 "Photo: Stephen Reidmiller")
The Austin City Council voted unanimously Thursday night to approve a plan that would allow the construction of high-rise student housing in West Campus. The council postponed voting on the plan, called the University Neighborhood Overlay District, at last week's City Council meeting.
Debated since the summer of 2002 and postponed until today, the Overlay plan finally passed with amendments concerning affordable housing, streetscape specifications and parking requirements. The amendments met very little resistance.
"I'm surprised that there aren't any more objections," said Jackie Goodman, Austin Mayor Pro Tem.
In previous meetings, neighborhood groups couldn't agree on appropriate height limitations and potential traffic problems.
"I think we delayed them into submission," Mayor Will Wynn said.
The new district is bordered by Guadalupe Street on the east, Lamar Street on the west, Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard on the south and 29th Street on the north. It allows developers to build as high as 175 feet, but only in the blocks west of Guadalupe.
To build that high, developers must agree to improve sidewalks and lighting and plant trees.
The council declined to include an amendment supported by the Student Government to increase the plan's minimum off-street parking requirement to 80 percent of the residential population, leaving it at 60 percent.
Jerry Harris, a lawyer representing a West Campus property owner, said the city wants to encourage pedestrian usage and reduce cars in the area.
"The cost for parking spaces is very expensive, and rent for a student would have been negatively affected," Harris said.
SG President Brent Chaney said he spoke with council members in an attempt to bring it up for discussion, but said they later changed their minds.
"Unfortunately, some council members think that they know what's best for the University instead of what actual students think," he said.
Chaney admitted that, aside from the one drawback, everything else about the plan would help students.
"... We just wish there would be more parking available for them," Chaney said.
One amendment to the proposal accepted by council stated every building must be at least 12 feet from the front face of the curb of the adjacent street. This will allow more natural lighting on sidewalks during the day.
The House of Tutors and other buildings on the block will be raised 15 more feet than the original plan proposed.
The goal of the plan was to provide student housing within walking distance of campus while maintaining single family residential neighborhoods, said Mike McHone, vice president of University Area Partners.
"In most places inner cities are dead, but in Austin it's different," McHone said.
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