AllianceTexas highlights annual impact of business park development for Fort Worth City Council

AllianceTexas reported a total of 53.4 million square feet had been developed and 63,021 jobs had been created in the master-planned community through the end of 2021, per a presentation from its developer Hillwood.

Mike Berry, president of Hillwood, delivered the presentation at a Feb. 15 Fort Worth City Council work session. Berry estimated the development's economic impact last year as $8.66 billion, a slight increase from the $8.24 billion reported in 2020. That pushed AllianceTexas to an estimated $100.6 billion in cumulative impact in the region since 1990.

Berry also reported that AllianceTexas paid a cumulative $3.13 billion in property taxes, including $621 million to the city of Fort Worth and nearly $65.58 million to the city of Roanoke, over that time span. Keller ISD has received more than $657.2 million while Northwest ISD has received more than $1.04 billion since 1990, according to the presentation.

According to a Hillwood report, Fort Worth has invested $112 million into AllianceTexas, which makes up 11% of total public funding for the development but only 0.89% of total funding when considering the public and private sources combined.

The presentation highlighted developments in AllianceTexas’ business park, where Charles Schwab completed its headquarters last year. The business park reported 3.6 million square feet in new leases at the end of 2021 as well as 2.7 million square feet in lease renewals.

Fort Worth Alliance Airport, a public-private partnership airport between the city and Hillwood, is beginning construction on a new fixed-base operator servicing aircraft in 2022, Berry said. He described the potential of freight delivery by drones as “a little further off” but noted Google’s wing drones had begun package delivery for Walgreens.

“If you haven’t been [to the airport], I encourage you to come up there,” Berry said. “With Amazon, FedEx, it’s growing.”

Council member Carlos Flores asked Berry whether Hillwood was seeing any efficiency improvements following a partnership with the autonomous driving company TuSimple, announced Feb. 1. Berry said it was too soon to say but referred to a “driver shortage” that meant there was more of a need for self-driving vehicles.

Find out more about AllianceTexas here.