Dallas Homeowners Push Back on ForwardDallas Land Use Plan as Residents Flee to The Suburbs
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A lot of ink has been spilled about a U.S. Census report showing that Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington grew faster last year than any other metropolitan area, but the big numbers are not in the City of Dallas. In fact, more people moved out of Dallas than moved in.
The “why” of it all could be as simple as affordability. Housing options are lacking, and property taxes are comparatively high. Big cities come with crime rates and occasionally have some aging, low-performing schools.
So how can Dallas get people to stay and support the tax base?
City staff is working hard to update the ForwardDallas comprehensive land use plan, which could address some wonky development and zoning challenges. A new Economic Development Corporation is hiring its first CEO and actively recruiting new businesses to add to the tax base. A new city manager will be hired soon and will no doubt have a long to-do list.
But is there a quick fix to get people to stay in Dallas proper? The experts say probably not.
Population Boom?
Several news outlets reported earlier this month that the North Texas metro population increased to 8.1 million, attracting more than 152,000 new residents last year.
Dallas County added about 4,300 people in 2023, only because there were twice as many births than deaths, D Magazine’s Matt Goodman wrote in a March 15 article.
“Last year, more people decided to leave Dallas County than those who moved here,” Goodman wrote. “Leave babies out of the equation, and we lost about 15,000 residents in 2023.”
The report goes on to say that about 34,000 U.S. residents decided to leave Dallas, but the county added only 19,000 international newcomers.
“This should be a wake-up call for city officials,” Goodman wrote. “The North Central Texas Council of Governments is planning for 12 million people in the region by 2045, which will lead to infrastructure investments that facilitate even more sprawl that makes it even easier to leave the city proper. Dallas is competing for people, which means it’s never been more important for the municipal government to craft pro-growth policies and ensure that the nuts and bolts of building permits get sorted out.”
ForwardDallas Comprehensive Land Use Plan
Enter ForwardDallas, the comprehensive land use plan that has a lot of residents up in arms these days. The most common argument is that it could threaten single-family neighborhoods by suggesting accessory dwelling units be allowed by right and encouraging higher density in certain residential areas.
We’ll say it louder for the people in the back: ForwardDallas is a comprehensive land use plan, not an affordable housing plan or an attempt to shoehorn duplexes into single-family neighborhoods. If the update is adopted this summer, it will guide future zoning decisions, but it’s not even about zoning, city planners say.
Former city columnist Jim Schutze weighed in on the plan last week.
“Try to read the thing,” Schutze said of the draft 60-page plan. “The version online is one of these hybrid PowerPoint/Amazon shopping docs written in Plannerese that you can’t force a straight answer out of with a stick. The whole exercise makes me want to say, ‘Shut up. Tell me exactly what you want to do with single-family zoning, and don’t use any planner words, because I’m not a planner.’ That’s a tell, a clue. Who are they talking to?”
There appears to be a lack of trust in elected officials and city staff, and some longtime Dallas homeowners who have been labeled NIMBYs (“Not in My Backyard”) are convinced that city planners are trying to destroy their neighborhoods.
“If the planners had had their way here in the 1980s, most of the strong neighborhood rebirth would not even have happened,” Schutze wrote. “From East Dallas to the M Streets, even the Park Cities neighborhoods west of Central Expressway, we would see elevated highways and eight-lane thoroughfares designed to whisk commuters from downtown to new suburban housing developments.”
More Opinions on ForwardDallas
On the other side of the argument are homeowners and housing advocates who say greater density will increase housing options and affordability.
Developer Nathaniel Barrett, a member of the Dallas Zoning Ordinance Advisory Committee, attended a District 14 community meeting last week on the comprehensive land use plan. He posted a play-by-play on his X account that started a lively dialogue about ForwardDallas.
Barrett reported that Plan Commissioner Melissa Kingston said at the meeting the region is expected to add 1.5 million people by 2030. Additionally, the median home cost in the 75214 ZIP code is $875,000. The average rent is $1,900 and occupancy is 97 percent.
