Into Downtown’s Tunnels, A Horror Story

From time to time we’ve revisited the damage done to downtown Dallas by Montreal urban planner Vincent Ponte, who proposed in the June 1968 issue of Esquire that downtown Dallas bury its businesses underground — a decision then-Dallas Mayor Laura Miller referred to in The New York Times in ’05…

Schutze, It’s Your Trinity Too, Ya Know

Just saw this hot-off-the-virtual-presses release about a February 8 wingding at The Trinity Trust concerning the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge opening-week ceremonies scheduled for October. As you’ll note, there’s a photo of Gail Thomas, Lyda Hill and Lynn McBee standing next to a placard bearing the new slogan: “It’s My…

Is Fort Worth’s Star-Telegram Now a Newspaper Without a Home?

Just got off the phone with Jim Witt, executive editor of the Star-Telegram, who pointedly did not deny this morning’s hot rumor — that the Fort Worth newspaper’s building, which has been on the market since September 2008, has been sold and the staff told to work from home. Sheesh…

Dallas, An “American Icon”

On Christmas Eve afternoon, radio-radio’s Julia Barton stopped by the offices to interview Schutze and me for an episode of Public Radio International’s Studio 360, which is hosted by Kurt Andersen. Barton had been tasked with doing a piece on Dallas as part of the show’s “American Icons” series, which,…

Inside the Statler. Like, Yesterday.

I’ve tried several times in recent weeks to reach Plano attorney Tom Keen, who reps the Hong Kong consortium that owns the Statler Hilton downtown, but so far, no luck. Not only do Friends of Unfair Park ask, oh, once or twice a week about the place, but Keen has…

Also, The Many Hairstyles of Bobbie Wygant

Bobbie Wygant’s 2011 Coming Soon Film Reel from Atombomb.tv on Vimeo.Our pal Erik Clapp, keeper of the Bobbie Wygant Archive, just sent this most watchable teaser featuring little look-sees at classic interviews he’s in the process of restoring before posting to the site. Good Lord, that’s an estimable roster of…

Atmos Complex Just Got More Afforable

I’ll leave it to Schutze, who’s covered this subject at great length, to explain precisely how Larry and Ted Hamilton wound up including more affordable-housing units in their Atmos Complex project downtown. Perhaps Jim will do so as early as tomorrow morning, when, I see here, the Downtown Connection Tax…

For Your Weekend Listening Pleasure: Me

Those two women above, of course, are Faith Hill and Chrissie Hynde, the latter of whom was my first rock-and-roll crush. That was taken yesterday at the Verizon Theater in Grand Prairie, where, tonight at 9 p.m., the former Audrey Perry and the Great Pretender will perform in front of…

Now It’s “A Debacle”?

While I was writing the DART item below, about 29 Friends of Unfair Park forwarded along the freshest of hot-off-the-press tweets from Sports Illustrated’s Peter King:I’m telling you: I-30 between Dallas + Fort Worth is a plow-less, snow-windswept moonscape. This is officially a debacle.At this very moment, King and Mike…

Super Bowl XLV Media Party: My Top 10 Observer-ations

10. The House of Blues put on a pretty nifty show, but $30 for valet parking? I was as gouged as I was cold. 9. After gorging on sausage, blackened catfish, brisket, fajitas, beans-n-rice and then repeating the process, I will not be eating today. 8. I’ve never even met…