Contrasting Whole Foods in Austin and Philadelphia

Downtown grocery stores are tough to implement. There is no way around it. Not even the most organic and flexible among us can pull off a new store perfectly and serve both pedestrians and cars equally well. I had the opportunity last week to visit stores in both Philadelphia and Austin and the differences are striking. I was expecting the Austin store to impress me. It's their headquarters after all; as well as a flagship store. Located downtown in the hip West Sixth neighborhood, it covers a full city block. (Inside, it is nothing short of grocery bliss, and if you can navigate the crowd you will be rewarded with some of the best barbecue in Texas according to my tour guide with Austin Eats.) However, I wasn't focused on the food on this stop. I had my eyes on how Whole Foods developed in an urban neighborhood, which they usually do so well with structured parking, mixed-uses, flexible store design, etc. In fact, a couple days earlier, I was in Philadelphia and spotted this iconic Whole Foods blended into the streetscape as if it were here for 100 years.

In Austin I saw something completely different. Of the four street frontages around the store, you will find the following: 1. loading zone 2. parking lot 3. parking lot 4. stair-stepped facade and signage camouflaging the real entrance. There isn't one comfortable walking experience all the way around the building. The best approach is by car, which I did a couple days later to take these pictures below. It's design would be very welcome in suburban areas that are trying to create urban districts, but yet are still auto-dominated markets. What impressed me most about the neighborhood is that the tallest buildings in downtown Austin are residential and are located within walking distance to a fantastic grocery store. That is tough to beat on the sustainability test. I just wish I didn't have to drive there.