San Antonio Riverwalk

I had the opportunity to take a business trip to San Antonio and the thing I was most excited about was revisiting the Riverwalk. It had been probably around 25 years since I had been there when my wife and I took a day trip there with my parents years ago. I had remembered it as beautiful, full of life and surprising cool on what was a pretty hot summer day. It was every bit as lovely as I remembered and probably even better than it was 25 years ago.

I arrived in San Antonio in the early afternoon and was dropped off at my hotel, the Springhill Suites by Marriott near the Henry B Gonzales Convention Center. My first impressions of San Antonio weren’t great. There are a lot of empty lots in the area directly west of the convention center. There were a lot of unimpressive buildings and surface parking lots and frankly it looked like San Antonio was dilapidated. It reminded me of so many midwestern cities that deteriorated following the closure of big manufacturing plants in those cities. My hometown is one which is still recovering from plant closures dating back to the 80s, and I am well aware of this ‘look’. Early on in the trip, I did a decent amount of walking along the sidewalks in the area around the Riverwalk and it just wasn’t enjoyable at all. There didn’t seem to be any cohesive feeling that you get from walking around a downtown area with block to block buildings like you get when walking along the downtowns of Chicago, New York or San Francisco. I think the reason for this, however, was that in San Antonio all of the energy of this city is centered around the Riverwalk.

As soon as I had a chance, I headed to the Riverwalk, and it was more impressive than I remembered. The first thing that I noticed was just how close the walkway is to the water. Living in a city that is hit almost yearly with floods, this is impressive. In my hometown, we have some bike paths that are deliberately built 20 feet above normal river level, so that they don’t flood when the river rises (not all of our paths are high enough to avoid flooding). I live in the Quad-Cities, which is built around the Mississippi River. In our area, the height of the river can vary 15 feet over the course of a year. Designs of parks along the Mississippi take this into account and this makes the river feel somewhat distant, but in San Antonio, you can literally sit on the walk and touch the water.

What makes this possible is some really impressive engineering, involving dams and an enormous flood tunnel. They essentially turned this section of the San Antonio River into a canal by being able to control the river level so effectively. The tunnel is 24 foot diameter bored tunnel approximately 140 feet deep that works as an inverted siphon. It’s a brilliant design that helps keep this river from overflowing.

The second thing that hit me is just how close restaurants and bars are to the river. There just aren’t that many places where someone can sit at a restaurant while dining directly next to a river, but there are quite a few restaurants along the Riverwalk where you can do just that. Even on weekdays, these restaurants seemed to get a decent amount of business. They seem incredibly romantic, but since I was traveling alone, I had no desire to dine in a romantic atmosphere. I instead did what any self-respecting solo man on a business trip would do, I ate at bars.

Also impressive are all of the little touches that are at virtually every point along the Riverwalk. There are art pieces, statues, and planters everywhere. Anytime your eyes wonder, they come across something interesting and beautiful. Sometimes its a bright mural sized painting adding contrast to the stone walls.

Sometimes its an enormous statue in the middle of a set of bridges.

Sometimes its a set of unique light fixture illuminating the path.

And sometimes, its a fountain making the underside of a bridge beautiful. I mean, honestly, when was the last time you were impressed by the underside of a bridge.

I was even impressed by where they stored the boats that they used for tours.

There are these storage and maintenance areas under parking lots and streets in the area where these boats operate. It is such a unique solution to use the space under the streets for what is essentially maintenance garages.

Throughout the Riverwalk area, there are flower planters and trees that not only offer beauty, but also provide shade. I don’t know if there is an actual temperature difference between the temperature in a parking lot in San Antonio and the temperature in the Riverwalk, but I would say that it feels like about 10 degrees cooler by the river.

I also loved the fact that stone was used throughout the Riverwalk area. It seems like an obvious choice to use the same material all along the river, but it’s literally miles of stone. Maybe this is an extremely common type of stone in San Antonio, but they used a ton of it and it makes everything feel cohesive.

Oh, and there are water features – everywhere! I love these kinds of water features. They add to a cooling effect by creating some mist in the air and they also provide noise that has an amazing ability to calm the soul.

There are so many water features, they even hide some in grottos.

One of my favorite things along the Riverwalk was the Amphitheatre that straddled the San Antonio River. On one side, there is a raised stage right on the edge of the river and on the other is a seating section that looks like it had capacity for a few hundred people. The seating has a unique stone and grass layout, which means that if you were attending a show there, you would be seated on grass. I imagine that would be comfortable, but you might be a little worried about grass stains on your pants. There weren’t any shows there during my stay in San Antonio, but I hope it gets used a lot because it is very beautiful and unique.

I really love the Riverwalk area in San Antonio and I can see why so many shops, bars and restaurants have located themselves around it. The Riverwalk is one of those amazing examples of how important city planning and engineering can be to the vitality of a city. San Antonio could have easily just decided that they would build enormous flood walls or giant berms to prevent flooding and if they had done that then the area certainly wouldn’t be the commercial success it is today. Creative engineering and great design created a space that is truly unique, and it is definitely a fantastic reason to visit San Antonio if you get the chance.