Is it hot at Fort Worth Stockyards?

Fort Worth Stockyards: brick streets, Texas sun, and finding the shady side

By mid-afternoon in high summer, the brick streets of the Fort Worth Stockyards throw off heat from every direction. This is a historic district, rows of old cattle-era buildings, wide pedestrian lanes, and open pavement, and like most historic districts, its shade comes from the buildings themselves, not from trees. July here runs hot, with afternoon highs around 95°F and August a degree warmer still, so the difference between the sunny side of the street and the shaded side is the difference between comfort and a slog.

Which side of the street stays cool

The Stockyards' main lanes run past two-story brick storefronts, and those buildings are your shade. On a July afternoon the sun sits about 68 degrees high at 3 PM on a west-southwest bearing near 244 degrees, so the shadows fall toward the east and northeast. In practice that means the eastern side of a north-south street catches building shade through the afternoon while the western side stays lit. Walk the shaded sidewalk, cross under awnings and porch overhangs where the old storefronts offer them, and duck indoors between stops. The open middle of the district, the wide event areas and the pens, has little cover, so save those for the cooler hours.

Beating the Texas heat

At 95°F under a high sun, this is a place where the heat is the main event, not a footnote. A few things make a summer visit workable:

• Go early or late. Sunrise is around 6:32 AM and the sun doesn't set until roughly 8:38 PM, so mornings before 10 and evenings after 6 are far kinder than the 1-to-5 PM stretch.
• Drink water steadily and reapply sunscreen; the brick and pavement radiate heat well after the sun moves off them.
• The twice-daily cattle drive and other outdoor events put you in open sun. Plan those for the edges of the day and find shade to wait in.

The heat eases in the shoulder seasons. April and October afternoons sit in the low 80s, and the district is genuinely pleasant then. March and November are cooler still. If you can pick your month, those beat the June-through-August peak by a wide margin.

Making the most of a hot afternoon

The honest truth about the Stockyards in July is that you plan your route around shadow. Stick to the shaded sidewalks, use the covered porches and interiors of the shops and saloons as waypoints, and treat the open plazas as quick crossings rather than places to linger at midday. The historic buildings do the work if you let them.

To see exactly which streets and storefronts will be shaded at the hour you visit, pull up the satellite shadow view for the Fort Worth Stockyards before you head out.