At this point in time the city and city transit authorities should be in a position to provide developers of properties like the "Left Bank" with some guidance on where future streetcar/light rail tracks might be most likely to run. My guess is that there is no such plan in place at all.
The "transit station" pictured in the Left Bank preliminary plans posted (thanks Austin55) is most likely based on an alternative alignment for what is now referred to as the TEXRail that was abandoned a few years back after a series of public hearings and a "study". Those FWWR tracks could have easily connected the TXRail line from the Stockyards into the formerly envisioned SW line from the Hospital District down to past Wedgwood. I spoke at one of those meetings suggesting that if this line was adopted a streetcar "connector" could have been constructed from the 9th Street Station (ITC) down 9th St. onto 10th St, across the river on a dedicated bridge to a second station on the FWWR line serving the Westside. The final administrative decision of course was to consolidate all commuter rail traffic at the ITC and "postpone" the SW line in favor of trying to build from downtown to the airport.
All that said, I could see a streetcar line "snaking" from Downtown west along 5th, crossing the Trinity over a dedicated bridge connecting to westside 5th St. at the Left Bank Project, continuing across the Montgomery Plaza development and on to Currie St., where it would turn south through the new developments there, and then west onto Lancaster just west of the Trinity bridge approach. There is plenty of room on the south south side of Lancaster to widen the street to allow for safe streetcar/LR ROW all the way to Camp Bowie, where the line could run down the median all the way to Ridglea.
A branch line could depart at Gendy Street and head south a few blocks to provide weekend service to gun shows, concerts and whizbangs at WRMC, Stock Show season attractions, and events at the future Bass-Rogers Rodeo Show Arena.
OK, so my idea doesn't go down 7th St. But it also doesn't screw up the traffic there much, other than crossing 7th at Currie. 7th Street is a major west-side artery, and traffic there into and out of downtown can be testy as it is; more development in the area is going to only add to the congestion. "Completing the grid" wherever possible will help local traffic by providing alternative routes, and better facilities for pedestrians and bikes will go a step further in this regard. I think the main thing is that streetcars are not tying up traffic at the Camp Bowie/University/7th intersection using this alignment, and the trains would help to encourage dense development along under-developed blocks of 5th St. while serving new dense development along Currie.
If this sort of plan was already envisioned, and had some EIS work already under the bridge, I bet the developers at Left Bank would be totally onboard with providing right of way and other infrastructure assistance (like help with the grade separation at the FWWR tracks for example). The sorry state our city leaders have left streetcar/LR transit sitting in after rejecting the federal grant Dallas now is using to extend streetcar traffic into Oak Cliff will make it difficult to efficiently and economically integrate this inevitable transportation mode into the fast-approaching future city.
