Fair Use? Players and the UT expansion machine
“On the day that the Dog & Duck Pub announced its imminent closure to make way for a parking garage, a grad school friend commented on Facebook that “it’s like Austin is actively working to take all my reliable favorites away.” Other folks wondered what beloved campus-area hangout was next on the chopping block – the Crown & Anchor? (“From your lips to the developers’ ears,” read one rueful comment.)
Generations’ worth of UT students had similar reactions when it was announced that Players was closing for good on November 23. After more than 30 years serving greasy burgers and frosty goblets of mid-range beers to Longhorns, the iconic restaurant will finally succumb to the university’s long campaign to colonize the southwest corner of the outer campus.
While the nondescript building’s green shingle roof and sad sign that reads, “Open [black square] hours” suggests disrepair, the shabbiness of the building indicates the kind of no-bullshit place Players is. Opened in 1981 by freshly minted UT graduates Carlos Oliveira and Edward Hempe, Players has done the same thing for the past 33 years: burgers, fries, shakes, beer.
It’s where UT staff can eat lunch on the cheap, or students can hang out at 2am after a long night of studying (or drinking), and the sticky patina on the tables bears witness to their long years of use. It’s also one of the last few places where students can gather near campus that isn’t a church or a chain. The food at Players isn’t going to win any awards, but its closure situates what is otherwise a humble burger joint at the tense intersection of modernization, Austin’s changing food culture, and UT’s seemingly unquenchable thirst for land.”
Haupt, Melanie. Austin Chronicle 14 November 2014.