It’s a February afternoon that’s warm and sunny with a crispness in the air from preceding days where overnight lows hovered around freezing. 

Roy Landa is walking around the grounds of The Landmark on Tower. Traffic goes over the railroad tracks by the combination food truck park/restaurant on Tower Road in Alamo. Thick-trunked oak trees loom over green turf and stylish picnic tables. Under the old oaks, customers go through the doors of the entrance to The Landmark’s indoor dining and games area. There’s a wall of handles offering something not commonly seen in the Rio Grande Valley.

It’s a self-serve beer wall with 24 taps, with 20 for beer choices and four for wines. The choices of beer are craft, imports and domestics with wine selections to fit every taste. A brick oven sits behind the main counter and bakes the pizzas that are the ideal side dishes to go with the range of beers and wines on tap. 

There’s a relaxed feel to the place. It’s just as Landa intended when he opened his Alamo business last October. He wanted a venue where families could gather and bring their children to play video games inside, or where they could sit outside and watch their kids roam around on the turfed lawns leading to the food trucks. Landa wanted to recreate how he felt growing up at family gatherings of barbecues and cookouts in backyards with kids frolicking about without a care in the world.

“I don’t want people to feel like it’s a bar,” Landa said of The Landmark. “This is a family-oriented place. I wanted somewhere that people could relax and disconnect from their phones.”

The former Alamo city commissioner had one other motivation in mind when developing the site on Tower and Business 83. 

“I had my community in mind,” said Landa, who grew up in Alamo. “Growth here had been stagnant. I thought a place like this would add something positive for the community.”

Finding A New Challenge

Landa is a multifaceted businessman and owner.

Among his real estate and restaurant holdings is Rio Grande Valley College, a school in Pharr that has nursing and medical support programs. He and a partner built the school from scratch to the large campus it now occupies on U.S. Highway 281, just north of the Pharr Interchange. Landa cast about for a new challenge after the school’s success. He settled on a spot on the corner of Tower and Business 83.

It’s an intersection with history that’s both tragic and hearkens back to the Valley’s agricultural past. It’s the site of a March 14, 1940 truck/train accident that took the lives of 34 farm workers. At the time, the accident marked the most fatalities on a Texas highway. Just adjacent to the accident site was the Crest Fruit Company. It was just one of the dozens of packing sheds and agricultural warehouses that lined Highway 83 long before the expressway was built. 

Landa has a keen sense of local history. He recalls the stores and businesses he grew up going to as a child that are now gone. It was a sense of nostalgia that was an inspiration in developing the Landmark. There are various food truck parks around the Valley. Landa wanted something more even while praising the six food truck owners at the Landmark that offer loaded tater tots, a waffle bar, burgers and hotdogs with a Mexican twist, and tacos featuring premium meats and handmade tortillas.

The beer wall fits the bill. It’s what Landa calls “the self-pour experience.”

Customers can go to The Landmark’s main counter and be given a chilled 15-ounce mug with a bracelet that has a microchip. The latter will electronically track the beers a customer selects along with the quantity of beverages he or she is drinking to make sure that it’s being kept in check. There’s a range of well-known national light beer brands to go with Mexican-sourced beers. Regional beers come from the 5X5 Brewing Co. of Mission.

“You only pay for what you pour,” Landa said. 

Family Affair

Sitting outside on the turfed grounds, Landa has a word or two with his older brothers, David and Gilbert, who are his partners in the business venture and help to keep The Landmark looking clean and neat. 

There’s a stage for live music on the northern end of the property. The Landmark is open Tuesday through Sunday from 6 p.m. to 11 p.m., and a bit later on weekends when there are larger crowds. The outdoor option is a good one right now, Landa said, for customers who may not feel comfortable with indoor public spaces.

The unique indoor/outdoor beer wall establishment with self-serve taps and food trucks on 103 N. Tower is getting its footing. In its first days of operations last October, so many people came to The Landmark that local police officers were called to direct traffic and keep customers from parking on the properties of nearby residences. It’s all good now and Landa believes he’s onto something with a business he hopes can well serve Pharr, San Juan, Alamo and the surrounding Valley communities.

“We were always eating outside when we were growing up,” he said. “I want to help bring back some of that, being outside, somewhere comfortable where you don’t feel rushed and you can enjoy family and friends.”