Downtown stakeholders plan future of Central Business District

By Patrick Brendel Friday, 25 June 2010

AUSTIN — After decades of population growth, despite city policy aimed at preventing dense development, downtown Austin is primed to explode.

Potential new development—possible under current zoning laws—is estimated at 37 million square feet, which would more than double the 30 million square feet of existing downtown development. With the near- and long-term future in mind, city officials, planners, property owners and individuals have invested years of effort in crafting the Downtown Austin Plan, set for city hearings and City Council action in late fall.

"Downtown should be designed and planned as a destination that serves the whole community. We're trying to create a space that works for everyone," said Jana McCann, of lead consultants McCann Adams Studio.

Generally, stakeholders agree high-density development downtown, when done properly, can be an asset for residents, businesses and the environment. A major focus of the plan is offering solutions to encourage that kind of acceptable growth, while preserving and enhancing the things that make downtown attractive, such as parks and historic resources.

The Downtown Austin Plan will include a robust implementation strategy including the creation of a quasi-independent economic development corporation focused on downtown development, McCann said.

Downtown Austin Plan

Acting like a neighborhood plan for the Central Business District, the downtown plan gives an overall vision for future growth, recommends public projects and lays out zoning for buildings in the downtown area.

The council initiated the plan through a December 2005 resolution, eventually offering a $1.4 million contract to consultants McCann and Jim Adams, who have led several major planning projects, such as the Waller Creek District, Mueller development and others.

Distinguishing downtown from other projects is its size and economic significance to the region, not just Central Austin.

"Even if you may not come downtown every day, it is really important," McCann said.

About 80 percent of downtown property taxes are exported to provide services—such as schools, hospitals and infrastructure—outside of downtown, said Charles Betts, executive director of the Downtown Austin Alliance.

Additionally, the vibrancy and culture of downtown attract visitors and form their impressions of Austin once they leave.

"When people think of Austin, if they've ever been here, they think of downtown," Betts said.

The downtown plan is the sum of several smaller plans focused on areas, projects or topics, such as the Northwest District, transportation infrastructure or density. Some of the individual plans have already been approved by council; some are still pending and some, like urban rail, might not be decided when council votes on the overall plan, tentatively set for late fall.

Density vs. affordability

High-density development is associated with increased residential rent. As a solution, the downtown plan includes a Downtown Density Bonus Program, where developers can build bigger in exchange for including affordable housing or paying into a city fund to purchase affordable housing.

One conflict is whether the city should use the fund to buy housing units downtown, or more units outside of downtown.

"It raises a lot of interesting questions about what we expect from downtown, how we should allocate scarce funds, how we can continue to make downtown as diverse as we all expect it to be," Councilman Chris Riley said.

Approved in July 2009, the original density bonus/affordable housing plans were made with housing aimed at downtown workers earning 80 to 120 percent of the area's median income, or about $73,000 for a family of three, McCann said.

However, in March the City Council passed a resolution that emphasizes providing housing—in combination with social services—for those making less than 30 percent of the area's median income, or about $20,000 for a family of three.

The plan supported creating 170 very-low-income housing units downtown, compared to the council resolution of 350 units. McCann said a revised density bonus/affordable housing plan will likely be a part of the overall downtown plan. In June, the city's Planning Commission suggested that half of the fund be used for housing downtown and half for housing near downtown.

Old and new

A seemingly haphazard patchwork of old and new structures, downtown has developed from an 1839 design by Edwin Waller, Austin's first mayor. The plan lays out a grid of streets anchored by major public green spaces, including the Capitol, Colorado River and four public squares, three of which exist today.

Today's downtown plan calls for a major revitalization of green spaces to serve as focal points of development in places such as Waller Creek, Palm Park, Waterloo Park and the historic squares.

"Parks and open spaces are the most undernourished resources in downtown. Most recent development and redevelopment clings to Lady Bird Lake because it is a great open space," McCann said.

Another top priority of the plan is to maintain downtown's historic feel, a task made more difficult by a lack of information on buildings potentially worth saving.

