wears you down, pop your head into the aluminum Air Stream trailers that line Congress and sell homemade cupcakes and ice cream. About two miles away on the corner of Sixth and Lamar is Austin’s best music store (Waterloo Records) [www.waterloorecords.com] and bookstore (Book People) [www.bookpeople.com]. Both are independent giants.

 Area code for Austin is 512