Dallas Fort Worth Urban Forum

ZaZa, Crescent, Mansion, Ritz, Omni are likely candidates for Legacy.

The deck park previously proposed wasn't much better than the typical unused gardens you find in office campuses. It's probably best they went with a basic decorative pathway for now if it leaves open the possibility for a larger park in the future. With how hostile the pedestrian experience is on the highway-facing sides of both legacies, a deck park needs to be a destination in its own right if it wants to act as an appealing connective bridge.

While we're at it, traffic along legacy really needs to be slowed. It's a bummer how wide they initially planned it. The extra driveways along legacy for parking around legacy east is such a waste.

THRILLHO wrote:
While we're at it, traffic along legacy really needs to be slowed. It's a bummer how wide they initially planned it. The extra driveways along legacy for parking around legacy east is such a waste.

So true. Sitting in my car, watching someone cross Legacy from one side of The Shops at Legacy to the other is uncomfortable for the both of us.

vman wrote:

undefinedprocess wrote:

vman wrote:^^^
especially since it seems the previously approved deck park will never happen.

That's a shame because if any area would greatly benefit from a deck park, this is it.

Speaking of parks...is that some sort of park on the north end of Headquarters between the highrise apartment tower and the midrise one? I only drive by it on my way to work and it's always still dark , so I've never seen it in the light.

That park is a private park for the residents of Windrose Tower and LVL29 only. Would rather shops/another tower go there, but hey, a private park? That's a cool amenity lol.

THRILLHO wrote:The deck park previously proposed wasn't much better than the typical unused gardens you find in office campuses. It's probably best they went with a basic decorative pathway for now if it leaves open the possibility for a larger park in the future. With how hostile the pedestrian experience is on the highway-facing sides of both legacies, a deck park needs to be a destination in its own right if it wants to act as an appealing connective bridge.

While we're at it, traffic along legacy really needs to be slowed. It's a bummer how wide they initially planned it. The extra driveways along legacy for parking around legacy east is such a waste.

I agree, it was pretty basic, which sucks, but I'm hopeful that one day, it'll happen and the design will be improved. I still wonder how much it'd be used considering Legacy West's parking garages cut off everything... If I had SimCity abilities, I'd demolish those parking garages, build maybe one slightly taller one with a tower on top, and then put the rest underground. Those parking garages coming down + a deck park would really transform the area and its feel. Same with OG Shops at Legacy side.

Well it is Plano and this development is a walled garden not a real walkable urban neighborhood. Legacy East was done much much better in terms of walkable neighborhoods with calming roads, retail and office space with parks. Legacy West is a strip center for luxury goods facing one street with a rush of semi-urban but mostly suburban office complexes and a few residents thrown in to check the box. Overall Legacy pays lip service to new age urbanity but rarely pays any attention to any of the rules. It will be a success for the time being because its trendy and new. Call me in 30, 50 and 75 yrs and we will see if the decisions made now affect the long term viability or if it becomes the next generations Willow Bend. It honesty could go either way. Victory looked great when it opened to and it had to be fixed and is still trying to be something.

A cap over the Tollway would go a long way to address Legacy's "deficiencies."

cowboyeagle05 wrote:Well it is Plano and this development is a walled garden not a real walkable urban neighborhood. Legacy East was done much much better in terms of walkable neighborhoods with calming roads, retail and office space with parks. Legacy West is a strip center for luxury goods facing one street with a rush of semi-urban but mostly suburban office complexes and a few residents thrown in to check the box. Overall Legacy pays lip service to new age urbanity but rarely pays any attention to any of the rules. It will be a success for the time being because its trendy and new. Call me in 30, 50 and 75 yrs and we will see if the decisions made now affect the long term viability or if it becomes the next generations Willow Bend. It honesty could go either way. Victory looked great when it opened to and it had to be fixed and is still trying to be something.

Oh yeah, I completely agree with you. I think it's a great start and I think there were a few decisions that were made that have helped sustain it & accelerate its growth and popularity, but yeah, it is faux-urban, that's for sure. But with that being said, I believe that with some relatively "simple" (not saying they're easy or cheap) changes, it could really progress towards being more authentically urban.

I will say, though, the trendiness and the weight of the name "Legacy West" for the general population... It's impressive. People from all around DFW come up to West Plano just to flex. It's pretty wild to see.

Anyways, I feel that none of the West Plano/Frisco/DNT corridor projects can truly become "urban" unless developers/property owners work together to connect all of them so they are less of "urban islands," and more like smaller districts in a large fabric/core.

That's a whole different conversation, so I'm not diving into that. Just saying that I agree with you, but I think Legacy as a whole is far from doomed, at least right now. And if I'm being honest, the hype/energy has far exceeded/outlived what I thought it'd be. We're nearly 5 years into Legacy West being fully open, and I'd have figured it would've died off a bit by now, but it seems to be continuing to rise in popularity, especially as new retailers move in.