The last time the city attempted a comprehensive study of historic resources was more than 25 years ago. A primary objective of the downtown plan is to update the 1984 Cultural Resources Survey and Presentation Plan, which identified about 7,300 potentially historic structures built before 1935 in Central Austin. Since the survey, hundreds of downtown structures have been razed.

Fred Schmidt, owner of Wild About Music on Sixth Street, is torn between a respect for history and a penchant for new urbanism, or appropriate high-density development.

"The towers [on Congress Avenue] are good. They brought vertical construction and a density of use good for downtown, but in the process we lost a lot of the original urban historic fabric of 'The Main Street of Texas,'" he said.

County, state plans

An integral, independent factor to the downtown plan is development of Travis County and state-owned property downtown.

"[The county and state] are very important members of the downtown community, providing public services and creating a stable employment base," McCann said. "They create a significant amount of jobs.

"We're excited that both agencies are reinvesting in their downtown presence in a significant way. It's good news for the downtown plan."

In coordination with city planners, Travis County is preparing a Central Campus Master Plan for its facilities downtown.

County planners estimate the amount of space county government needs will more than double in 25 years, from about 530,000 square feet today to 1.1 million square feet in 2035.

The process began in June 2009 with a needs assessment. Public workshops are set for July and again at the end of the year. County commissioners will consider the plan in meetings in September and again in January, with the final report set to come out in March.

Even before the plan is complete, commissioners have already made a major real estate acquisition to prepare for growth, by voting to buy an office building at 700 Lavaca St. for $61.25 million. The building will contain the Commissioners Court, commissioners' offices and administration.

The county should close on the 15-story building by the end of June, said Bill Anderson, senior vice president of Office Leasing Advisors, an office tenant representation firm headquartered at the Lavaca building.

"They plan to start moving county people in the fourth quarter of this year," he said.

In the long term, the county's and state's plans will cause rental rates to rise, he said.

"Anything between Cesar Chavez and 15th is going to be looking at increases because everybody down here now is fighting over space," he said.

For state development, Texas Facilities Commission staffers released plans in late spring projecting development in the state Capitol Complex to triple in the future, with an addition of 7 million square feet—about 20 percent of downtown's entire development potential.

The tentative scenario estimates future state office needs to be 1 million square feet in the seven-block, 122-acre Capitol area. Another 1 million square feet of office space would be added on state-owned land near The Triangle.

The remaining 6 million square feet of potential space in the Capitol Complex would be developed under public-private partnerships—as The Triangle was—making the state-owned land subject to taxation.

Staffers will report to the commission in August. They expect a timeline to be drafted within a year. Although the plan is still in an early phase, it represents a radical departure from a 2009 plan to create a new state complex near Toll 130 east of Austin.

Implementing the plan

The Downtown Austin Plan is not the first city plan for downtown, or even the only plan in the works involving downtown. A major concern for some is how the neighborhood plans—including the downtown plan—will fit into the broad comprehensive plan, the city's overarching policies for growth and development. The neighborhood plans exist as amendments to the city's current 1979 Austin Tomorrow Comprehensive Plan, which would be replaced by the proposed Imagine Austin Comprehensive Plan, slated for council consideration in 2011.

Attorney and Realtor Frank Herron has been involved in shaping the comprehensive plan, which would provide mandatory guidelines for development of the entire city for the next 30 years. It does not make sense, he said, for smaller plans to precede passage of the comprehensive plan.

"By passing all of these smaller, more detailed planning efforts first, we're painting ourselves into a corner of having to match the comprehensive plan to smaller efforts than vice versa," he said.

However, City Councilman Chris Riley does not anticipate that type of conflict to occur.

"The neighborhood plans would be folded into the comprehensive plan. They would be something like subchapters in the comprehensive plan," he said.

McCann said the final draft of the downtown plan, when presented to city officials starting this fall, will include a robust implementation strategy. The details are still being worked out, but the plan will recommend creating an economic development corporation specific to downtown. The strategy will also include a list of prioritized projects for the next 10 years, suggested capital projects and changes to city policy.

"The worst case is for this to be a wonderful study that costs millions [and sits] on a shelf," Schmidt said.

Additional reporting by Rebecca Nordquist

For more information on the Downtown Austin Plan, visit www.cityofaustin.org/downtown.