Fire crews battle 2-alarm blaze at former Villa Town motel

April 17--A crowd gathered outside homes, on neighboring motel balconies and across the street Monday evening as they watched a troubled and abandoned south-central Lubbock motel burn.

Lubbock Fire Rescue crews began battling the two-alarm fire at the former Villa Town motel around 5 p.m. in the 5400 block of Avenue Q. LFR Battalion Chief Steve Holland said LFR crews and the Lubbock Fire Marshal's Office also responded to another blaze at the same structure at 10 a.m.

By 6:20 p.m., fire crews were in defensive mode battling the second blaze throughout most of the two-story structure. Red flag conditions, including strong winds, were adding to the difficulty, keeping the smoke from rising and closer to ground-level, Holland said.

No injuries had been reported.

The first fire, which was reported at the opposite end of the structure around the kitchen, remained under investigation by late Monday, but the fire marshal's office believes it was incendiary in nature and is asking for the public's help in providing information, according to Holland. It was not immediately clear what sparked either blaze.

The second fire was reported about 5:01 p.m. and, by 5:12 p.m. Lubbock fire officials called for a second alarm to bring out additional resources.

Mary Dorsey and Donna Rodriguez said they'd both been at the residences of their adult children when they started smelling what they initially believed to be a neighbor's barbecue. They were surprised when they walked out to see thick smoke.

"I couldn't even see across the fence through all that smoke," Rodriguez said. She indicated that the fence was about six feet from the front door of her son's residence.

Rodriguez, who was at a residence two streets north of the fire said the smell was strong as it filtered inside the residence with the door closed and she couldn't get rid of it even with some spray. Dorsey said she tried to overpower it with a candle.

By 8 p.m., smoke from the fire covered much of the area between 54th Street east of Avenue Q to about the Interstate 27 down past 34th Street.

Fresh black smoke and orange flames were still visible at the scene just before then.

One man who lives just down the street from the fire was handing out masks to people so they wouldn't breathe the smoke. He declined to speak with A-J Media but mentioned he hoped the wind didn't carry the smoke toward his residence.

Rodriguez and Dorsey worked at the Villa Town motel in its heyday. Rodriguez said the building has been abandoned for a long time and it doesn't have a good reputation anymore.

"That's one less worry Lubbock has," Rodriguez said.

Last week, the A-J reported that Banyan Strategies LLC, a Lewisville, Texas-based commercial real estate investment and development team, bought the property for about $540,000 in February, according to Lubbock County records.

A co-owner of Banyan, a behind-the-scenes guy who asked to not be named, said renovating dilapidated hotel and motel properties is a priority of his business, the article reads. The company plans to put $1.5 million into the property and re-brand it under the Clarion Hotel flag within a roughly six-month timeline. It was not immediately clear by late Monday what the fires would mean for the proposed renovation projects.

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