Addison wrote:A cap over the Tollway would go a long way to address Legacy's "deficiencies."

Definitely. Aside from the walled-garden effect of Legacy West (hate those parking garages), the Tollway is the biggest issue in the area. Capping it would help connect Granite Park, Legacy Town Center/Shops at Legacy, Legacy West, and any other future developments that spawn around DNT/121. To be honest, dropping SRT/121 below grade and capping it in a place or two (not sure exactly where) would be interesting to see as well.

Yeah urban islands is prolific in our current cycle of urban developments. The key point is most developers don't want their developments to be integrated into some larger puzzle. Each developer wants a walled garden and that's not gonna change cause its how developers like to build. They don't want their investment helping other properties when it comes down to it.

I do not think Legacy West is doomed either and I agree its rapid and sustained some sort of lightning rod for half a decade for sure. I will look forward to seeing how over time its popularity maintains.

The key point is most developers don't want their developments to be integrated into some larger puzzle.

I'm not sure I agree with that, other than with the caveat that specifically Legacy West didn't want to be associated with Drein Capital Partners JC Penny Project, which in retrospect was a good idea because it was rejected by the city council and now is bankrupt and without a plan.

But generally, huge setbacks from existing developments are required as per city code. The developers are the ones asking for those setbacks to be more limited, but they can only do so much via special zoning requests.

Setbacks are one thing sure but they aren't what I am talking about. You can have development facing the street or other development in a thoughtful way with sidewalks and trees and connectivity to other tracts even with large setbacks. After all we need more public space anyway and even lawns in a more urban designed context could function better than our suburban front lawn history of the rest of suburbia.

Back in October, DMN reported that Ryan LLC was relocating its headquarters from the Galleria area to Legacy West. They propose two towers at the SW corner of DNT and SRT, one 24 floors and one 10 floors. Someone asked at the time if that was the last plot to be developed there. I said that I thought there was one more lot which primarily fronts DNT access road (north of Liberty Mutual and immediately east of Ryan LLC new buildings).

Now that lot is spoken for:
https://www.dallasnews.com/business/jobs/2021/11/24/last-large-building-site-in-planos-legacy-west-changes-hands/

"KDC has purchased the largest remaining Legacy West building site not already earmarked for development."

"The 10-acre block is near the southwest corner of the Dallas North Tollway and State Highway 121, north of Liberty Mutual Insurance’s high-rise campus. The property has been owned by the partnership that started in 2014 to develop the 250 acres surrounding J.C. Penney’s old headquarters campus in West Plano. Since then, partners Karahan Cos., Columbus Realty and developer KDC have built what’s considered the most successful mixed-use development in North Texas, if not the entire state."

Based on the TDLR TABS information, it looks like Lucid's showroom in Legacy West could be starting renovations in the old Barnes & Noble Kitchen space on April 23rd.

New tower is set to start in Plano’s $3 billion Legacy West
The high-rise on S.H. 121 will house offices for Dallas’ Ryan LLC.

https://www.dallasnews.com/business/rea ... gacy-west/

Incredible speedrun attempt for the blandest skyline in the country.

IcedCowboyCoffee wrote:Incredible speedrun attempt for the blandest skyline in the country.

Look I don't make up rules... But just to reiterate...

Suburbs can't have Skylines (Plano), that's just called sprawl...

Cities can't have more than 1 Downtown (Houston), that's just called sprawl..

Suburban development near highways/toll roads cannot and should not be considered "Urban" (Frisco), that's just psuedo-urbanism...

Not just bland but straight up ugly. Our architecture, in some sense, reflects nihilism if not some vague utilitarianism benefiting the current developer/architectural zeitgeist.

CityLine entering the chat.

Dragon_Lady wrote:Not just bland but straight up ugly. Our architecture, in some sense, reflects nihilism if not some vague utilitarianism benefiting the current developer/architectural zeitgeist.

Are these Mars Volta lyrics? WTF does this mean? Lol

Checking my Architecture textbooks now for translations.

Tivo_Kenevil wrote:

IcedCowboyCoffee wrote:Incredible speedrun attempt for the blandest skyline in the country.

Look I don't make up rules... But just to reiterate...

Suburbs can't have Skylines (Plano), that's just called sprawl...

Cities can't have more than 1 Downtown (Houston), that's just called sprawl..

Suburban development near highways/toll roads cannot and should not be considered "Urban" (Frisco), that's just psuedo-urbanism...

