Downtown events planned for F1 weekend

AUSTIN (KXAN) - Circuit of The Americas organizers and local company RunTex have applied for city permits to host festivals downtown Austin surrounding the first Formula 1 race weekend.

The events would bring big crowds to downtown and close several downtown Austin streets for a few days.

In August The Austin Fan Fest proposal to host the Austin Fan Fest at Auditorium Shores was withdrawn by Mayor Lee Leffingwell due to a scheduling conflict with the Palmer Events Center across the street. Since then Circuit of the Americas has been looking into other locations for their festival.

The latest proposal to the city has CoTA hosting their Austin Fan Fest in the warehouse district between Lavaca Street and Congress Avenue on Second through Fourth streets.

The event would begin on Friday evening and run through Sunday. Some road closures would begin as early as 6a.m. on Wednesday, November 14 for that event. The event would also close some Congress Avenue lanes on Friday, Nov. 16 between Second Street and Fifth Street. All Congress Avenue lanes would reopen by Monday morning.

Local company RunTex separately proposed a downtown event called Experience Austin. Organizers hope to introduce the world to Austin by showcasing local food and music along Congress Avenue according to James Russell with RunTex. 

Experience Austin plans live music at Ninth Street and Congress Avenue.

Experience Austin would close Congress Avenue from Seventh Street to the Capitol and some blocks on Eighth through 11 ^th streets would be closed starting the Tuesday of that week.

COTA has also asked the city to close lanes along Trinity Street between 15 ^th Street and MLK Jr. Boulevard for the scores of buses organizers plan to use to shuttle fans to the racetrack.

The F1 race comes to Austin Nov. 16-18. As many as 120,000 people are expected to attend the race weekend.