At the D14 meeting, according to Barrett, a homeowner asked city staff representatives why they were advancing the plan when “everybody dislikes it.”
“Staff nails it and says the consensus tone of this room is not reflective of the entire city,” Barrett posted.
The lack of housing options and affordability challenges also have led to homelessness, Barrett said.
“Many would sincerely say they are very much in favor of people moving to Dallas but have no plan for how that will be accommodated,” Barrett wrote on social media.
In a March 11 email, Dallas Neighbors for Housing spokesman Adam Lamont called the first version of ForwardDallas “a great pro-housing version.”
“Now, opponents are trying to strip away the good parts of ForwardDallas, therefore maintaining our housing status quo and making Dallas more unaffordable for all of us,” Lamont’s email states. “While ForwardDallas doesn’t change any zoning, it is the road map for future zoning decisions. And it recommends allowing for more housing across Dallas in the form of townhomes, [accessory dwelling units], and small multiplexes, though not by right. What it does is allow for [is] more precise future decisions on where additional housing should go in our city.”
Community meetings are underway so residents can weigh in on ForwardDallas, now under review by the City Plan Commission, before it goes to Council in June.
Plan commissioners discussed ForwardDallas during a March 21 meeting and slated public workshops from 6 to 9 p.m. April 18 and May 9.
The meetings were originally scheduled for March and April, but Commissioner Kingston pushed back on what she called an aggressive timeline.
“What I’m hearing is staff decided they want to get this to council by June even though we’ve been working on this for years and so we’re developing an aggressive schedule for the rest of us to get it to June, and if that means CPC has to meet every week during the week, well that’s just how it is,” Kingston said. “I object to that. I don’t think that’s respectful of our time or our other commitments. I just can’t do this. Maybe that is by design — less commissioners, less public comment, less time. That’s certainly how it worked in ‘06.”
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How ’bout we incentive home builders to build affordable housing within the perimeter. Cities have always been inhabitated by extremely wealthy or extremely poor residents. This is about real estate and the accumulation of wealth. I keep meaning to research community land trusts. Is that an answer? I’ll volunteer on a Real board that has heart AND teeth. From whence does that come?
The Forward Dallas plan isn’t perfect but it’s certainly better than the current status quo. A huge draw for what brought people to Texas was cheaper housing and good jobs. If we continue to force our land use to be inefficient it’ll be short term pain, for a long term crisis.
And to the other person’s comment, developers are already incentivized to build cheaper homes far away…since the land is already cheaper. The reason we shouldn’t want that is that the costs to maintain infrastructure over a wider area grow exponentially and single family homes don’t provide the tax base to cover those services. There a reason that the fire department or police department doesn’t cover all the way out to the most rural areas. It’s too expensive and requires more people, more equipment and more time.
Lastly, for the opponents of forward Dallas, what right is there to force other peoples land to use in the ways you want? Enabling ADUs and duplexes/townhomes doesn’t force you to live in one but it does allow others.
Evan, what right do you or anyone else have to break the contract a buyer has when he/she buys in a certain area? This is not forcing other people to land use, it is fulfilling the obligation of the land use set in the area when the lot/home was purchased. I have no problem with density in areas where there already IS dnsity, and in areas equipped to handle the traffic because of public transit. We are adding more cars and exhaust to Dallas and I learned last night the EPA may soon charge us millions for poor air quality. We need green space to refresh the air. Interesting commentary about infrastructure. A friend’s home burned to the ground last year outside of Alvarado bc the fire department didn’t have enough water. What is your source on that, and I’d love more information!
Candy, many of the areas already near public transit are single family homes – plenty of SFH near Mockingbird, Burbank, White Rock, Lake Highlands stations, not to mention almost all the stations south of downtown are surrounded by SFH, but very few of them allow even gentle density like ADUs or duplexes within a half mile of the station.
Also, fulfilling the land use obligation of an area when a lot was purchased is preposterous. If I bought a house in 1980, why should that land use be locked in eternally? When is it ever allowed to change? After the heat death of the universe? Such an arbitrary requirement means that basically certain parts of the city are forced to be frozen in time because some people are afraid of change.
