VIDEO: The Frank Erwin Center officially comes down
AUSTIN (KXAN) — The Drum is no more.
Crews ripped down remaining supports Sunday for the Frank Erwin Center, bringing the frame of the hallowed Texas Longhorns basketball arena and university events center to the ground in a cloud of dust and debris.
PHOTOS: Erwin Center enters final stages of demolition
Dan Cook, the executive director for planning, design and construction at UT shared about the land’s next steps on Monday.
“There’s a lot of love for the Erwin Center that we will all celebrate,” Cook said. “[We’re] looking forward to the future, [and] we see that Austin has been growing. The partnership between the University and the MD Anderson Cancer Center presents itself as a really awesome opportunity to create what we’re referring to as a joint medical center.”
The 500,000-square-foot Erwin Center, built in 1977, was the home of Longhorns men’s and women’s basketball until the Moody Center opened in 2022. Both programs won more than 500 games each in the Erwin Center, and the last public event in the building was a Harlem Globetrotters game in April 2022.
Outside of Longhorns basketball, the building hosted huge musical acts. John Denver’s concert in 1978 drew the largest crowd in venue history with nearly 17,900 people.
The UT Board of Regents approved the $25 million demolition project in May 2023 and demolition began the following September. An expansion to UT’s Dell Medical School will replace the Erwin Center and the Denton A. Cooley Pavilion in the southeast corner of campus.
There’s no date yet on when they’ll start building the new medical center, but Cook said UT aims to take its first patient in 2030.
There’s still some work to be done to clear out this site, but according to Cook. They’re on schedule and under budget. 80 percent of the demolished materials are set to be recycled.
Cook told KXAN they have an architect under contract for the new medical center, and will be sharing more news on that soon.
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