Oak Lawn: Congress & Welborn (~21 ST)

[CTroyMathis]

Article with 9-story rendering of Toll Brothers residential proposal at Congress Ave. & Welborn St.

From 10AUG16
http://www.dallasnews.com/business/real ... t-oak-lawn


An updated visual of the proposal from today:



https://twitter.com/ericwmiller/status/ ... 0603586560

[eburress]

Not too shabby...I like it!

[DPatel304]

I like it. It's about time we start seeing some density closer to Oak Lawn Ave.

[Tnexster]

That seems like a rather dramatic upward change.

[muncien]

The new render (not the one shown in the first post which is 19 stories) appears to be a better fit for the area... at least for now. Personally, I prefer these 9/10 story buildings as they seem to support density, but maintain a more people oriented neighborhood than 20 story towers, which do better in CBD. But, maybe that's just me.

[Thymant]

Nice upgrade! Good to see a new high rise in the Oaklawn area.

[ContriveDallasite]

Wow this is massive, would love to see this happen. I would like to see retail in the base of these buildings. As the density is substantially increasing in these neighborhoods it makes much more sense to start providing neighborhood amenities that are accessible by foot.

[muncien]

I don't know... I'm really struggling with this one. This type of building should be on Oak Lawn proper. There are a ton of lots along that street that could (and should) support this. But putting it on the itty bitty two lane road surround by owner occupied townhomes just doesn't seem right.
I also don't like the idea of replacing owner-occupied units with a plethora of rentals... although I could have lived with the shorter variation. While this may be an upgrade for the particular lot, it seems like a downgrade for the neighborhood.

[LongonBigD]

Move the 20 story version to the land accumulated by HEB just NW of Oaklawn and Lemmon intersection. They don't need it now that they bought Albertsons (Lemmon & McKinney). Put retail on the first floor, high density/visibility project to kick off the rebirth of Lemmon Ave. Homerun!!

[Dmkflyer]

I'm hopeful we'll end up with an actual HEB at the Lemmon location.

As for this tower and the other one on the boards a few blocks from it, I think it actually makes sense for the whole area to be more dense with a mix of towers, midrise, 4-8 story structures, and townhomes. While not all properties should be dozed, I think that there are several prime candidate lots for redevelopment that should be taller and denser. That said, I would like to see walkups on the ground level in many of the taller ones and at least street level interaction and no podium garages.

IMO, the entire area bound by Maple, Oak Lawn, Highland Park, and Turtle Creek itself is the area that is prime for the most mid to highrise construction and an area that would support more condos than apartments or at least apartments that could eventually make the switch. The zoning for height is there, the OLC is there to help ensure quality and it is still within the Turtle Creek area. Already, there is this tower, the one at Dickason and Hood, the Perot office tower, Great Gulf condo tower, and Great Gulf apartment tower proposed here. Now things are rumbling again about the site of the post building surrounded on 3 sides by the Renaissance and facing Lee Park. Additionally, there was the sale of the stubby office building that came with a vacant lot at Rawlins & Wellborn, the sale that I believe has finalized on the Turtle Creek Gardens Condos, and the eventual redevelopment of the Republic Bank building on Turtle Creek right next door, as well as Turtle Creek Village changing hands again.

The whole area bounded by the tollway, Oak Lawn, and Highland Park should be more of the 4-5 story buildings and townhomes.

Complete Streets initiatives for Cedar Springs, Oak Lawn, and Lemmon Avenues would really solidify the whole area.

The interesting thing is that this is really already happening, for the most part.

OLC is already giving their nods for towers in the area mentioned above, there is a lot of townhome and 4-6 construction going on in the other areas above and there are plans (even if far off) for the streets intitatives. If Kroger comes back to the table like they did in East Dallas, that will be big. Additionally, Tom Thumb is now back in the neighborhood and they have already shown they have been on board for urban stores, so I could easily see another highrise or midrise going up at TCV with them moving to to the ground level and being able to keep their store open in its current location until completion and thus opening up the rest of the property for redevelopment.

[tanzoak]

I don't know... I'm really struggling with this one. This type of building should be on Oak Lawn proper. There are a ton of lots along that street that could (and should) support this. But putting it on the itty bitty two lane road surround by owner occupied townhomes just doesn't seem right.
I also don't like the idea of replacing owner-occupied units with a plethora of rentals... although I could have lived with the shorter variation. While this may be an upgrade for the particular lot, it seems like a downgrade for the neighborhood.