Everything you said is wrong lol

The Ryan building’s tower crane is permitted to go up anytime after July 15.

https://oeaaa.faa.gov/oeaaa/external/se ... 554&row=18

The building’s permanent height will be 333 feet.
https://oeaaa.faa.gov/oeaaa/external/se ... 6397&row=0

Yep, saw that. Looks like it'll be just shy of LVL 29. The tower canyoning of DNT continues...

Windrose Tower is the still the sales champion among DFW high-rises.

74 sales in 31 months of sales. 2.39 per month. 12 remaining.

Sellout projection at this pace of sales: 3 years, 1 month.

DO we have any comparison on the types of sales these are? I know it seemed like many of Museum Tower was international buyers who weren't exactly living in them but is this project seeing more actual living buyers, or is this another real estate investment by lots of people betting on Legacy's longer-term value.

cowboyeagle05 wrote:DO we have any comparison on the types of sales these are? I know it seemed like many of Museum Tower was international buyers who weren't exactly living in them but is this project seeing more actual living buyers, or is this another real estate investment by lots of people betting on Legacy's longer-term value.

Anecdotal, but I can definitely attest to a higher percentage of Windrose Tower's units appearing as/being lived-in (seeing people on balconies at all hours, lights on, etc.). Museum Tower could have the same number of "lived in" units, but obviously, two completely different sized buildings here, hence my anecdotal evidence for a higher percentage.

Ryan office-tower tower-cranes (say that 3 times fast) have been up for a week or so.

Golden Goose is open.

Lucid Motors is opening a location here: https://www.lucidmotors.com/

R1070 wrote:Lucid Motors is opening a location here: https://www.lucidmotors.com/

Yep, had found out about this last year through TABS, but had been basically no movement (that we've been aware of) since then. Glad to see it confirmed on the site, and glad they're finally entering DFW (although would love for them to be in Dallas-proper, especially in the core or core-adjacent to act as a little attraction).

Anyone dug up/seen any updates on KDC's 1.5M sqft. multi-tower project and/or Columbus Realty's 18-story residential tower set for (some of?) the last remaining plots in Legacy West?

Uchiko is coming to the north side of Legacy West.

It’s exciting, but it’s kind of redundant. This would’ve been nicer down south at the District at Willow Bend, if that place would ever get its shit together.

Proquest20 wrote:Uchiko is coming to the north side of Legacy West.

It’s exciting, but it’s kind of redundant. This would’ve been nicer down south at the District at Willow Bend, if that place would ever get its shit together.

You happen to know what unit they're taking over?

https://www.tdlr.texas.gov/TABS/Projects/TABS2023007265
Looks like a David Yurman boutique is under construction. I would assume they're opening next to Golden Goose, or somewhere in the luxury section.

The Ryan, LLC office tower at the northern end of Legacy West is finally progressing at a quicker pace. Believe they're up to the 4th or 5th floor now.

acclar11 wrote:https://www.tdlr.texas.gov/TABS/Projects/TABS2023007265
Looks like a David Yurman boutique is under construction. I would assume they're opening next to Golden Goose, or somewhere in the luxury section.

That's great news. They are pretty selective when opening new boutiques, wonder if this means the Northpark store will remain or depart.

Jasimm wrote:

acclar11 wrote:https://www.tdlr.texas.gov/TABS/Projects/TABS2023007265
Looks like a David Yurman boutique is under construction. I would assume they're opening next to Golden Goose, or somewhere in the luxury section.

That's great news. They are pretty selective when opening new boutiques, wonder if this means the Northpark store will remain or depart.

Highly doubt David Yurman would leave Northpark, this is probably just a second store.

acclar11 wrote:

Jasimm wrote:

acclar11 wrote:https://www.tdlr.texas.gov/TABS/Projects/TABS2023007265
Looks like a David Yurman boutique is under construction. I would assume they're opening next to Golden Goose, or somewhere in the luxury section.

That's great news. They are pretty selective when opening new boutiques, wonder if this means the Northpark store will remain or depart.

Highly doubt David Yurman would leave Northpark, this is probably just a second store.

I think within recent years the area has seen an increasing demand for luxury goods, and Legacy West and Clearfork have done a good job at providing that to people who live further away from Dallas. Between Legacy West, Clearfork, NorthPark, and maybe Southlake Town Square and the Galleria, to an extent, DFW has proven it is able to sustain these brands quite well. I could even see David Yurman opening a third store in Fort Worth, eventually.

Proquest20 wrote:

acclar11 wrote:

Jasimm wrote:
That's great news. They are pretty selective when opening new boutiques, wonder if this means the Northpark store will remain or depart.

Highly doubt David Yurman would leave Northpark, this is probably just a second store.

