Posted July 14: After hearing feedback from concerned residents, Austin City Council approved June 22 the creation of an extra draft for the city’s CodeNEXT project, a multiyear effort to update the city’s land development zoning code. The city’s existing land development code has not been subject to major revisions since the mid-1980s.
After the first CodeNEXT draft was released Jan. 30, Mayor Steve Adler said he saw Austin on a trajectory of becoming a city similar to San Francisco, where rapid growth and a lack of focus on affordability led the city to see an average home cost $1.1 million. He said CodeNEXT is an important step in managing this growth.
CodeNEXT’s initial maps for proposed rezoning were released to the public April 18 and highlighted zoning changes across the city, including the West Austin neighborhood of Lost Creek that was annexed in 2015 and River Place, which is undergoing the annexation process.
Lost Creek possible zoning
CodeNEXT is the first opportunity for Lost Creek to receive zoning designations, said Paul Schumann, president of the Lost Creek Civic Organization.
“Lost Creek’s interim zoning was filled with problems, and the CodeNEXT draft adopted a lot of those errors and added more,” he said. “The city painted Lost Creek with a broad brush and didn’t look at individual properties to see how big the land was and how properties are being used now.”
Schumann said the area was being “up-zoned” with low-density residential zoning—meaning more development on less space.
The proposed zoning also allows property uses—such as operating day care centers and home businesses or providing a short-term rental guest house—that contradict deed restrictions created by Lost Creek’s original developers, Schumann said.
“There’s an extended list of possible uses that were never intended in this neighborhood, “he said.
One of the remaining undeveloped properties in Lost Creek, the Marshall tract, would be zoned as low-density residential in the new code, Schumann said.
concerns in other areas
In areas such as River Place and Four Points, CodeNEXT rezoning could result in increased population density without improved transportation options, said Linda Bailey, a vice president of the Austin Neighborhood Council and a board member of nonprofit Save Our City Austin. The proposed code would make it easier to develop multifamily housing or subdivide properties, she said.
Under the code, sections of River Place would be zoned as low-density residential, which allows residents to build guest homes onto properties or to convert homes into duplexes, Bailey said. Those structures are currently prohibited on many River Place properties due to deed restrictions and could increase traffic in the neighborhood, she said.
Through CodeNEXT, Shepherd Mountain, a neighborhood composed of mainly single-family homes west of Capital of Texas Hwy., will be rezoned as medium-high density residential, Bailey said. The reclassification would not allow new single-family homes to be built and would instead permit multifamily properties on undeveloped lots, she said.
Similar to Lost Creek, deed restrictions in Glenlake, a neighborhood off City Park Road, prohibit homeowners from operating business out of their homes, a restriction that would be allowed under the new low-density medium residential zoning, Bailey said.
“The city will enforce the city code, not neighborhood deed restrictions,” she said.
Are more layers needed?
Both Bailey and Schumann said residents want the city of Austin to add a fire-mitigation overlay to CodeNEXT. The overlay would require new buildings constructed in areas prone to wildfires to comply with international wildfire safety standards.
“West Travis County has been united on this front from the beginning,” Bailey said. “We saw the Steiner Ranch fire in 2011 and how close it came to our neighborhood, and there’s no fire regulations in CodeNEXT. It was forgotten.”
Schumann said CodeNEXT does not account for Lost Creek’s designation as an International Dark Sky community, and an overlay with additional lighting regulations should be considered.
Also, CodeNEXT does not label Capital of Texas Hwy. as a Hill Country Scenic Roadway, which comes with additional development regulations, Bailey said.
“Somebody probably just forgot to add it, but for some of us, we live out west because of the beauty along the highway,” she said. “That needs to be added back in.”
Christopher Neely contributed to this article.
