Once popular motel may have a date with demolition
A once-posh motel on East Scott Avenue faces the prospect of the wrecking ball.
On Tuesday Wichita Falls city councilors will hold a hearing to determine the fate of several run-down properties, including what was once the Capri Motor Hotel at 914 East Scott.
It opened in 1953, built by a retired local railroad engineer C.W. Rowland and partners. It boasted 32 carpeted rooms, year-round air conditioning, a swimming pool and televisions.
The Capri opened at a time when passenger rail service was beginning to decline, jet travel had yet to be born, and Americans were taking to the highways in powerful automobiles.
Scott Avenue was the major thoroughfare through Wichita Falls, routing thousands of vehicles past the businesses of downtown. Many motels were built along the highway. Motorists could choose from the Capri, the Dixie Courts, Lone Star Cabins, Old Mills Courts, the Catalina, Triple D Motel, Town & Country Motel, Imperial Motel, Tex Motel, Belmont Courts and others.
In addition to offering overnight stays, the Capri became a social hub.
In September 1953, a prominent family hosted a party for their college-bound daughter at the Capri, providing “a morning swim, an afternoon of bridge and a luncheon served on the patio by the pool.”
In 1954, the newly hired advertising director of the Daily Times and Record News established his family at the Capri while they shopped for a new home. Poolside birthday parties at the Capri for kids were common.
But almost as soon as the Capri was constructed, the seeds of its demise were planted. By 1954, civic leaders were planning for the “Red River Expressway System” to divert highway traffic away from Scott Avenue to one-way lanes created from Holliday and Broad streets. The project was dedicated Nov. 15, 1958 and with some state money and a couple of bond elections was completed over the next few years.
East Scott Avenue went into a slow decline, with many businesses moving out or closing. The Capri and other motels that once welcomed traveling families on East Scott Avenue gradually became low-rent residential motels and most vanished entirely.
By 1972, the Capri offered rooms for $24 a week with sheets changed every four days.
Police calls became common. Somewhere along the line the name changed to Budget Inn. And then somewhere along the line it was abandoned. Water service was cut off in 2012.
City staff believes it has become a dangerous structure inhabited by vagrants and targeted by vandals. The roof is caving in and the walls have holes. The old motel is filled with trash, mold and stagnant water.
The property changed hands several times and now belongs to a Fort Worth man who owes nearly $3,000 in back taxes. The appraised value of the 13,000 square-foot property on 1.2 acres of land is just $18,000.
Owners of condemned properties on the list have been served by code enforcement and can appear at Tuesday’s meeting to arrange for demolition or have the city do it at the owners’ expense.
This article originally appeared on Wichita Falls Times Record News: Once popular motel may have a date with demolition
