May 07, 2006
Dallas is the largest American city without a comprehensive plan. Instead, it has shelves of zoning regulations, dozens of neighborhood plans and nearly 800 planned development districts. Yet until now, gathering these fragments into a single, coordinated
David Dillion, Angela Shah and Victoria Loe Hicks
Dallas Morning News
Sunday, May 7, 2006
(The following paragraphs are selected excerpts from the full article in the Dallas Morning News. To review the full article, select the link at the bottom of this page.)
The proposed comprehensive plan, Forward Dallas, offers a framework for the future rather than a blueprint. The city commissioned it from Fregonese Calthorpe Associates of Portland, Ore., in the wake of the Morning News 2004 Tipping Point series, which warned that Dallas was in danger of falling into terminal decline without major structural changes. The plan establishes the goals and ground rules for development, yet remains sufficiently flexible to accommodate the huge cultural and economic changes that are coming down the road no matter what.
If approved and implemented this year by the City Council, Forward Dallas will change the way the city looks and works over the next 25 years. It will become a taller, denser, transit-friendly place, with more condos, townhouses and mixed-use projects and a smaller proportion of single-family residences. Redevelopment will have parity with new construction; green space will be an entitlement instead of an afterthought; and alternative forms of locomotion will emerge to compete with driving 60 mph with the top down.