The land use commissions received a briefing on the affordability implications of the third and final draft of CodeNEXT Tuesday night, with only a few weeks left before they turn in their official recommendations to City Council. Consultants and staff shared the most up-to-date projections on how many affordable units would be facilitated by adopting […]
City of Austin Zoning and Platting Commission
The City of Austin’s Zoning and Platting Commission addresses issues of land use as assigned to it by Austin’s City Code. It has sovereign authority, or the right to make final decisions on certain cases.
Posted inZoning
Commission strikes compromise in contentious mixed use zoning request
In line with the emphasis on mixed use zoning proposed in the CodeNEXT draft, the Zoning and Platting Commission voted to approve staff’s recommendation of mixed use Limited Office zoning for a lot on Slaughter Lane during its Mar. 20 meeting. The request had originally been to upzone both 1109 W. Slaughter Lane and 9401 […]
Posted inLand Development Code
Land use commissions skeptical about CodeNEXT 3.0 promises
The third draft of CodeNEXT made its long-awaited debut last Monday, presented to the public at an open house that evening in the flattering light of the golden hour – but by the next night, at the joint land use commission meeting, the congeniality of first impressions had given way to sober deliberation. Consultants and […]
Posted inReporters' Notebook
Reporter’s Notebook: We’ve made haranguements
Save Our Strings… Could the city be moving toward declaring musicians as an endangered species? Not yet, but at last week’s meeting of the Austin Music Commission there was a good deal of talk about declaring the city’s music culture as a natural resource that needs to be actively protected from growing development pressures throughout […]
Posted inLand Development Code
Days away from new draft, city commissions give their last word on CodeNEXT (for now)
Less than a week out from the release of the latest version of CodeNEXT, city commissions are weighing in on what they’d like to see in this latest draft of Austin’s Land Development Code. The Zoning and Platting Commission laid out its plan Tuesday for gathering public feedback on the new rules, which would regulate […]
Posted inReporters' Notebook
Reporter’s Notebook: Which side?
More news from the Amazon (bid)… Austin has landed on the bad side of an LGBT rights group’s effort to influence online retail giant Amazon’s decision on where to build its next headquarters. The “No Gay? No Way!” campaign issued a statement last week that singled out nine of the 20 finalist sites for being located […]
Posted inLand Development Code
City demographer smashes assumptions about growth at CodeNEXT meeting
For the past year, the land use commissions have been reviewing the drafts of CodeNEXT, and the discussions have primarily revolved around how to accommodate the incredible population growth the city has experienced for the past few decades. About two weeks before the third and final iteration of the proposed Land Development Code rewrite debuts […]
Posted inLand Development Code
CodeNEXT wrong on PUDs, says commission
Waiting for the release of the third and final draft of CodeNEXT has not stopped the Zoning and Platting Commission from continuing to criticize the second draft, even after the commission submitted its formal recommendation last October. One of the main issues of contention discussed at its Jan. 2 meeting was the current system of […]
Posted inPlanning
Flag lot variance request revived after failed approval
Having already been postponed once before, a plat application for a new subdivision in West Austin was postponed again by the Zoning and Platting Commission at its Jan. 2 meeting after a motion to approve failed to pass. Two of the three existing single-family homes located on the 1.98 acres at 1401 Allen Road will […]
Posted inZoning
Commission tries in vain to add affordability requirements to commercial rezone
The legal constraints of Vertical Mixed Use zoning stalled efforts to add income-restricted affordable housing to a rezoning request at the Zoning and Platting Commission’s Dec. 19 meeting. The 2-acre property at 9829 1/2 North Lake Creek Parkway is currently zoned Multifamily Residence-Highest Density (MF-6) and is located at the corner of a commercial intersection. […]
Posted inLand Development Code
Commission demands more precision in CodeNEXT land uses
It’s easy to get lost in the new CodeNEXT zoning categories and their form-based considerations without keeping in mind their underlying purpose: setting the standards for how properties in Austin can be used. At the Nov. 28 joint meeting of the land use commissions, the CodeNEXT team explained how the list of uses had been […]
Posted inPlanning
Five years later, Imagine Austin gets progress report but no update
Despite a long road ahead, the progress report on Imagine Austin presented at the Nov. 7 joint land use commission meeting indicated that the city was on track in its implementation of the comprehensive plan. Still, some commissioners expressed frustration that staff had forgone an update to the plan in spite of new reports and […]