I am interested in the stance Fort Worth Council Member Cary Moon is advancing regarding the permitting of high density residential apartments in his district in particular, and the city in general.
http://www.star-tele...le90046652.html
I would like to know more about the particulars of his vision though, especially if it would support existing city initiatives like urban villages and city dreams like transit oriented development. On the one hand, I have to applaud his attempt to proactively prevent another Woodhaven apartment enclave from being developed somewhere else in the city. But I would like to know if the ultimate failure of that sort of development has been thoroughly studied by professionals and if Moon's ideas are in agreement with what such a study would recommend. Has the UTA Institute of Urban Studies ever looked into this? I also applaud the ideas cited in the article of separating apartment developments from single family, but I believe that parks and green space can effectively provide that separation. I am somewhat worried by what appears to be a desire to permit multifamily primarily adjacent to industrial areas; preventing this sort of arrangement was what prompted urban zoning in the first place more than a century ago. I see nothing in the article about mixed-use zoning, the type that allows retail and office to coexist in the same building with residential, and a district in which this sort of sustainable arrangement is allowed and even encouraged. I am worried about his assertion that "best use" for a large tract of land in the Mercantile development near I-820 Wright and Beach Street is high density residential, especially in the light of a distinct lack of infrastructure and services identified in the article. Locating this sort of project a mile from a future commuter station and calling it TOD shows a glaring lack of knowledge of what makes that sort of development work.
