Fort Worth takes steps to demolish a 100-year-old eyesore looming over Worth Heights

Fort Worth officials have ordered razing permits for an abandoned grain silo and elevator that residents have claimed for years to be an eyesore and danger to the community.

Five razing permits have been submitted to demolish the structures at 3700 Alice St. in Worth Heights south of downtown. One of them has been issued to demolish the “awnings and partial foundation” while the other four are under review.

There will be two phases in the demolition of the property, a city official said. The first will demolish accessory structures (including asbestos abatement), mowing and removal of trash and overgrown vegetation. The silos would be demolished in the next phase.

Phase one will cost approximately $96,661 and is projected to be complete by September. The demolition company, Garrett Demolition Inc., will use conventional excavators to demolish the accessory structures.

The date to demolish the silos hasn’t been determined. The city is searching for a plan to fund the $1.5 million project.

Vicki Bargas, vice president of the Worth Heights Neighborhood Association, called the silos a “terrible eyesore” that attracts crime and is a danger to those who enter them.

“We’ll be glad to have it out of the neighborhood,” Bargas said. “No neighborhood should have to put up with something like that.”

In March, the Building Standards Commission voted unanimously that the silos are substandard and hazardous. The commission ordered the property owner to repair or demolish the complex within 30 days.

The property was deemed substandard because of loose and falling sheet metal, broken windows, corroded piping and deteriorated awnings. In addition, the property is not secure. The property has been the site of illegal dumping and multiple fires.

The owner of the property is listed as 3500 Alice Trust. Code compliance has tried to contact the owner numerous times between October 2016 and February 2024 with no success, the city said. The Star-Telegram could not reach the property owner for comment.

On April 10, the silos caught on fire. No one was hurt or injured.

The silos and grain elevator date to 1924, when Fort Worth was considered the grain capital of the Southwest, according to an archivist at the Fort Worth Library. The complex was owned by the Fort Worth Elevator Co. The structure does not have an historic designation.

In December 2016, the property came before the city’s Building Standards Commission, which unanimously deemed the silos “substandard and hazardous.” It was not demolished because the city lacked the funding.

From 2006 through February 2024, the property has been the subject of 59 citizen complaints. There have been 367 phone calls to the police about the property since December 2005. Unpaid taxes on the property total $224,167.

On Sept. 10, 2016, a 17-year-old girl fell several stories from the structure and died.