(Editor’s Note: This story was updated at 4:49 p.m. on Sunday, Jan. 15, to reflect that local businesses mostly shut down at 9 p.m., not 8 p.m., and that there would be about 800 cars an hour on Fitzhugh Road before and after an event, not 8,000.)
‘It’s a cluster all the way around’
DRIPPING SPRINGS – Several residents are not welcoming the idea of a proposed music venue near their homes.
California developer Blizexas LLC is planning to bring a 5,000-seat concert venue to the Dripping Springs/Austin area off Fitzhugh Road. The developer is looking to design a space similar to that of its 2,500-seat open-air venue, Mountain Winery, in Saratoga in California.
Photo by Natalie Frels
California developer Blizexas is looking to build a music venue off Fitzhugh Road in the Dripping Springs/Austin area, causing several neighboring residents to express their concerns.[/caption]
“We have been looking at the Austin area for a number of years,” said Bill LeClerc, director of real estate and investments for Lexor Investments, the parent company of Blizexas. “We decided on this location because part of what is important to us is having a natural setting that we could build our concept in.”
While LeClerc ensured that his team is planning to follow state and county regulatory guidelines to operate, residents are still hesitant. Some even formed the Stop Fitzhugh Concert Venue Coalition in opposition.
A Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) public hearing was held on Nov. 29 to discuss the municipal wastewater permit application proposed by Blizexas LLC. The applicant requested authorization to dispose of treated wastewater at a final-phase daily average flow not to exceed 12,000 gallons per day via a subsurface drip irrigation system with a minimum area of 2.75 acres of public access land, according to TCEQ.
The wastewater treatment facility and disposal site are proposed to be located approximately 0.25 miles east of the intersection of Crumley Ranch Road and Fitzhugh Road and in the drainage basin of Barton Creek in Segment No. 1430 of the Colorado River Basin.
One of the major concerns that residents have expressed is the negative impact the venue may have on Barton Creek, which is one of the area’s beloved resources.
“When there is any type of overflow from this drip irrigation system, whether it be from rain, excess usage [or] worn away soil, there are two main waterways in which it exits the septic fields,” said resident Carrie Napiorkowski. “One is through Shield Ranch, which is a 6,400-acre nature preservatory, that butts up against this property. It drains through the property and enters right into Barton Creek. The other exit is directly down Fitzhugh Road that runs down the road and then also ends up in Barton Creek.”
The proposed site is not in the city limits of Dripping Springs, yet the city is still known to have become the first in Texas designated as an International Dark Sky Community. Because of this, noise and light pollution are worrisome.
“The problem with the noise is not only is it going to disrupt our way of life and being comfortable to sit in our own yards, the noise actually kills off the wildlife,” said Cynthia High, who lives about a mile away from the proposed site. “We have been working hard to keep the wildlife in our area and try to coexist."
Cynthia added that there are other music venues in the area, including Jester King and Treaty Oaks, that are respectful to the residents by only playing music until about 8 p.m.
The narrow, winding road and driver safety are also among the concerns.
“[They] are proposing a 5,000-person venue with parking for 2,000 cars, which we later learned that they are trying to buy up properties around them so they have additional space for parking, which means there will probably be more than 2,000 cars,” said resident Will High. “Even at 2,000, that is about 8,000 cars an hour on Fitzhugh Road before and after an event.”
An area that already witnesses multiple accidents could be seeing more, Cynthia said.
“If I was a parent of a teenager, I would be scared to death to let them drive those roads in the dark coming home. You know they will be drinking and who-knows-what there,” Cynthia said. “It takes an experienced driver to get through those roads without getting into an accident and we have a lot of accidents.”
Residents already experience issues with emergency vehicles responding to calls during busy traffic times, but if events are planned, that could cause longer wait times.
“A year ago in November, it took [more than] 20 minutes for paramedics to get to my house — which is going to be across the street from the venue — because my contractor fell off the roof and he died,” Napiorkowski said. “He was only 40. That was 22 minutes and they got caught in traffic. Imagine now … it was at 5:15 in the evening; that’s going to be the time people are going into the music venue. There is no way emergency services are going to be able to reach us. We won’t be able to get in or out.”
Napiorkowski said when there are accidents on Fitzhugh, Trautwein or Crumley Ranch, if those happen in the middle of the road, there will be a dead standstill of cars.
But LeClerc said his team is “working with county transportation to come up with mitigation measures that will ultimately improve the transportation out there.”
The venue details are not a done deal yet.
“Now, we are in the process of waiting for TCEQ to respond to all of the oral and written testimony that was received,” LeClerc said. “Once that is completed, then we will have a better sense of a timeline of when we might receive that permit or if there will be more hurdles that we will have to go through.” To learn more about the concerns of the venue, visit www.stopfitzhughconcertvenue.com.
This is a developing story. The Hays Free Press/News-Dispatch is continuing to monitor this situation and will update the public as more information becomes available. If you would be affected should the venue be built, please send an email to [email protected].
