Owners of the landmark Dr Pepper building in Dallas say they’ve come up with a plan to save the former soft drink plant from a meeting with the wrecking ball.
Dal-Mac Investments Corp. said it has commitments from two major retailers-Barnes & Noble Bookstore and Marshall’s-to be major tenants in the building once it is renovated into a retail center.
Dal-Mac officials said those commitments, along with the high prospects that several smaller tenants also will sign leases there, have persuaded them to abandon demolition plans.
The company previously had said the only viable option for the property was to raze the landmark and build a shopping center in its place.
But the company reconsidered its position after neighborhood groups, preservationists and the city’s Landmark Commission launched an effort to fight the demolition.
“We now anticipate the project will be 100 percent leased,” David Cunningham, Dal-Mac’s vice president of development services, said of the renovated building.
That was welcome news at City Hall, where the City Council unanimously agreed to designate the 50-year-old former bottling plant an official historic landmark.
“As they say in the sporting world, it looks like we snatched victory from the jaws of defeat,” said council member Glenn Box, whose district includes the building.
Historic preservationists and others who have fought to save the building warned that the council’s action did not mean that it would not one day be demolished.
If Dal-Mac sells the project, which it is likely to do, the new owners could successfully seek a demolition permit if the project is not financially successful, said Catherine Horsey, executive director of Preservation Dallas.
However, she added that she was “fairly confident” that the project would be successful, particularly because the site is next to a major transit rail station.
The council’s vote and Dal-Mac’s announcement capped nearly two years of controversy surrounding the fate of one of the city’s most recognizable buildings.
The flap began in 1993, when Dal-Mac bought the art moderne Dr Pepper building from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., then obtained a demolition permit from the city.
Demolition was blocked, however, after the city enacted a demolition moratorium while it considered whether the building should be designated a historic landmark.
Since then, Dal-Mac has faced staunch opposition to its demolition plans from residents in the area and historic preservationists who argued the building is an important part of Dallas history.
In recent months, the Landmark Commission and the City Plan Commission also moved to save the building by recommending that it be designated a historic landmark.
Amid the opposition, Dal-Mac agreed in December to begin regular meetings with the city, residents and transit officials to try and work out a compromise.
The Dr Pepper Team, as the group was called, spent months trying to find ways to both meet Dal-Mac financial needs but save the building, said Trudy O’Reilly, chairwoman of the Landmark Commission.
The turning point came when preservation architect Larry Good came up with a renovation plan that retailers liked, Cunningham said.
Good said the plans include few changes to the building, retaining all of its most important features, such as the clock tower and limestone entrance.
“A lot has changed since we had a demolition permit in our hand two years ago,” said Kirk McJunkin, Dal-Mac’s vice president of business development.
Said Box: “A couple of months ago, it looked like we might not be here with this good news.”
Bobbi Bilnoski, who represented six neighborhood groups and two business associations fighting the demolition, said the community pressure on Dal-Mac paid off for all parties.
“We welcome Dal-Mac to our community,” she said.
Cunningham said the $20 million renovation would begin this summer and be completed next spring.
