How Do You ‘Keep Fort Worth Funky’? Building on the Old Merrimac Disco Seems Appropriate
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From Staff Reports
The Dallas-Fort Worth chapter of the Urban Land Institute is posing an interesting question for its next event: “Is Fort Worth the next Austin?”
As North Texas is expected to grow from 8.2 to 12 million people in the next 20 years, land planners and the like are asking how to tackle this kind of growth while ensuring cities like Fort Worth, whose lesser-known nickname is Funkytown, keeps its signature funkiness.
Essentially, “Keep Fort Worth Funky.” (You can read in The Fort Worth Report how Fort Worth got the nickname.)
How do you do that? There’s no one answer, but redeveloping the site of an old disco is a start.
Where a Disco Once Stood, New Mixed-Use Could Come
A 10-acre mixed-use development along the Trinity River is under city review in Fort Worth. Transwestern’s Merrimac project, planned for Old University Drive and Merrimac Circle, would include a seven-story residential building with integrated parking and 52,000 square feet of retail, Bisnow reported.
The development would also feature separate restaurant and retail buildings along pedestrian-friendly streets and green space. The site previously housed the Merrimac Restaurant & Discotheque in the 1980s.
A similar project secured zoning approval in 2022 but never moved forward. If approved, the Merrimac project would rise just north of the Westbend development, where construction on a 321-unit multifamily building is set to begin this year. The area is experiencing a development boom, with more than $2 billion in projects planned for downtown and the Cultural District.
$2B Data Center Campus in Fort Worth
ACS Infrastructure Development, through its subsidiary Turner Construction, is moving forward with a $2 billion data center campus on a 107-acre site off Hicks Field Road in north Fort Worth, thanks to city tax incentives finalized earlier this month. The project’s first phase is expected for completion by 2031 and the second by 2034.
It’s one of many data centers coming online as the industry flocks to Texas for its relatively cheap energy. Fort Worth City Council in October 2024 approved a 121-acre data center at Rock Creek Ranch near Crowley. Developer Ray Washburne earlier this year discussed selling his downtown Dallas Morning News asset to an unnamed data center firm.
According to the Texas State Comptroller, there are 279 data centers in the state, with 141 in Dallas-Fort Worth. In 2023, DFW alone was home to about 0.565 gigawatts of data center inventory, the second-highest total in the U.S., Commercial Property Executive reported.
The city approved a 10-year economic development incentive agreement, starting at 35% of incremental business personal property after Phase 1 and increasing to 70% after Phase 2. In return, ACS must invest $481.6 million in real property improvements and nearly $1.7 billion in equipment, as well as create 37 positions that pay more than $150,000 a year.
You can read the complete Hicks Field data center presentation here.
Montgomery Street Antiques May Be No More
A new 12-story hotel and mixed-use development is headed for a popular antique mall on Montgomery Street. The 7.4-acre site of the Montgomery Street Antique Mall will be redeveloped with the hotel, retail shops, and a stand-alone multifamily residential building, Fort Worth Report reported.
Phoenix Property Co. is developing the property at 2501 and 2601 Montgomery St. The development will revamp the bustling corner of Interstate 30 and Montgomery Street, south of Dickies Arena and west of the Fort Worth Botanic Garden in the Cultural District.
Mall management has not announced a closing date or whether they will relocate.
Correction: An earlier version incorrectly stated the Metroplex’s combined population of 8 million as Fort Worth’s population.
