Lauren Drewes Daniels
Audio By Carbonatix
At best, Dallas City Hall is an architecturally significant civic structure that has housed the city government for close to 50 years and featured as a backdrop in Robocob. At its worst, critics argue, the I.M. Pei-designed structure is a deteriorating eyesore, unworthy of a $1 billion-plus renovation bill, and should be demolished to make way for redevelopment, namely a potential new home for the Dallas Mavericks.
The debate over whether the city of Dallas should relocate from the building has turned City Council meetings into veritable showdowns, complete with hours of public comment. The jury is still out on the building’s long-term future, but in the meantime, the space around it is set to turn into another kind of battleground next month.
On April 18, runners known as “Spartans” will take over the property at 1500 Marilla Street (apparently prime real estate for sporting events). Instead of buttons and printed T-shirts urging officials to “Save Dallas City Hall,” belligerents in this struggle will don trail shoes as they navigate what a release describes as a five-kilometer “fast, high-intensity obstacle course.”
The race will take runners throughout Dallas’ urban core and set them against 20 obstacles, including rope climbs, wall traverses and heavy carries. While City Hall Plaza will serve as home plate for the race, it is unclear whether the structure’s deteriorating roof, a waterlogged third-level basement recently described by a council member as a “swamp,” or crowds of angry preservationists will be among the obstacles.
The Spartan Race is being organized by a Boston-based company that hosts hundreds of similar events each year. Spartan courses, despite the foreboding name, could be considered comparatively approachable compared to some of the company’s other offerings, like the 72-hour-plus Death Race, which appears significantly easier than making a decision on City Hall at this point.
Competitors in the Dallas race are looking at a course with an average completion time slightly over 90 minutes, according to the company’s website.
Past Spartan races have required competitors to crawl under barbed wire and jump over an open fire, and while those weren’t mentioned in a release, both sound pretty civil compared to some of the things happening in city government right now. And just like any good City Council meeting, there will be an area in the plaza set up for spectators. It remains to be seen if any will be invited to offer public comment before the race starts.
The first, “elite” group of runners will be released at 7 a.m, with heats following through 1 p.m. Also, it’s easier to become a Spartan than you might expect: no armor required, just online registration. Parking won’t be available on the plaza during the event, and judging from the report council members received in February, you may want to avoid the parking garage.
Council members still have to decide City Hall’s future. Maybe they can take a lesson from the Spartan Race as runners compete to overcome persistent obstacles en route to a corporate-sponsored finish line.