What's wrong with rentals? I live in an apartment. A scourge of young professionals! These are going to be high-end units, which is something that can't be said of the owner-occupied units they're replacing. And I think the new renderings (see below) are a street-level improvement on the previous shorter proposal, with nine townhouses facing Welborn. A definite upgrade for the neighborhood imo.

[tanzoak]

Here's a first-hand account of the OLC meeting, where they voted to support this version: http://candysdirt.com/2017/01/04/toll-b ... ntroversy/

Also, personally I love how Dallas allows larger buildings on smaller streets because it makes it much more interesting and less predictable to walk around. That would never be allowed in California, which is very strict about restricting development to major thoroughfares.

[Thymant]

Here's a first-hand account of the OLC meeting, where they voted to support this version: http://candysdirt.com/2017/01/04/toll-b ... ntroversy/

Also, personally I love how Dallas allows larger buildings on smaller streets because it makes it much more interesting and less predictable to walk around. That would never be allowed in California, which is very strict about restricting development to major thoroughfares.

I agree, having larger buildings on smaller streets it basically what helps makes Uptown and Oaklawn dense. McKinney ave for instance is very small relative to the amount of traffic and buildings that exist on it as well as the trolley and just look what has become of it. Whats most important is that these projects remain at scale at gound level, which based of the ground level rendering, this tower clearly does.

[Tivo_Kenevil]

I don't know... I'm really struggling with this one. This type of building should be on Oak Lawn proper. There are a ton of lots along that street that could (and should) support this. But putting it on the itty bitty two lane road surround by owner occupied townhomes just doesn't seem right.
I also don't like the idea of replacing owner-occupied units with a plethora of rentals... although I could have lived with the shorter variation. While this may be an upgrade for the particular lot, it seems like a downgrade for the neighborhood.

What's wrong with rentals? I live in an apartment.

Nothing is wrong with it and it's the smart thing to o right now. The NTX housing market has limited amounts of homes for sale. There was a news story this week stating that it was officially cheaper to rent than buy in NTX.

[tamtagon]

Being only one block back, hopefully the scale of this will encourage a total reconstruction of Oak Lawn Avenue, at least from Cedar Springs to Old Parkland. The strip center landscape is entirely out of step with the direction of the rest of downtown. Scrape it off and start fresh.

Right now, McKinney Avenue has the leading reputation as the place in Dallas pedestrians can have a full experience, but only the absence of initiative will keep Oak Lawn Avenue from owning that arena.

[muncien]

Thanks for the link with the additional information.

I have no issue with either rentals or height per se. I'm one of the last people on this forum to bash density.

There are just two things that I find wrong with this (and only marginally). Owner occupied units are hard to come by. This immediate area has been made up heavily of such units and it has benefited greatly from it. Even the local elementary school that serves this area is one of the few 'exemplary' rated DISD schools (at least it was up until two years ago). I really wish we could get more ownership opportunities around here, even if they were more dense. Rentals are the fast buck, but town homes and condos have a lasting impact on the neighborhood.

Lastly... It's not like there's no room left to build. You have four major thoroughfares (Oak Lawn, Maple, Cedar Springs, Lemmon) all of which should be flipping their strip centers and parking lots to this type of development. Once that's done, it make sense to flip these little infill lots. Going the opposite direction makes no sense.

I do like the way they designed this to interact with the street. Those 'town-home' style units are pretty sweet. I just wish folks could buy one instead of pay $4k/month to rent... only to move out ever two years.

[wbarch]

just got an early notification about the HEB site near Oak Lawn. 3900 Lemmon (entire block) potential buyer is requesting a zoning change new subdistrict in PD 193 for additional structure height with use to be MF with restaurant and bar uses.

[OrangeMike]

just got an early notification about the HEB site near Oak Lawn. 3900 Lemmon (entire block) potential buyer is requesting a zoning change new subdistrict in PD 193 for additional structure height with use to be MF with restaurant and bar uses.

3900 Lemmon already has its own thread with renderings and info. It's not really in the vicinity of Congress and Welborn.
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