New Housing Development in Agave?

[Novacek]

Originally Posted by petro

I hear what you’re saying about scale, but I didn't say bigger, I said "better.” And for the record, it's 208 acres + 93 acres of parkland, which isn't all that little.

A lot of people are disappointed with what we were promised with Mueller vs what we actually got—expensive housing, big box stores, and chain restaurants. It's possible the same thing could happen with this project, but at least in its conception, it seems better. I like that there are several distinct neighborhoods, each with their own town center, shopping, restaurants, food trucks, and hilltop parks with views of downtown. And the fact that it's 10 minutes to downtown vs 5 minutes, may actually help to keep housing prices at more attainable level.

All of that requires the stores/restaurants/food trucks to pick that location.

But there's some headwinds to that, including the very thing you call out as an advantage, the more limited incomes of the residents.

There's always going to be some tradeoffs between price and amenities. Planning up front to try and reduce residents transportation/energy costs will help some, but there's never a free lunch.

What's the incentive for businesses to locate there? In Mueller, they get (some) high incomes residents, a larger overall population, and they're also near the center of the metro, so they can pull in customers from all over. Scale matters for many things.

Here, at least for a while, they're off on the edge, away from the majority of the metro. But the restaurant will still be paying a lot up front for brand-new construction.

[petro]

Originally Posted by Novacek

All of that requires the stores/restaurants/food trucks to pick that location.

But there's some headwinds to that, including the very thing you call out as an advantage, the more limited incomes of the residents.

There's always going to be some tradeoffs between price and amenities. Planning up front to try and reduce residents transportation/energy costs will help some, but there's never a free lunch.

What's the incentive for businesses to locate there? In Mueller, they get (some) high incomes residents, a larger overall population, and they're also near the center of the metro, so they can pull in customers from all over. Scale matters for many things.

Here, at least for a while, they're off on the edge, away from the majority of the metro. But the restaurant will still be paying a lot up front for brand-new construction.

My memory isn't so short that I've forgotten people making similar comments about Mueller 10 years ago. Actually, that goes for East Austin as a whole. People routinely on this forum wrote it off entirely (some still do).

I guess we'll just have to see what happens with this area in another 5-10 years.

[Novacek]

Originally Posted by petro

I guess we'll just have to see what happens with this area in another 5-10 years.

Yep. As I said, it's not that I think this will be a _bad_ development. It's always nice for there to be that option.

Originally Posted by petro

My memory isn't so short that I've forgotten people making similar comments about Mueller 10 years ago.

Mueller is basically centrally located. It's 5 miles from downtown, and 3 miles from UT. Thousands of existing commuters pass it daily to/from Round Rock and north Austin. It also got a major employer in the hospital.

If people were saying that about Mueller, they were wrong.

It'll be a lot longer until anything like that is a factor with this proposed development. Though as Austin continues to grow, 130 will eventually start putting more growth further out than this.