As Austin weathers the dog days of summer, wildfire risk is once again a hot topic in the city. A new report this week by the Office of the City Auditor said that the city could be doing a better job of fireproofing areas outside of the urban core, an area that’s roughly two-thirds of […]
Zoning and Platting Commission
Posted inZoning
Mobile home rezoning case raises questions about living arrangements
In an attempt to tackle gentrification head-on, last August City Council directed city staff to begin rezoning mobile home parks that were operating as such but were not appropriately zoned. Six of those rezoning cases came before the Zoning and Platting Commission at its May 7 meeting, but only four of them were recommended for […]
Posted inZoning
Traffic concerns for proposed Braker Lane development give Zoning Commission pause
At the corner of Braker Lane and Dessau Road sits an oddly shaped 0.9-acre parcel of land that has been the subject of at least two heated zoning disputes. In mid-2016, the owner of 1308 E. Braker Lane, Sinh Tron Le, successfully got the property rezoned from SF-2, which allows standard single-family homes, to MF-2, […]
Posted inCity Hall
Camelback is back, but this time at the Ethics Review Commission
After so much contention and inflamed passions on both sides, it’s no surprise that the story of the Camelback planned unit development did not end with the Nov. 1 approval by Council. On Dec. 12, the Ethics Review Commission heard a preliminary case against Jim Duncan, the vice chair of the Zoning and Platting Commission […]
Posted inPlanning
Plans for Colony District Park permit move forward
The Zoning and Platting Commission had a few questions before unanimously approving a conditional use permit for additional amenities to Colony District Park last Tuesday. The park, which is located at 7201 Colony Loop Drive, is home to Overton Elementary School, and the community is eager to make improvements to the public spot. Plans include […]
Posted inZoning
Commission votes to deny rezoning for Northwest bar
The Zoning and Platting Commission voted to side with members of a Northwest Austin neighborhood against a request that would permit a bar to open in their neighborhood. It is not the first time this neighborhood has opposed similar requests, and the bad memories of past cases, rightly or wrongly, weighed on the outcome of […]
Posted inLand Development Code
Commission vice chair calls density bonus programs a failure
At the Zoning and Platting Commission’s Feb. 6 meeting, Vice Chair Jim Duncan continued his series of CodeNEXT presentations with an indictment of the city’s density bonus programs, one of the city’s main approaches to facilitating housing for households making less than 80 percent of the median family income. He charged city staff with being “blind” […]
Posted inLand Development Code
The new ‘old code’ zoning category makes waves at commission
If adopted, CodeNEXT will be a total rewrite of the Land Development Code, but as comprehensive as the revisions will be, remnants of the old code will remain. At their Oct. 3 joint meeting, the land use commissions learned about the proposed zoning category for these vestiges of the current code: Former Title 25, or […]
Posted inLand Development Code
CodeNEXT divides commission, spurs review of recommendation process
No city commission has been as prolific in its criticism of CodeNEXT than the Zoning and Platting Commission, and the commission fired off another letter of recommendation at its July 18 meeting in an effort to get feedback in before the release of draft 2.0 in September. After half a year of intense scrutiny over […]
Posted inLand Development Code
Zoning and Platting looks to pinpoint gentrification
As the only major growth city in the U.S. with a declining African-American population, Austin knows it has a gentrification problem, and the Zoning and Platting Commission took a step toward addressing it on May 2. Commissioners unanimously passed a motion asking staff to develop criteria for what makes an area at risk of displacement […]
Posted inReporters' Notebook
Reporter’s Notebook: Of departures (people, codes and forts)
ZAP! Pow! Bang!… People paying attention to the membership of the Zoning and Platting Commission (if you are out there, you are probably reading this) may have noticed change has come/is on the horizon. As we reported, now-former Chair Thomas Weber has left the commission, with former Austin Neighborhoods Council President David King taking over […]
Posted inZoning
Planning Commission denies request for bank drive-in services on 38th
At the urging of two Zoning and Platting commissioners, the Planning Commission unanimously denied a rezoning request for a conditional overlay for drive-in services at 623 West 38th St. during its Jan. 24 meeting. City staff had supported Pioneer Bank’s request to remove the current prohibition on drive-in services from the current zoning, in part […]