Vacancy to Vitality: Exploring Housing Futures along San Antonio’s Transit Corridors

The Vacancy to Vitality: Exploring Housing Futures along San Antonio’s Transit Corridors exhibition opened on December 9, 2025, and ran through January 10, 2026, presenting the results of a year-long research effort via a public exhibition format. The exhibition synthesized data analysis, spatial mapping, and design research to document the extent of vacant and underutilized land—including surface parking—along seven proposed rapid transit corridors in San Antonio.

Large-format maps, diagrams, and typology-based design prototypes illustrate how incremental infill and adaptive reuse of common commercial building types—such as strip malls, motels, drive-throughs, and big-box retail—could accommodate medium-density, transit-oriented housing while maintaining existing commercial uses.

Exhibition Opening: 4:00 p.m. December 9, 2025.
Panel Discussion: 6:00–7:00 p.m.

Exhibition

Panel Discussion

The public panel discussion held on December 9, 2025, at the San Antonio Central Public Library was a core component of the Vacancy to Vitality exhibition opening, designed to share the research findings in a public, multidisciplinary forum. The 75-minute program brought together academic researchers, design practitioners, and public-sector leaders to examine how vacant and underutilized land along San Antonio’s proposed rapid transit corridors could be redeveloped in ways that add housing while strengthening existing communities.

The program opened with welcome remarks from UT San Antonio’s Dr. Eric Brey, Dean of the Klesse College of Engineering and Integrated Design, and Dr. Michelangelo Sabatino, Director of the School of Architecture + Planning, followed by an overview of the exhibition and research
framework by Principal Investigator Ian Caine. The panel discussion was moderated by Paola Aguirre Serrano (Borderless Studio), who framed the conversation around vacancy as a citywide opportunity requiring coordinated action across design, planning, policy, and partnerships. An interactive audience poll grounded the discussion in lived experience, highlighting everyday encounters with transit, walkability, and underutilized properties.

Panelists included Jim Bailey (Alamo Architects), Esteban López Ochoa (UT San Antonio), and Christine Viña (VIA Metropolitan Transit). The moderated discussion included four rounds of questions. The first addressed policy foundations for infill development, including TOD zoning, incentives, and land-assembly strategies. The second examined displacement risks and community stability, pairing housing policy research with on-the-ground development realities. The third focused on design strategies, emphasizing incremental infill, adaptive reuse, and the importance of preserving everyday commercial buildings—such as strip malls and drive-throughs—as active cultural and economic assets rather than treating corridors as blank slates. The final round centered on implementation, highlighting the need for cross-sector collaboration among transit agencies, city departments, developers, universities, and community partners.

A structured audience Q&A allowed participants to submit questions in real time, reinforcing the role of public dialogue in refining research assumptions and identifying practical barriers to implementation. The program concluded with brief closing reflections from each panelist, focused on immediate actions—policy, institutional, and civic—that could move vacancy-to-vitality strategies from speculation toward execution.

Support

Funding provided by the SOM Foundation’s 2023 Research Prize, with additional support from the City of San Antonio, San Antonio Area Foundation, and the San Antonio Public Library.