What was the grandstand on the shores of Lady Bird Lake in East Austin used for? Decades ago, the public event space was full of life. Now it's rundown, like an old relic.
Imagine walking the trails along Lady Bird Lake. On the pedestrian bridge at Chicano Park, you look across the lagoon to see a grandstand right by the water.“I come out to Town Lake often, and for years I’ve seen the grandstands at Fiesta Gardens," Matthew Rizzo says."I was always kind of curious as to what the history was behind them and how they were used.”Rizzo says the grandstand makes him think of the finish line of some kind of boat race. He isn’t too far off.
“At that time, ski shows and motorized boats were really popular, so they were wanting to bring that sort of flair to it and make it a tourist attraction,” says Sarah Marshall, coordinator for the historic preservation and tourism program at the Austin Parks and Recreation Department. The drag boat races occurred three weekends out of the year, with the championship races taking place as part of Aqua Fest in August.Paul Hernandez was a community activist and founder of the Austin chapter of the Brown Berets, a paramilitary organization focused on Chicano rights that started in the '60s. In a documentary about the dispute called “," he talks about the problems the community faced during the weeks when the races were happening.
“They don’t give a damn about our property, our houses, our neighborhood. All they want is a good race, to see somebody break a record or flip over and break his neck,” Hernandez says in the documentary. Cuellar, executive director of the Rancho Alegre Conjunto Festival."It just had a community feel to it.”
Outside of Austin’s yearly Pride fest, Fiesta Gardens isn’t used for much these days. Cuellar has tried a few times to host an event at the Gardens, but he hasn’t had much luck. The neighborhood has changed — and so have the rules.
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