UTSA set to demolish Texas Pavilion
One of the last remaining buildings erected for the 1968 World’s Fair will be demolished, ending a yearslong battle over its fate and potentially clearing the way for a new arena for the Spurs.
The University of Texas at San Antonio said Wednesday it will demolish the Texas Pavilion structure at Hemisfair and build a new home for the Institute of Texan Cultures either near the Alamo or at the university’s Southwest Campus.
To pay for it, the university will seek proposals for developing the 13 ⅓ -acre site the museum has occupied at 801 E. César E. Chávez Blvd., which has been floated as a possible location for a Spurs arena.
“The building itself has been an albatross to the museum,” UTSA President Taylor Eighmy said during a recent meeting with the San Antonio Express-News editorial board. “You have to separate what the museum can be and what the building can or cannot be.”
The 180,000-square-foot building, which was erected for the World’s Fair to showcase the state’s history and cultures, is deteriorating. It’s also larger than necessary for the museum, whose exhibits are outdated and suffering declining visitation since the pandemic. University officials have said renovating it would be prohibitively costly.
Constructing a smaller, modern museum at a different location in the downtown area would be less expensive, could generate more foot traffic and make it easier to seek accreditation that would allow for programming such as rotating Smithsonian Institution exhibits, they said.
To make way for demolition in summer 2025, the Institute of Texan Cultures will close in May and temporarily relocate to 8,500 square feet on the first floor of the Frost Tower starting in early 2025. Objects and archives not on display there will be stored in about 25,000 square feet of climate-controlled storage space.
Possible locations
UTSA officials are weighing two locations for its new home. Their preferred option is a lot behind the Crockett Hotel at Bonham and Crockett streets. The other is a block bounded by Navarro, Augusta and North St. Mary’s streets and Richmond Avenue at the university’s Southwest Campus, the former home of the Southwest School of Art.
Building the museum would cost $103.5 million, UTSA says, with an annual budget gap of $2.6 million on the site near the Crockett Hotel and a budget gap of $2.1 million at the Southwest Campus location. The campus option is less expensive because UTSA owns the land.
In the fall, the university entered into a memorandum of understanding with Crockett Hotel owner 1859 Historic Hotels Ltd. and the city to evaluate the feasibility of building a 65,000-square-foot museum and parking garage with 575 spaces at the Crockett property. The study is expected to wrap up by the end of this month.
University officials prefer the Crockett site because they expect the museum would draw more visitors there due to its proximity to the Alamo, River Walk and future Alamo Visitor Center. The museum has averaged about 27,000 visitors annually in the past two years, while the Alamo draws more than 2.5 million annually.
UTSA could also make money from the parking garage, though its ownership, operation and maintenance is still being determined. The garage would include offices for park rangers and Alamo staff and provide parking for visitors to the Alamo, Crockett Hotel and other destinations as well as the museum.
Keeping the museum in the Texas Pavilion and renovating the building would cost $177.5 million with an annual budget gap of $11 million, according to the university’s projections. The building is in poor condition, with a backlog of $7 million worth of maintenance problems. The air conditioning system has been broken for six months and the museum is renting chillers to get by. There’s mold on some exhibits.
“We’re spending a lot of money for no one to visit the museum,” Eighmy said.
Historic significance
The Texas Pavilion’s demolition is likely to be met with disappointment from the Conservation Society of San Antonio and residents who are loathe to see it torn down.
Many have fond memories of visiting the museum on school trips or during festivals.
Society officials couldn’t be reached for comment.
The organization is working to have the building listed on the National Register of Historic Places, arguing it’s worthy because of its connection to HemisFair ’68 and its brutalist architecture. The building was designed by Houston architectural firm Caudill, Rowlett and Scott and resembles an inverted pyramid.
It’s also connected to a trailblazing Mexican American architect. William “Willie” M. Peña helped create the building’s unique structure, which pays homage to Mesoamerican temples, Sarah Zenaida Gould, executive director of the Mexican American Civil Rights Institute, wrote in an op-ed for the Express-News. Peña thrived when there were few Mexican Americans in his profession, she wrote.
Placement on the National Register does not prevent a building from being razed. It does make a building eligible for historic tax credits for rehabilitation.
UTSA officials said they’re exploring ways to pay homage to the Texas Pavilion at the museum’s new home, such as creating an area to showcase the “Faces and Places of Texas” dome show.
“There is huge empathy and feelings for why the Texas Pavilion is endeared to many,” Eighmy said. “Unfortunately, we cannot afford to bring it up to speed so we can inhabit it and operate out of it, never mind getting it accredited. It’s throwing good money after something that obviously has an emotional connection for some in our community. We have to make a hard decision: What is best for having a vibrant, immersive, engaged ITC for the next 50 years that tells the stories that need to be told?”
The future of the Texas Pavilion and the museum have been in limbo for years.
In 2016, the University of Texas System asked developers to submit proposals for a mixed-use project at the property, a move opposed by people angered that community input wasn’t sought. In the wake of that controversy, UTSA launched what it called “ITC Centennial 2068,” an effort aimed at setting the path for the museum’s next 50 years.
The university set up a steering committee and task forces to evaluate options for the museum and the property it occupies and asked for feedback from residents as well as firms that focus on museums, architecture and real estate development.
Three scenarios emerged: moving the Institute to another location at Hemisfair, moving it to a place outside Hemisfair or renovating the original building.
UTSA hired firms to conduct assessments of the Texas Pavilion and financial analyses of the three options.
Spurs arena
The possibility of the Spurs constructing an arena at the museum property first surfaced last year.
Moving to Hemisfair would bring the team back to its home for its first 20 seasons. It would also be the apex of the city’s yearslong transformation of the World’s Fair site into a gathering place with public parks, apartments, restaurants, stores and a hotel.
The city has been quietly working to relocate the team from the Frost Bank Center as part of efforts to reinvigorate downtown in the wake of the pandemic. The East Side facility was built in 2002 and, according to many, no longer stacks up against rivals’ arenas. Spurs officials have stayed mum about the possibility, and couldn’t be reached for comment Wednesday.
The San Antonio Missions baseball team, which was acquired by a group of local owners in 2022, is also eyeing moving to the center city from its West Side home at Wolff Stadium. The team is under a deadline from Major League Baseball to upgrade the stadium to league standards or construct a new one.
According to sources familiar with the matter, a city official discouraged the Missions’ owners last year from pursuing the museum site as a location for a new ballpark, likely because City Hall was contemplating it as a new home for the Spurs.
In February, the UT Board of Regents conditionally approved a plan to lease or sell the property to the city. The board did not discuss it in public, but the meeting agenda said the transaction was for a “potential downtown revitalization project.” A city spokesperson said only that the proximity to Hemisfair would provide development opportunities and noted the city is in the process of renovating the Alamodome and expanding the Henry B. González Convention Center nearby.
Asked about a Spurs arena, Eighmy said the university would have to work through its process to determine the property’s future. It plans to issue a request for proposals for redeveloping the property this fall, begin razing the Texas Pavilion next summer and finish the museum’s new building in 2029 or 2030.
“We want to get on with the business of having the ITC that our community deserves,” he said.
The city has an option period giving it the exclusive right of first refusal to move forward in negotiations with UTSA, said university spokesperson Joe Izbrand. That stretch of time will end as UTSA finishes razing the Texas Pavilion and finalizing its analysis for the property, which would need to be finished before putting out a request for proposals.
“This process allows us to keep our options open to achieve the most financially beneficial use of the land to support the new museum,” Izbrand said.