Council members approved two separate contracts with GFF Design at their Aug. 18 meeting.
The overview
One contract costs $43,100 and includes creating a land use plan for 213 acres near FM 407 and US 377.
The study will look at undeveloped land from Cook Street down to Frenchtown Road, and then from US 377 to just east of Myrtle Drive, to create the plan, Town Manager Mike Sims said. This includes the area identified for the future town center, police department and municipal buildings, Sims said.
The second contract costs $55,200 and involves creating a land use plan for 1,056 acres along the I-35W corridor, which includes the Heritage development, the Harvest development and the Heath tract, which is a piece of undeveloped land that town officials are considering bringing commercial buildings to. GFF Design officials will study those tracts of land along with any other land that could be developed within the next few years along the I-35W corridor, Sims said.
“The goal is to have a uniform look for the city-owned property and all the property surrounding it and to clearly convey what town officials want to future developers,” Sims said.
GFF Design officials will create an overall study of all the land, have meetings with town officials and write out development guidelines for the town, according to town documents.
“We’d look at the vacant land within [each] zone, try to make sure that we know what’s going on [and] try to make sure that we have any zoning updates that need to happen,” Sims said.
The background
Town officials approved GFF Design to develop a master site plan for the buildings that will be developed on the town-owned property located on FM 407 at the July 27 Council meeting. The intent is to create a town hall and police station, which will coincide with the town center planned for development adjacent to the town-owned property, Community Impact previously reported.
The Heritage property is another large development in the works, which includes a 123.93-acre development on the southwest corner of I-35W and Robson Ranch Road. It will have an unnamed grocery store and a Baylor Scott and White wellness campus, according to previous reporting.
Anything that council members approved for these developments will not be influenced by the new development guidelines that this planning process puts in place, Sims said.
Looking ahead
In the next couple of months, GFF Design will work to understand the lay of the land, which includes reviewing infrastructure, water systems and trees, Sims said.
Then GFF Design will bring ideas to Council and get feedback before coming up with a preliminary plan. Council will give more feedback to the proposed plan so that GFF Designs can create a final plan for Council approval.
Sims said he expects both land use plans to be completed by January.
