Developers behind The Grove at Shoal Creek—a proposed 75-acre, mixed-use community off 45th Street and Bull Creek Road—released the newest version of their development master plan March 30, which features additional parkland and reduced proportions of office and housing space.

Initial plans for The Grove, which include some of the only planned affordable housing units in west Central Austin, received a mixed response. Some community members stated the development would increase traffic and did not offer an adequate amount of quality parkland.

Grove representatives met with area residents and stakeholders more than 50 times during the past year to solicit input and have made several updates to the original plan, said Garrett Martin, co-owner of ARG Bull Creek LTD, which owns the Grove project.

The newest Grove plan features 18.6 acres of parkland, 150,000 square feet of retail space, 225,000 square feet of office space, 700 residential units and 300,000 square feet of assisted-living housing. The new totals amount to a 26 percent increase in parkland, a 12 percent reduction in residential development and a 35 percent reduction in office space from the previous master plan released in July, according to Grove representatives.

The new plan also includes a greenbelt and a proposed 250- to 300-foot-long pedestrian and cyclist bridge spanning Shoal Creek that The Grove announced in February.

The Grove mixed-use district is scheduled to include retail, office and residential units.[/caption]

“More than 15 months ago ... I committed to approaching this process with honesty, integrity, a sense of purpose in creating the very best community possible and a sense of compromise,” Martin said during a March 30 community meeting. “As we move through the rest of this process we remain committed to those same ideals, and we would ask you to do similarly.”

Some Shoal Creek-area residents said the master plan changes do not fully alleviate neighborhood concerns about the proposed development.

Carolyn Mixon, who lives in Shoalmont, said the percentage of office and retail space does not concern her as much as the square footage, which she would like to see cut in half.

“Our neighborhood is in full support of a mixed-use development there; we are just very much concerned about the density and the traffic that density will create,” Mixon said. “They appear to be trying to build something similar to The Triangle or The Domain … all of which work fine on the edges of our neighborhoods, but this is in the middle of several neighborhoods.”