VP of master-planned communities, Howard Hughes

The concept of an 11,400-acre master-planned community in the path of northwest Harris County's expanding growth drew Peter Houghton to accept a job with Bridgeland in 2005. During his time with the community, he has overseen the first lot sales, developed a distinctive neighborhood concept and this year prepares to start building Bridgeland's first village center—Lakeland Heights.

Before coming to Bridgeland, Houghton worked on other master-planned communities in Houston such as Cinco Ranch, Greatwood, Seven Meadows, Eagle Springs, Summerwood and more across the country.

With several hundred homes now completed in the community, Houghton is responsible for all operations of Bridgeland—but primarily the sales revenue—which has been mostly residential until this point. He also balances his time with homebuilders and determines the right residential products to meet the largest market, or he offers as many different types of housing products for which there is demand.

Lakeland Heights, one of four residential villages within Bridgeland Houghton has worked on, is a traditional neighborhood design community with 350 homes featuring rear alleys, craftsman architecture and front porches, all within walking distance of the community's future village and town centers. The concept is one that Houghton is proud of, as no other developers have tried to do an urban project in a suburban area to that scale, he said.

Bridgeland was purchased by the Howard Hughes Corporation, which also owns The Woodlands, two years ago. After 35 years of building out The Woodlands, the company is now ready for another 30 plus years of developing Bridgeland, Houghton said.

What does the master plan of Bridgeland encompass?

It envisions 21,000 homes with more than 800 acres in a mixed-use town center on both sides of the Grand Parkway, with emphasis on creating jobs in the community town center. Our goal is to have at least one job per home site, so 21,000 homes means 21,000 jobs, which is similar to The Woodlands. With the jobs and office space you create a destination for retail, entertainment, restaurants and civic options, and that's what we think could distinguish us from other master plans—having a significant office space presence.

How do mixed-use developments benefit such a large unincorporated area like Cypress?

They're really critical to have mixed-use [space] and primarily jobs located within the community—that's the key to cutting down long commutes. The old model of a sea of rooftops with no adjacent retail, dining, shopping or working is a little outdated. Most consumers today expect and demand some sort of town center, mixed-use area in the community.

How have master-planned communities evolved over the years?

There is an ever-growing development design that incorporates natural and conservation areas within the community. At Bridgeland, the original concept was to maintain more than 3,000 acres of common space. One of the things we did from the beginning was develop a series of master studies; before we did the land plan we did a master environmental study to identify all the significant environmental features and determine which ones to preserve or enhance. Then we laid out the basic residential and commercial pods around those natural features. Sustainability and all of its facets are much more important in master-planned communities than ever.

What other master-planned communities have influenced Bridgeland?

Prior to Howard Hughes' formation, one group that originally influenced us quite a bit in Bridgeland was Rouse Company from Columbia, Md. Columbia was one of the original master-planned communities that started in the 1960s. We looked at Columbia and The Woodlands—which we owned half of at the time—and they were the inspiration for the conceptual plan here. I was fond of saying at the beginning that just like the vision Mr. Mitchell had in The Woodlands and Mr. Rouse had in Columbia, we will have a similar vision in Bridgeland.

What is the time frame for Bridgeland's village centers, and what will be included in them?

Lakeland Village Center is scheduled to start construction this year, and the first phase of the town center we believe will happen in the next three years. It will take decades for it to be built out completely to become something similar to The Woodlands. The village centers should have a grocery store—which we will not have in [Lakeland] since we're still pretty new—pharmacy, adjacent support retail, some small office and medical uses. The main thing is that they're designed to be mixed-use. We'll have four village centers designed as small downtowns for the four residential villages, which will each have about 5,000 homes. The town center is the downtown for all 21,000 homes. We have a few sites planned for schools, churches, a college campus and hospital campus.

How will the real estate landscape in Cypress change in the next 10 years?

It's going to change dramatically. Cypress is lucky to have large master plans that dominate the market such as ourselves, Cypress Creek Lakes, Towne lake, Canyon Gate and Fairfield. There have also been recent purchases along the Grand Parkway by large developers, which is always a good thing for an area. Typically, the larger the development and the more experienced the developer, the stronger the plan is, the higher quality the amenities are, and those communities are more sustainable in the long run than smaller ones. I think you'll see a huge amount of growth follow the Grand Parkway and the rapidly approaching build-out of land in Katy ISD. The extremely strong growth that Katy ISD has seen is going to go somewhere, and I believe it'll go to Cy-Fair ISD, being a comparable high quality district in an area dominated by master-planned communities.