The Santa Fe Freight Building is a former

freight depot A transport hub is a place where passengers and cargo are exchanged between vehicles and/or between transport modes. Public transport hubs include railway stations, rapid transit stations, bus stops, tram stops, airports and ferry slips ...

Fort Worth, Texas Fort Worth is the fifth-largest city in the U.S. state of Texas and the 13th-largest city in the United States. It is the county seat of Tarrant County, covering nearly into four other counties: Denton, Johnson, Parker, and Wise. According ...

. Designed in the style of

Art Deco Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the Unite ...

known as

PWA Moderne The Art Deco style, which originated in France just before World War I, had an important impact on architecture and design in the United States in the 1920s and 1930s. The most famous examples are the skyscrapers of New York City including the Em ...

, it was built on the site of an older freight depot in 1938. Upon construction, it was jointly owned by the

Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway The Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway , often referred to as the Santa Fe or AT&SF, was one of the larger railroads in the United States. The railroad was chartered in February 1859 to serve the cities of Atchison, Kansas, Atchison and Top ...

and the

Southern Pacific Company Southern may refer to: Businesses * China Southern Airlines, airline based in Guangzhou, China * Southern Airways, defunct US airline * Southern Air, air cargo transportation company based in Norwalk, Connecticut, US * Southern Airways Express, M ...

. Its first floor was a freight warehouse that also provided cold-storage capabilities while its second floor housed office space for the Santa Fe. In the 1990s, the building had fallen into vacancy and was named one of 15 historic "highly significant endangered properties" in Fort Worth by its Historic and Cultural Landmarks Commission. The building was restored by local developers in 2002 and reopened as the Fort Worth Rail Market, an open market space that was ultimately transformed into restaurant and office space before the project was abandoned by 2005. In 2006, the

University of Texas at Arlington The University of Texas at Arlington (UTA or UT Arlington) is a public research university in Arlington, Texas. The university was founded in 1895 and was in the Texas A&M University System for several decades until joining the University of Te ...

(UTA) signed a lease to use the Santa Fe Freight Building as its Fort Worth satellite campus, spending approximately $1.2 million to redesign and renovate the building. It continues to serve as UTA Fort Worth, which has awarded over 3,500 total degrees and has expanded to include ten different degree programs since its establishment in 2007.

Architecture

Erected in 1938 to replace an existing

, the Santa Fe Freight Building was constructed during the stylistic phase of

known as

(PWA standing for the

Public Works Administration The Public Works Administration (PWA), part of the New Deal of 1933, was a large-scale public works construction agency in the United States headed by Secretary of the Interior Harold L. Ickes. It was created by the National Industrial Recove ...

), which combined elements of former architectural styles and was popular for both government and commercial projects. Due to a sudden boost of prosperity in 1920s, the city of Fort Worth emerged as a major center of Art Deco architecture, constructing dozens of new buildings in the 1920s and 1930s, many of which remain prominent features of the city's landscape. At the time of its construction, the Santa Fe Freight Building was noted for featuring extensive cold storage for perishable freight. The use of

reinforced concrete Reinforced concrete (RC), also called reinforced cement concrete (RCC) and ferroconcrete, is a composite material in which concrete's relatively low tensile strength and ductility are compensated for by the inclusion of reinforcement having hig ...

, a key feature of Art Deco construction that allowed for larger buildings, was also noteworthy to contemporary commenters. Exterior features of the building are largely utilitarian (a hallmark of PWA buildings) but it does boast decorative elements such as a

parapet A parapet is a barrier that is an extension of the wall at the edge of a roof, terrace, balcony, walkway or other structure. The word comes ultimately from the Italian ''parapetto'' (''parare'' 'to cover/defend' and ''petto'' 'chest/breast'). Whe ...

and a

neon sign In the signage industry, neon signs are electric signs lighted by long luminous gas-discharge tubes that contain rarefied neon or other gases. They are the most common use for neon lighting, which was first demonstrated in a modern form in Decem ...

. The Santa Fe Freight Building is two stories in height and measures in length by in width. As originally designed, the first floor consisted of a freight warehouse that also included a cold-storage capabilities. The second floor housed office space for both the

's freight agent and its division superintendent.

History

Freight depot

The Santa Fe Freight Building was built on the site of a former freight depot that stood between 12th and 14 Streets and east of Jones Street, which was torn down in 1937. That year, building of the new freight depot was bid out for $123,900, and construction was expected to take 10 months with 50-100 workers for most phases of the project. Construction was delayed a few days in July 1937 due to the

Little Steel strike The Little Steel strike was a 1937 labor strike by the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) and its branch the Steel Workers Organizing Committee (SWOC), against a number of smaller steel producing companies, principally Republic Steel, In ...

, and it was ultimately completed in May 1938. Together with the newly renovated Fort Worth Union Depot, the new freight depot was jointly owned by the

and the

. At the inauguration of its operation, there were 16 trains serving Fort Worth each day: eight run by the Santa Fe, four by the Southern Pacific, and four by the

Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad The Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad (CRI&P RW, sometimes called ''Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railway'') was an American Class I railroad. It was also known as the Rock Island Line, or, in its final years, The Rock. At the end ...