I think within recent years the area has seen an increasing demand for luxury goods, and Legacy West and Clearfork have done a good job at providing that to people who live further away from Dallas. Between Legacy West, Clearfork, NorthPark, and maybe Southlake Town Square and the Galleria, to an extent, DFW has proven it is able to sustain these brands quite well. I could even see David Yurman opening a third store in Fort Worth, eventually.

David Yurman was in the original "prospective" tenant list for Clearfork, but many of the luxury retailers that they hoped for didn't make the cut.

Proquest20 wrote:

acclar11 wrote:

Jasimm wrote:
That's great news. They are pretty selective when opening new boutiques, wonder if this means the Northpark store will remain or depart.

Highly doubt David Yurman would leave Northpark, this is probably just a second store.

I think within recent years the area has seen an increasing demand for luxury goods, and Legacy West and Clearfork have done a good job at providing that to people who live further away from Dallas. Between Legacy West, Clearfork, NorthPark, and maybe Southlake Town Square and the Galleria, to an extent, DFW has proven it is able to sustain these brands quite well. I could even see David Yurman opening a third store in Fort Worth, eventually.

I think we would have quite some time before we can manage three, only NYC and LA currently have 3 boutiques.

I was hoping LW would pull in new to market tenants instead of just making Northpark/Knox again haha.

Now that Michael Kors and Vineyard Vines have closed at Stonebriar and Willow Bend, respectively, I would really like to see them open stores at Legacy West, where they’d likely be much more successful.

Jasimm wrote:

Proquest20 wrote:

acclar11 wrote:Highly doubt David Yurman would leave Northpark, this is probably just a second store.

I think within recent years the area has seen an increasing demand for luxury goods, and Legacy West and Clearfork have done a good job at providing that to people who live further away from Dallas. Between Legacy West, Clearfork, NorthPark, and maybe Southlake Town Square and the Galleria, to an extent, DFW has proven it is able to sustain these brands quite well. I could even see David Yurman opening a third store in Fort Worth, eventually.

I think we would have quite some time before we can manage three, only NYC and LA currently have 3 boutiques.

I was hoping LW would pull in new to market tenants instead of just making Northpark/Knox again haha.

Even if Legacy West and Clearfork did get their own David Yurman boutiques, Dallas is still going to only have one. As for Legacy West pulling new to market boutiques, I’d like it if they’d build that sky park to connect Legacy West to the Shops At Legacy. Then hopefully, the latter one can be leased with more stores, especially considering it’s been struggling with more vacancies, similarly to Willow Bend.

Diptyque announced more openings in "secondary markets" after opening multiple boutiques in primary markets like Los Angeles, San Francisco and New York City.

They specifically named several cities including Dallas. I wonder if they would consider opening a second store in Legacy West with all the additions of luxury boutiques.

Jasimm wrote:Diptyque announced more openings in "secondary markets" after opening multiple boutiques in primary markets like Los Angeles, San Francisco and New York City.

They specifically named several cities including Dallas. I wonder if they would consider opening a second store in Legacy West with all the additions of luxury boutiques.

I’d rather they go to Fort Worth before they come to Plano, considering Plano is much closer to NorthPark, but it would be nice regardless. I also hope Legacy West builds a Nespresso store since I buy their pods and recycle them too lol

I’d like it if they’d build that sky park to connect Legacy West to the Shops At Legacy.

Far better connectivity than what exists would be nice, but I regularly see people crossing the pedestrian bridge between the two, comparatively more than cross the bridge between NorthPark and The Shops at Parklane or the SMU corner and Mockingbird Station, and far more than I would have ever expected. So many more in fact that I believe if they built some decent shade structures (basically copying the Legacy bridge in Plano connecting the two) the amount of crossover traffic between the two in Dallas would noticeably increase.

The_Overdog wrote:

I’d like it if they’d build that sky park to connect Legacy West to the Shops At Legacy.

Far better connectivity than what exists would be nice, but I regularly see people crossing the pedestrian bridge between the two, comparatively more than cross the bridge between NorthPark and The Shops at Parklane or the SMU corner and Mockingbird Station, and far more than I would have ever expected. So many more in fact that I believe if they built some decent shade structures (basically copying the Legacy bridge in Plano connecting the two) the amount of crossover traffic between the two in Dallas would noticeably increase.

I work in Legacy West and have yet to walk over to Shops at Legacy. That service road makes me nervous, but I do see people crossing it. Maybe I'll try it today.

Aren't they suppose to build a deck park over DNT to connect the two sides??

From what i heard the deck park was put on pause due to lack of funding.

However, They added a pedestrian crosswalk and a two way bike lane for the bridge on Legacy Drive a year or so ago. I assume they plan on adding a bike lane on that road later on but prebuilt the bridge part.. and they are almost done with the headquarters crosswalk over the DNT. So there has been some decent changes to the intersections.

David Yurman is now open!

Vuori is coming soon.