The Future of Preston Center Is in Michael Morris' Hands Now
On Thursday evening in a spacious meeting hall at University Park United Methodist Church, neighborhood leaders and local bureaucrats, led by City Council member Jennifer Staubach Gates, began the process of puzzling over how to solve Preston Road and Northwest Highway. The intersection, choked with traffic and curiously dumpy given the immense wealth that surrounds it, was recently the site of two knock-down zoning fights that revealed a yawning gap between what the market wants for those corners (apartments and office space) and what neighbors are willing to accept (the status quo).Mark Graham Developer Luke Crosland's dream of redeveloping Preston Center has been crushed by bureaucracy and neighborhood opposition.
The process will take at least a year and a half and will produce a master plan for the area that will guide development in the area for the foreseeable future. Should apartments go in Preston Center? Should Mark Cuban be allowed to build an office complex behind Ebby Halliday's little white house? Should the condos behind the pink wall go higher than three stories? All of that, plus possible traffic remedies, will be dealt with.
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