The Allandale Reporter

Second Site Plan Approved

On Thursday, the Austin American-Statesman confirmed the City has approved Lincoln's second site plan. The article, "City approves site plan for Northcross Wal-Mart," said the approval clears the way for the 192,000 sq ft Supercenter to be built.

Also on Thursday RG4N filed a lawsuit against the City of Austin and Lincoln Property seeking to invalidate the site plan. Here are links to their press statement and lawsuit petition.

Allandale Executive Committee Votes to File Lawsuit

At last night's ANA meeting, the Executive Committee voted unanimously to file a lawsuit against the City for approving the Northcross site plan that includes a Wal-Mart Supercenter. As ANA has stated all along, we are concerned the development will create significant traffic problems, negatively impact surrounding businesses, and ultimately change the character of the area.

It’s NOT a Done Deal!

We, the Allandale Neighborhood Association (ANA), are working on your behalf and need your help. As you know, Lincoln Property Company is redeveloping Northcross Mall to include a 192,000 square foot Wal-Mart Supercenter. A one-stop store of this magnitude will overburden our roads, negatively impact surrounding businesses, and ultimately change the character of Allandale.

For decades, Allandale residents have successfully fought to preserve the quality and character of our neighborhood. We have saved the neighborhood from serious threats by:

• Securing the largest zoning rollback (to SF-2) in Austin history;
• Blocking the conversion of Koenig Lane into a 6-lane freeway;
• Stopping a church expansion that would have destroyed many neighborhood homes;
• Blocking the extension of Far West Boulevard into Allandale.

VMU in today's Austin American-Statesman

According to today's article in the Austin American-Statesman, Allandale is not the only neighborhood with concerns about how the City is going about approaching density. In the article, "Will Austin neighborhoods embrace denser growth?" by Sarah Coppola, only 34 of the 80 neighborhoods asked to submit a list of properties they wanted excluded from the density incentives did so. Just a few of those accepted the density incentives for all properties in their area. Allandale submitted its list and was quite aggressive in the number of properties it opted out. ANA's Kerry Kimbrough, who lead the VMU application process, was interviewed for the article.

Neighborhood Density Figures

If you're curious about where Allandale stacks up compared to other Austin neighborhoods in terms of  population growth, residential makeup, population density, and related figures, you will find the answers from this Excel spreadsheet made available from the Austn Neighborhood Council's web site.

The data shows that Allandale ranks 51st out of 63 in terms of percentage growth and 52nd out of 63 in terms of absolute growth.  As stated in the comment below, this makes it one of the least dense, slowest growing neighborhoods in Austin.

In 2005 , Allandale had a population of 6,467, an increase of only 56 from 2000.  Allandale has a total of 3,228 households most of which are single family units (2,439).

Northcross and the Supercenter

It's not a done deal. We continue to press on. In the last couple of weeks, while City staff review Lincoln's second site plan - one that has since been modified to include a smaller Supercenter, members of the ANA's Northcross Committee have let the City know our concerns have not changed. Northcross is no place for a Supercenter. We don't have the infrastructure nor the desire for a single retailer of that scale.

Get it before you get it

This week the June issue of the Allandale Neighbor will begin arriving on your doorstep. It's not junk mail so don't toss it like it was just another one of those 5-topping two-for-one large fill-em up pizza flyers.

This issue of the Allandale Neighborh includes articles on property taxes,  Allandale's Tyke and Bike Ride, upade on the MoPac 1 project with managed lanes, Allandale's most senior mom, battling  mosquitos, business profile on Knife Sharpest, groundbreaking of the new Steck Ave library, as well as articles on Oak Wilt., Fire Ant Management, Honey Bees, WaterWise and our regular features: ANA President’s Letter, ANA Executive Committee (EC) Meeting Minutes, Committee Updates, Constable’s Notebook, and Dog Talk

But why wait for it to come to  you, you can download it now, right here!

Neighborhood Rights

submitted by Tom Linehan

Neighborhood frustration - you hear it in conversations with other neighborhoods about the City's planning process and VMU. In our area, it comes up regarding city staff approving the Northcross redevelopment without adequate notice or analysis on the impact it will have on our neghborhood.

