The Drag Holds Its First Third Thursday

By Karem Said
Originally published in the Austin American Statesman, April 22, 2005

Mark Niblack stood transfixed, watching three women in rainbow-colored clothing bounce in unison on crouched legs, performing traditional Indian dance.

The dance was one of many activities held on Guadalupe Street's first-ever Third Thursday, planned as a monthly street festival featuring music, food and vendors.

"I've been living in Austin since the late '70s," Niblack said. "This is just my daily pattern, to come down here on my bicycle."

Third Thursday was inspired by First Thursday on South Congress Avenue. Yet even with the help of trundling Austin Adventure Duck trucks, traffic between the 40 participating businesses was minimal.

Even performers like Ellie Weisberg, with a UT group that practices the martial arts dance Capoeira, seemed unaware that the event stretched from West 23rd to West 38th streets.

A gaggle of UT students coalesced around Cream Vintage at 26th Street, while less than a dozen gathered outside the Ozone bike shop at 32nd Street to watch "Pee Wee Herman's Playhouse."

Meanwhile, Avant Garde salon at 34th Street was packed for a discounted "cut-a-thon," as a brass band called the Polka-Dillos entertained families between In-Step and the Wheatsville Food Co-op.

The Guadalupe event is a first peek at Independent Business Investment Zones, an Austin Independent Business Alliance project still mostly in the blueprint phase. The project is designed to create business districts -- and thus commercial prowess -- with stronger neighborhood identities.

Districts on the drawing board for 2005 are West 43rd Street and Duval Street, Airport and North Loop boulevards, South First Street and a block of business in East Austin.

Austin City Councilman Daryl Slusher -- who helped secure publicity funding for Third Thursday from the city's Small Business Development Program -- appeared at Wheatsville Thursday to speak and visit with friends.

"I think it's a nice turnout," he said, "but it'll get bigger."