Here Comes The Land Development Code - First Draft

As October 4th draws closer, the Land Development Code (LDC) rewrite team continues to listen to questions and concerns from the Austin city council and constituents, but very few answers have been given prior to the public draft release this Friday.

Yesterday’s work session featured a short presentation from city staff regarding what to expect in the coming weeks.

The main message centered on the LDC’s first draft release being the start of this process rather than the end. This was emphasized by both staff and Mayor Pro Tem Delia Garza (District 2).

Council previously aimed to vote on the LDC rewrite in October, but this timeline has been pushed back for a first vote for December since the draft will not public until Friday. The LDC Revision Team will publish the LDC first draft featuring code and maps revisions on October 4 for public review prior to the October 8 special called meeting to discuss the draft.

The need for revisions has been called on for years, especially following the public wide discontent for the past attempt, CodeNEXT.

At this point of time, there is a lot of ambiguity regarding the draft since maps and text are not public, which makes fully grasping the plan difficult in this preliminary stage. Also, many questions cannot be answered by staff because information gathering is still ongoing in anticipation for the release.

Council Member Jimmy Flannigan (District 6) urges the public and his fellow council members to avoid immediately posting articles about the contents of the code to give everyone a chance to read and digest the contents without any framing.

As we mentioned before, city staff affirms that this draft is a start rather than the end.

// The Bingham Group Team