There's a general mistrust in the City looking after our interests. Neighborhoods that have gone through the neighborhood planning process, one that can last 18 months or longer, say the plan they worked so hard on is not being enforced. When it comes to the VMU overlay districts other neighborhoods like Allandale are asking what gives the City the right to create an overlay district that makes a blanket zoning change without notification or the right of petition?

Last week's article in the Austin Chronicle, Developing Stories, Neighbor Power II: More lessons from Seattle, by Katherine Gregor, gives some examples on how neighborhood intersts in Seattle are given more attention. The article is the second in a series that talks about successes in Seattle as a result of an empowered neighborhood system. Instead of a cookbook approach to addressing density, the city gives neighborhoods their density targets and asks them to come up with a plan for how best to accomodate it. This is a good article. In encourage anyone interested in neighborhood issues to read it.

ENEMY MINE: LIVING WITH(OUT) MOSQUITOES

submitted by Blair Dancy

What are you doing about mosquitoes in your yard? Ever think you could do more, without resorting to explosives and cyanide? You’d be right!

Many of our neighborhoods have the dreaded “Asian tiger” mosquito, breeding happily in small pools of stagnant water. I could bore with you nasty details about the Asian tiger—how it’s only been in the U.S. since 1985, but has spread like wildfire east of the Rockies; how it’s so aggressive that it displaces our lazier, indigenous mosquitoes; how it’s spreading dengue fever in Latin America.

Upcoming VMU Affordability Meetings

The following was pulled from the City's web site regarding an upcoming meeting on VMU:

Council Member Brewster McCracken would like to invite neighborhoods to two public conversations to discuss how VMU fits into the larger context of affordable housing in Austin, and to take ideas and feedback on next steps. Participants will be Kelly Weiss from the City’s Neighborhood Housing department; Travis County appraiser Art Cory; and affordable housing advocate Cathy Echols, who was on the task force that helped write the VMU ordinance, and Council Member Brewster McCracken. These meetings will be:

Monday, June 11 6:30 p.m.
Austin Energy Town Lake Center
721   Barton Springs Road

Monday, June 18
6:30 p.m.
Conley-Guerrero Senior Activity Center
808   Nile Street

For more information contact Rachel May at: rachel.may@ci.austin.tx.us

Allandale Neighborhood Association Executive Committee Minutes: May 30 and June 1

submitted by Katie Hansen

Allandale Neighborhood Association Meeting of the Executive Committee May 30, 2007, continued to June 1, 2007

In attendance: Allan McMurtry, Cathy Yang, Michael Bomba, Katie Hansen, Joe Reynolds, Brent Sjolseth, Paulette Kern, Tom Linehan

Agenda: Voting on VMU

Called to order at 7:10

Minutes from 5/23/07 are read. Allan McMurtry makes a motion to approve minutes as read. Seconded. Passes.

Allan McMurtry makes a motion to suspend reading of the treasurer’s report. Seconded. Passes.

Update on Northcross Development

Today's Austin Chronicle has a good article on where things stand with the fight over the Northcross redevelopment. "Counting Cars and Fears: Northcross, policy, and power at City Hall" by Katherine Gregor addresses the revised TIA Lincoln submitted to the City and its implications for the development. The City has until June 21st to approve the second site plan Lincoln submitted.

ANA Submits VMU Application

submitted by Tom Linehan

On Monday, June 4, ANA submitted its application for Vertical Mixed Use (VMU) to the City. The recommendations were approved by the ANA Executive Committee in a 5-4 vote on Friday, June1. The recommendations deviated significantly from the recommendations submitted to the EC by the ANA VMU team. Instead of accepting many of the properties into the VMU overlay district with conditions as was recommended by the VMU Team, the EC elected to opt-out many of the properties with the exception of the Northcross Mall property and the properties along Burnet Road near North Loop. The overriding concern by members of the EC supporting the substitute plan was inadequate city infrastructure to support the increased density that VMU would bring.

You can see a copy of the completed application here.  Here is a draft of the recommendations submitted to the EC by the VMU Team. For background information on VMU, go here.