Office to Resi: Related redesigns high-rise plans near downtown

Related Companies is canceling its office plans and instead building pure residential on the south shore of Lady Bird Lake.

The New York-based firm, founded by Stephen Ross, originally planned to build a 15-story office building at the site just south of downtown Austin, but it has switched gears. Related’s revised plans call for a 17-story residential building with a mix of apartments and condos, Towers reported. 

The building is set to include 297 units, with 207 apartments and 86 condos. 

The project, dubbed One Lady Bird Lake, is expected to have 14,000 square feet of restaurant and retail space on the first two floors, plus three levels of underground parking. The structure will rise on a 3.3-acre lot that serves as a parking lot for the Hyatt Regency Austin hotel at 208 Barton Springs Road.

New York architecture firm Kohn Pedersen Fox has drastically redesigned One Lady Bird Lake, although its waterfront position remains. 

Related’s change of plans likely stems from years of poor performance by Austin’s office sector. The city’s office vacancy rate soared to a record high of nearly 20 percent last quarter, and the amount of available sublease space reached 5.4 million square feet. With lingering remote-work trends, high interest rates and a tight lending climate, the office market in Austin isn’t poised for a comeback anytime soon.

—Quinn Donoghue 

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