QUOTE
Anyone know where all 16 Villages are?
The sky is the limit for city
BY JOHN-LAURENT TRONCHE
October 08, 2007
Fort Worth is looking up, instead of out.
That’s the direction the city of Fort Worth is taking as it continues its revitalization of the city’s center in order to curb continued suburban sprawl at Fort Worth’s edges.
Working with local developers, neighborhood associations and urban design experts near and far, the city planning department has identified 16 urban villages, or areas where a new approach to development is emerging: higher-density, mixed-use and mixed-income.
“Higher density, compact development is not the enemy of, but the friend of quality of life,” said David Rusk, an urban design authority who spoke Oct. 2 at Design for Density, a conference that tackled topics ranging from congestion to homelessness.
Higher-density development is a move away from five-lane streets and a car-centered society toward a pedestrian environment. This is achieved through a variety of means, conference participants said, including narrower streets, reduced speed limits and mixed-use developments, such as Montgomery Plaza and Museum Place.
The conference included about 20 speakers and panelists in order to provide the city and its residents an opportunity to explore Fort Worth’s development future.
“I think we can educate ourselves as a community about our rapid growth, the implications of it and accommodating it,” said Fernando Costa, the city’s planning director.
If federal census projections hold true, Fort Worth could grow from 687,000 people to 1 million people by 2030, which Costa said makes Fort Worth the fastest-growing city in the United States.
The move to revitalize the city’s center comes at a time when much of the city’s growth occurs outside of Loop 820 in the Keller, Crowley and Eagle Mountain-Saginaw independent school districts.
“Unless we change, it will be continued suburban sprawl on the outskirts of Fort Worth,” Costa said.
Despite being the 17th largest city in the country, Fort Worth is one of the most-sprawling and least dense cities in Texas, Costa said, averaging fewer than 2,000 people per square mile. By contrast, Denver, which is similar in both size and shape to Fort Worth, has almost twice as many people per square mile.
Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper, who spoke at Design for Density, said improving public transportation and lessening drive times is one way to increase density.
“The single biggest impediment to economic growth is congestion,” said Hickenlooper, who was instrumental in the about-face of Denver’s downtown from ghost town to boom town.
The 16 urban villages – which include West Seventh, Near East Side and Historic Handley – are in various stages of development. In just three years, West Seventh has been transformed from warehouses and small bars into an area full of construction and new
developments.
The collaborative efforts the city is taking provide a chance to hear fresh ideas and get feedback, Fort Worth Mayor Mike Moncrief said at the conference. Costa, who helped spearhead the urban-village concept in Fort Worth, agrees.
“I think people are going to want to find solutions that are good for business, good for the environment and good for the community,” Costa said.
All of this conversation shouldn’t exclude those already here, said Rusk, former mayor of Albuquerque, N.M., and there must be a balance of low, mid, and high income development, which Rusk said Fort Worth can achieve by working with builders ahead of time to establish “local rules of the game” when it comes to making profits.
“Anyone good enough to work here is good enough to live here,” he said.
Fort Worth’s goal is balancing economic opportunities and quality of life, Moncrief said.
Contact Tronche at jtronche@bizpress.net
