A registered National Historic Landmark, Fair Park is the 227-acre home to the State Fair of Texas and various cultural institutions in Dallas, Tex. In 2020, Fair Park revised its masterplan to include a 14-acre Community Park and a parking garage. Designed by Gensler, the Fair Park Fitzhugh Parking Structure recently won the AIA Dallas Chapter Unbuilt Design Award.
The garage will have 1,650 parking spaces over five stories. In an attempt to design a large concrete parking structure that’s sensitive to its surrounding community, the team placed part of Community Park on top of the garage structure, making it an extension of the park.
To connect the park to the garage’s top deck, the design uses both earth berms and structural berms. On the surface of the north berm, an immersive outdoor experience includes a prairie landscape, viewing deck, shading canopies, shading platform, and rooftop event deck. With concessions and restrooms, the rooftop deck can be used for public and private events. Beneath the north berm lies 80,000 square feet of operational facilities for Fair Park and Community Park.
With a 47-foot ascent to the top of the garage, the project makes the structure’s height an asset for the park, offering views of the adjacent neighborhood, Fair Park, and downtown. It also creates a new, distinctive public space for Dallas. The project’s shape takes inspiration from the region’s limestone ridges and the park’s prairie-inspired landscape, blending and unifying the garage structure with its surroundings. The parking structure aims to incentivize wellness by encouraging people to walk rather than use the elevator.
On the Building Team:
Owner and developer: Fair Park First
Design architect and architect of record: Gensler
Associate architect: Moody Nolan
MEP engineer: DFW Consulting Group
Structural engineer: Ponce-Fuess Engineering
General contractor/construction manager: VCC and Con-Real
Parking consultant: WGI
Civil engineer: Pacheco Koch
![Fair Park Fitzhugh Parking](/sites/default/files/inline-images/Fair%20Park%20Fitzhugh%20Parking.jpg)
Related Stories
| Sep 13, 2010
'A Model for the Entire Industry'
How a university and its Building Team forged a relationship with 'the toughest building authority in the country' to bring a replacement hospital in early and under budget.
| Sep 13, 2010
3D Prototyping Goes Low-cost
Today’s less costly 3D color printers are attracting the attention of AEC firms looking to rapidly prototype designs and communicate design intent to clients.
| Aug 11, 2010
Underwriters Laboratories, ICC Evaluation Service announce dual evaluation and certification program for building products
Underwriters Laboratories (UL), the leading product safety testing organization, and ICC Evaluation Service, Inc (ICC-ES), the United States' leader in evaluating building products for compliance with code, today announced a partnership that will provide the building materials industry with a Dual Evaluation and Certification Program for building products.
| Aug 11, 2010
Minneapolis Public Housing authority, Honeywell launch energy retrofit program
Minneapolis Public Housing Authority and Honeywell today announced a $33.6-million energy efficiency and facility renewal program that will help the housing authority improve its infrastructure, reduce its impact on the environment, and save more than $3.7 million in utility costs per year. Local contractors will also complete a majority of the work for the program, one of the largest of its kind for a public housing authority, helping boost the Twin Cities job market.
| Aug 11, 2010
Shepley Bulfinch announces merger of Merzproject
National architecture firm Shepley Bulfinch of Boston and Merzproject of Phoenix today announced their merger. The merger unites Shepley Bulfinch, one of the country’s leading design firms, and Merzproject.
| Aug 11, 2010
The New Yorker's David Owen: Why Manhattan is America's greenest community
David Owen is a staff writer at The New Yorker and the author of 14 books, most recently Green Metropolis: Why Living Smaller, Living Closer, and Driving Less Are the Keys to Sustainability, in which he argues that Manhattan is the greenest community in America. He graduated from Harvard and lives in Washington, Conn., where he chairs the town planning commission.
| Aug 11, 2010
Brown Craig Turner opens senior living studio
Baltimore-based architecture and design firm Brown Craig Turner has significantly expanded its housing design capabilities and expertise with the launch of its new senior living studio.
| Aug 11, 2010
Economic conditions to cause drag on cement consumption
The conditions facing the construction industry are likely to remain weak for another year or more, causing a drag on cement consumption, according to the most recent economic forecast from Skokie, Ill.-based Portland Cement Association (PCA).
| Aug 11, 2010
Parsons Brinckerhoff names new CEO
Parsons Brinckerhoff announced the appointment of George J. Pierson as the firm’s CEO effective January 1, 2010. Mr. Pierson, currently President and COO of the firm’s Americas division, succeeds Keith J. Hawksworth, who becomes Chairman.