The City of Cedar Park celebrates its 40th anniversary Feb. 24, and its four decades of existence have brought countless changes to the area.

City staff aim to mark the occasion with a commemorative calendar, available at City Hall, that highlights Cedar Park's history and growth.

"We saw this anniversary coming up as a great way to recognize the progress Cedar Park has made over the past four decades," Media and Communications Manager Jennie Huerta said.

Water rights and encroaching Austin city limits led to the city's incorporation in 1973. The first meetings to discuss incorporation began at the most common and accessible place for Cedar Park's 700 residents—the volunteer fire department, said Sharon Wolfe, Cedar Park Heritage Society treasurer.

"There were mostly houses and people out here, but because there was not any city, one of the only places they could meet was the volunteer fire department. That's how the discussion became, 'What are we going to do?'" she said. "They didn't have cell phones and there was no email, so they had a calling tree, and that's how they would get people together to have meetings."

For years following incorporation, Cedar Park remained a rural town, said Duane Smith, the city's community and tourism development manager.

"Mostly it was people driving through on [US] 183 on their way somewhere else, typically Lampasas or Burnet. Basically, it was just a wide-open spot with a road," he said. "There were no traffic lights in Cedar Park, and if you headed to Austin, you didn't hit the first traffic signal until you got to Burnet Road, and most of that distance on US 183 was a two-lane road," he said.

There were a few stores and a post office established as early as the mid-19th century, but industry picked up, and the population grew in the late 1980s and early '90s, Smith said. Having reached a population of at least 5,000, voters approved a home rule charter in 1987, the same year road crews finished the extension of FM 1431 from US 183 to I-35.

By 1993, the population reached 10,000, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. That year the city celebrated its 20th anniversary with the first Fourth of July celebration in Elizabeth Milburn Park.

"It was the first fireworks display in Cedar Park, and it was also the first time we had the free watermelon," Smith said. "Although it wasn't the same month we incorporated, the celebration coincided with a popular holiday when more people were used to going somewhere else, but they stayed in Cedar Park instead."

Cedar Park's population doubled in the next five years, and by 1998 City Council adopted Cedar Park's first comprehensive plan, which identifies the overall goals for land use, development and roads along with opportunities and actions to achieve those goals.

"Cedar Park had been a home-rule city from 1987–98 before growth started occurring where having a comprehensive plan was best for the future for the city," Smith said. "The comprehensive plan tries to answer the question, 'What do you want to be in the future?' That was the first time the city had taken that approach, and it probably came at a very good time, since the city was in that transition area of becoming a population center instead of just populated."

The comprehensive plan was updated in 2006, and a consulting firm was hired in September to revise the plan entirely. Several community members will provide input to the growth blueprint, which will help shape the next 40 years in Cedar Park.

"The intriguing thing is for people to stop and realize that Cedar Park has not always been what you see today," Smith said. "It has been a process of growth, community spirit and people working together to get to this point."

In addition to the commemorative calendar, city staff interviewed community members on-camera about their memories of Cedar Park. The video is planned to be shown at the Feb. 28 council meeting and posted on the city website.