Denton City Council members directed city staff to begin design on a new permanent fire station in the Landmark master-planned community that will serve Landmark and Robson Ranch at a Feb. 3 council work session.
The gist
The new facility, Fire Station 10, will improve the fire department’s response time to Robson Ranch, Denton Fire Chief Kenneth Hedges said.
A report from Hedges showed that the Denton Fire Department has an average response time to Robson Ranch of about nine minutes from Fire Station 7, the closest station to Robson Ranch. The fire department aims for a response time of four minutes, Hedges said. Currently, Fire Station 7 is unable to make it to Robson Ranch Road within four minutes, per Hedges’ report.
The new station is planned to be just west of Landmark’s first phase of buildout, which is under construction.
“The internal expectation is that we can cover all of Robson within four minutes or near four minutes from this site,” Hedges said.
By the numbers
The station’s design phase will cost roughly $800,000, and the total project cost will reach about $12.3 million, Hedges said. Landmark would reimburse the city $5 million for public safety improvements through the developer’s agreement, per Hedges’ report.
What they’re saying
The $800,000 for the station’s design will come from money originally allocated for renovations at the Denton Service Center. Capital Projects Director Seth Garcia said the renovations are still in the design phase, as the building will need to remain operational during the renovations, which has led to a long design period.
“The logistics and needing to keep it fully functional [has] caused some intricate phasing opportunities for us to work through,” Garcia said. “Right now, the service center project is still continuing through the full design process.”
Deputy City Manager Cassey Ogden said the service center construction project hasn’t been fully funded yet.
“We don’t have all the construction funding yet for this project, which is why we’re recommending using the $800,000 for design,” Ogden said.
Some background
City officials originally planned to open a temporary fire station at the same site in October 2028 and build a permanent station in the future because there would not be roads or infrastructure near the fire station site, but Phase 2 of Landmark is developing faster than anticipated, Hedges said. The temporary station would have cost $1.2 million in unrecoverable funds.
Denton Chief Financial Officer Matt Hamilton said the city could save the $1.2 million on the temporary station by building a single permanent station.
“We could save that and just move forward with the permanent station that we thing we would need eventually anyway,” Hamilton said.
Looking ahead
Hamilton said the city would need to issue bonds to finance the $12.3 million permanent fire station, which would incur about $950,000 in annual debt service over 20 years.
Hamilton said the city will receive between $2.3 million and $2.5 million in tax revenue from Phase 1 of Landmark in December 2027.
Fire department officials have also identified a location for a future fire station that will serve Cole Ranch, Hedges said.
