If you haven’t heard about the furor over a proposed luxury high rise apartment complex at the intersection of Preston and Northwest Highway, and if you haven’t seen the “No” signs proliferating all over Preston Hollow as far west as Midway, as far north as Forest Lane, then you either live south of the Trinity or north of Sam Rayburn.
Transwestern wants to build a luxury apartment on an approximately 3 acre site at the very intersection of Preston and Northwest Highway. Because the area is zoned for 3-story residential multi-family units, they have to apply for a zoning variance to make it taller. Transwestern had originally asked for an eight story tall building, but then lowered it to six. The six stories would be contained to the very corner of Preston and Northwest Highway, and the structure would slope down to three stories closer to the single family homes on Del Norte. A small park would act as further buffer between the homes.
The process: first the city staff reviews the application. I’s dotted, T’s crossed. Then they send it to the city plan commission for a vote. After that it, it goes to the Dallas City Council, which could take up to four months and put us smack in the middle of August for debate.
This is a very different proposal from the one Luke Crosland is working over south of Northwest Highway, in the heart of a very vibrant Preston Center. I asked Claire Wright Stanard, who lives Behind the Pink Wall, a bright woman and former Realtor who has attended several meetings about these properties, including Laura Miller and Steve Women’s “Secret” meeting at the Athena high rise, where Steve owns a condo, to give me a summary of the differences between the two projects because they are very different:
(a) The Highland House proposed residential project is to be set in an already designated “Planned Development” which is a commercial center, not a residential neighborhood. Other than height restrictions, the City has little control over what type of project can be developed at that site.
(b) The site is outside of any proximal slope requirements.
(c) This is truly a high end rental property of approximately 250 units, with NO retail underneath whatsoever. There will be valets, concierge services, and a loading dock off street for all moving vans – no street unloading. Appropriate ingress and egress.
(d) There is more than adequate parking for tenants’ cars (2) per unit plus 80 more spaces for housekeepers, workers, guests, and deliveries. Two floors of the building are underground for parking and three stories of enclosed parking above ground.
(e) The rents are at $3.00 a sq. foot, therefore, approximately $4,000 plus per month. The target market is for empty nesters who live six months in Dallas and six months elsewhere; people who have sold their homes in Park Cities/Preston Hollow but want to still be near their grandchildren; people in the process of building homes; people who do not want to be in their cars all of the time but want to be able to walk to restaurants and shops; widows seeking elegant, safe living; people who travel often and want a lock and leave situation. The site has its own dog walk area.
(f) As presently zoned, an office building of 66,000 sq. feet at 10 stories could immediately be built at the site, and under this scenario there would be much more traffic generated by an office building than a residential building, as indicated in The Crosland Group’s completed traffic study by DeShazo & Associates. There would be more clients’ and patients’ cars arriving and leaving an office building during the day, more deliveries to offices, and more coming and going during peak hours.
(g) The biggest issue has been the request for the increased height from approximately 10 stories to 27 stories. Obviously, there is no way a residential business model could work at this site (3/4 acre ground) without going up in height. In fact, although it would be the tallest building in Preston Center, it is actually only 30 feet taller than any existing buildings.
(h) Under FAR an office building brings 1 person per every 175 sq. feet, whereas, in a residential property it will be one person per 1400 sq. feet (size of smallest unit) or possibly 2 people per 1400 sq. fee. So, actually, the results will be fewer people and fewer cars at the site even with the height increase.
(i) There is definitely going to be a new development built on this site, and a residential site is far preferable to another office building in Preston Center. The big hole where the Chase Bank drive-up was situated is going to be a large office building and is understood to already be 100% leased.
(j) Preston Center East is under University Park, whereas, Preston Center West is under the City of Dallas and the properties are owned by a group of various family trusts. There is no hope for Preston Center without new development. With the new taxes generated by these two new projects when they are completed in a couple of years, hopefully, the City will then consider pouring some of that money into re-developing the center parking deck at Preston Center which is terribly outdated and inadequate for the area. The City of Dallas owns the present three story parking deck (Our City Council must be pressed at some point about the parking)
(k) Luke Crosland already owns the building that houses Mi Piaci, Starbucks, Fed Ex, etc., and has lived in the area for 40 years. He is vested in Preston Center and will remain as owner of the project to deal with any repercussions or negative ramifications.
(l) Once the zoning is obtained, the Highland House project will take approximately 20-24 months to complete and all construction workers will park off site and be bussed into the site. No one who doesn’t get off the work bus will be allowed to work on the project.
(m) Obviously, another “high rise” will not pop up next to Highland House for it would block the views. At least not in the near future: the strip centers on Sherry Lane are made up of a group of independent owners and are within the proximal slope requirements, which would make it difficult to make a deal happen in those areas.
(n) The Highland House zoning variance was filed quite a while ago and the hearing will be the first week of May. Mr. Crosland welcomes questions and visits to his office for anyone desiring information or to see the model of Preston Center and how this project would fit into the existing structures. [email protected] 214-987-4888 -8411 Preston Road #750
TRANSWESTERN PROJECT:![Battleground Preston Hollow: Transwestern Filed It's Zoning Case Thursday for Lux Apartments at Preston, Northwest Highway Pink-Wall-townhouse-row1-5](https://img.daltxrealestate.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Pink-Wall-townhouse-row1-5.jpg)
(a) Transwestern’s proposed project is at the gateway to a prestigious, family oriented residential neighborhood. It is not in a commercial area.
(b) Due to the high density of the project, it brings with it the potentiality of 500 cars all coming and going during peak traffic hours, and using residential streets in Preston Hollow as north/south, east/west short cuts to avoid Northwest Highway and Preston Road traffic.
(c) Their proposal has inadequate parking and does not allow parking for housekeepers, visitors, laundry deliveries, service workers, etc. Since there is no frontal service road, visitors and workers will be parking on Bandera and Averill Way.
(d) The only place for unloading moving vans at the rental units is on Averill Way. The alleys are public alleys and conduits for condo parking and are not wide enough to accommodate moving vans.
(e) The entrances and exits to parking for the project are on both sides of Averill Way, where the entrances to the Town House Row homes are presently. Right now there are only twelve homes using those entrances. With this project there will be approximately 400 cars using those entrances/exits on the very short street off Preston. This will create a traffic nightmare and back-up.
(f) Transwestern’s rental project is not what is considered today “high end” with apartments at $2.00 a sq. ft. and sizes 1006 to 1360 sq. ft. This is much more of an Uptown type project.
(g) At six stories, the construction will now be “stick construction”and not concrete construction, which is required for taller structures.
(h) Transwestern has stated publicly that they are merely developers and will not own nor manage the property once it is built. It will be sold to an outside pension fund or private equity group, managed by a third party management company and there will be no one to be accountable to the Preston Hollow neighborhood after it is built.
(i) The majority of the properties behind the pink wall are resident owned, which brings with it a vested interest in the quality of the neighborhood.
(j) The infrastructure of the Behind the Pink Wall area was not built to handle this density of traffic. The streets are already over utilized and qualify for speed bumps. With no sidewalks, walking along our streets would become dangerous.
(k) Transwestern has still not presented the neighbors with the traffic study which they promised would be undertaken by Kimberly/ Horn – we were told at meetings in January that it would be ready in “three weeks.” It has not been made available to anyone, as far as I know.