Not allowing the city to change ultimately dooms it to the stagnation we’ve encountered. There’s a reason younger people are fleeing to the suburbs, and it’s affordability. Allow duplexes, allow ADUs, and you open up a lot of already developed land to new housing, which does drive down rental prices, making Dallas affordable. And keeping those people who want to live in Dallas but can’t afford it *in* Dallas means less sprawl, which means less people who live in Prosper driving an hour plus to work each way – that’s why our air quality is so incredibly bad. Green space doesn’t magically shorten the physical distances people commute to work, but creating affordable housing near their jobs and other daily tasks sure does
Chris, your driving scenario may have been a great point prior to Covid but now there is way more WFH than ever and experts say it’s here to stay. My daughter is a great example: worked from home during Covid and loved it so much she decided to do it permanently. Affordability is not that much better in the suburbs, unless you are talking single family home which is the first choice for families. What they are finding is fewer homeless, smoother roads, and slightly less crime (or the perception of it). What I’m hearing is people are tiring of the increase in traffic and wait times — congestion –that our growth has brought us. I do not think people mind the apartments per se but the traffic and “crowds” that come with them. Why doesn’t Dallas first clean up crime, streets, trash and homelessness and then see what happens. And if you start changing land use obligations without the consent of the homeowners then why should anyone bother with buying a home? Unless that is the whole purpose.
Also isn’t Mockingbird Station considered multi family?
2 blocks south of Mockingbird is SFH. And I’ve never understood the argument that what kind of house I have should be influenced by my neighbors house – If I want a polka dot pink house, and my neighbors don’t like it, that’s their problem. I do support reasonable restrictions like not allowing a structure 3+ stories next to a one story without the consent of the adjacent neighbors because of privacy concerns, and of course not allowiny uses that present health dangers like factories in neighborhoods.
And regarding cleaning up trash, streets, homelessness, etc – the city can walk and chew gum at the same time, but when occupancy rates are at all time highs in the city, doing those things won’t lower housing costs, though they will make the city more pleasant to live in, so still should be pursued.
In order to lower housing costs, you have to increase supply, and the city isn’t allowing that faster than demand is rising. I live in downtown now, but previously near Mockingbird, and before that in Junius Heights and Far North Dallas, and the worst traffic was by far in FND because the only way to get around was driving for everything and everyone. Since living within Loop 12 these past 8 years, traffic hasn’t been as big a factor in my life because I can walk to stores and restaurants, take DART trains or buses to events when it gets crowded. And the crazy thing is I see many people out walking. Sure, more people drive, but by having things in a walkable distance, it also means the distance to drive is reduced, further reducing traffic.
When I lived in Junius Heights, it was in a preWar duplex, and the neighborhood still felt like a single family neighborhood. My neighbors were a family of 4, and I lived with two roommates. It was probably the most community oriented neighborhood I had ever lived in, and the closest relationship I had ever had with neighbors.
But such neighborhoods are illegal in most of Dallas because everyone assumes that single family homes are the first choice for every family. Dallas can no longer compete in the realm of SFH – there are always going to be better and cheaper SFH in Prosper, Celina, Rockwall, Bedford, Mars, and other suburban communities. But Dallas can grow it’s population internally to reduce the impacts of traffic and air pollution. Because all the growth is happening externally to Dallas, but all the amenities are still in the city, that traffic and congestion will continue to grow exponentially even in a post-Covid world. Build denser housing closer to the jobs, and fewer will choose to live in the far flung burbs
BTW, I’ve worked from home since 2016 and I’d never go back either, but I also understand not everyone can or should WFH, so betting that it’s the only way of the future when it’s contracted so much post Covid already is wishful thinking at best
Anyways, thanks for responding, I truly do appreciate the website and the work you and your team do, it’s long been a great resource for keeping up with the goings on in the city 🙂
I’m tired of this ugly, 1950s single family home style of development. Its tacky and that’s why people are overweight and depressed. We need to be more like Paris and Copenhagen with tree lined streets and bike lanes. We need to get rid of these parking lots.