. In 1995, Fort Worth's Historic and Cultural Landmarks Commission recommended that the Santa Fe Freight Depot be designated one of 15 historic "highly significant endangered properties" in the city. By 1998, both the Santa Fe Freight Building and nearby Fort Worth Union Depot had become vacant. They were both bought by Fort Worth-based investor Shirlee Gandy that year, who proceeded to develop the Union Depot into an events venue to pair with the Ashton Hotel, which she also owned. After a long period of vacancy, the freight depot was restored by local developers in 2002.

Fort Worth Rail Market

A second phase for the Santa Fe Freight Building began in May 2002, as the city planned to convert it into an open market space christened the Fort Worth Rail Market that combined "specialty boutiques with fresh-produce stands and small restaurants". The Rail Market's first tenant was Hot Damn, Tamales; it also hosted Coffee Haus, Lone Star Wines, and Seafoodville, and was the first home of vegan restaurant Spiral Diner. However, Fort Worth city leaders grew increasingly concerned with the market's very low profit margins after just two years, observing that it was "hundreds of thousands of dollars in the red". Opinions as to why the market struggled so much financially were divided. Certain merchants laid the blame on the city administration and cited mismanagement as the primary cause. The manager of the project countered that he had the responsibility to safeguard public funds. The falling margins, combined with unexpectedly low public interest, eventually resulted in the

Tax Increment Financing Tax increment financing (TIF) is a public financing method that is used as a subsidy for redevelopment, infrastructure, and other community-improvement projects in many countries, including the United States. The original intent of a TIF program is ...

(TIF) commission approving a plan that would result in the conversion of "most of the space to offices or a large restaurant", which would reduce the annual losses by over 50%. This approach ultimately was not sustainable and the Fort Worth Rail Market would be abandoned completely by 2005.

UTA Fort Worth campus

In February 2006, after receiving approval from the

University of Texas System Board of Regents The University of Texas System (UT System) is an American government entity of the state of Texas that includes 13 higher educational institutions throughout the state including eight universities and five independent health institutions. The UT& ...

, the

(UTA) signed a 10-year lease to use the Santa Fe Freight Building as its Fort Worth satellite campus. After UTA spent approximately $1.2 million to redesign and renovate the building, it opened for classes as the Fort Worth Center on January 17, 2007. At its opening, the building measured roughly that included eight classrooms and a library with over 40 computers. Before acquiring the Santa Fe Freight Building, UTA had previously offered a

Master of Business Administration A Master of Business Administration (MBA; also Master's in Business Administration) is a postgraduate degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration such as accounti ...

(MBA) in Fort Worth since 2000, with classes first held at the UTA Research Institute in eastern Fort Worth. Since opening in 2007, UTA Fort Worth has awarded over 3,500 total degrees and has expanded to include ten different degree programs. Eight of these programs are at the graduate level and encompass

business administration Business administration, also known as business management, is the administration of a commercial enterprise. It includes all aspects of overseeing and supervising the business operations of an organization. From the point of view of management ...

criminology Criminology (from Latin , "accusation", and Ancient Greek , ''-logia'', from λόγος ''logos'' meaning: "word, reason") is the study of crime and deviant behaviour. Criminology is an interdisciplinary field in both the behavioural and so ...

criminal justice Criminal justice is the delivery of justice to those who have been accused of committing crimes. The criminal justice system is a series of government agencies and institutions. Goals include the Rehabilitation (penology), rehabilitation of o ...

health care administration Health administration, healthcare administration, healthcare management or hospital management is the field relating to leadership, management, and administration of public health systems, health care systems, hospitals, and hospital networks ...

real estate Real estate is property consisting of land and the buildings on it, along with its natural resources such as crops, minerals or water; immovable property of this nature; an interest vested in this (also) an item of real property, (more general ...

, and

social work Social work is an academic discipline and practice-based profession concerned with meeting the basic needs of individuals, families, groups, communities, and society as a whole to enhance their individual and collective well-being. Social work ...

. The other two programs offered are at the undergraduate level: a

Bachelor of Social Work A bachelor is a man who is not and has never been married.Bachelors are, in Pitt & al.'s phrasing, "men who live independently, outside of their parents' home and other institutional settings, who are neither married nor cohabitating". (). Etymo ...

program and a

Registered Nurse A registered nurse (RN) is a nurse who has graduated or successfully passed a nursing program from a recognized nursing school and met the requirements outlined by a country, state, province or similar government-authorized licensing body to o ...

(RN) to

Bachelor of Science in Nursing The Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN, BScN) also known in some countries as a Bachelor of Nursing (BN) or Bachelor of Science (BS) with a Major in Nursing is an academic degree in the science and principles of nursing, granted by an accredited ...

(BSN) program. UTA Fort Worth also offers professional development through its corporate education initiative.

References

Sources

External links

* {{coord, 32, 45, 00, N, 97, 19, 29, W, display=title 1938 establishments in Texas Buildings of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway Former Southern Pacific Railroad stations in Texas PWA Moderne architecture Railway freight houses Railway stations in Fort Worth, Texas Railway stations in the United States opened in 1938 University of Texas at Arlington campus