Kori, have you looked into Bandera or Boerne?
I drove out towards Bandera and the landscape is just gorgeous.
The hills are beyond beautiful.
Or maybe move out towards Medina Lake or even Canyon Lake.
I know a guy who moved his family from New Mexico to Bandera because of cheap land, the amount of land, the serene feel, and the beautiful landscape.
I love that area, but the traffic is horrendous.
And the only thing I don't like about my car that would make me even consider an SUV is that I like to go camping and I can't even fit a freakin' normal size ice chest in the trunk, and if I could somehow manage to get it in there....forget things like clothes and other supplies.
But you-know-who has a big assin' truck, so I don't have that problem anymore. Now I just have to get him to go camping.
I like older homes better. Not the new over priced ones where your neighbor can hear you break wind.
That area is way too crowded for me.
Give me the older neighborhoods where homes were built solid.
And it seems that the people who moved out north of 1604 have found that their area is becoming more "city" and less country.
Alamo Height, King Williams, Monte Vista, Terrell Hills, Olmos Park, SouthTown.
No doubt.
Much better built too. No doubt.
And for that reason, I am pondering a move to Floresville or Poth or even far east Texas. I am partial to a town out there called Kilgore. I got some family out there and I would love a small,country atmosphere.And it seems that the people who moved out north of 1604 have found that their area is becoming more "city" and less country.
It seems to me that every freakin' day I hear another ad from "Taylor Real Estate" about another "fantastic and beautiful development" in the hill country with fantastic views and only a short drive to the city.
Why not move to Kerrville, Ingram, or Hondo?
If you move to far away, you'll miss the Spurs games.
Not a bad idea...not bad at all. I like the way you think.
Kerrville isn't bad. Mostly populated by older retired people. It seems like a nice place.
Pictures I found:
Kerrville
Give it time.
Give what time?
Do you know how far Kerrville is from SA?
No real monster growth is occur any time soon. Not within the next 40-50 years.
Must of us will be dead by then. So quite worrying your life away about it.
Who's worried?
Put a sock in it.
imagine people that actually live in the city
poor s
how do they do it
alot of them dont even have tahoes
where do these people play their golf?
You. You keep bringing it up.
Here.
But really, that qhole post was clever. It really was.
The Developer claimed grandfathering status. (HB 1704) The City either didn't care, didn't have time, or felt they didn't have the legal basis to challenge the developer.I did not like what I saw coming down the last Stone Oak Parkway hill before hitting 281, what I saw was the hillside across 281 completely stripped of any vegetation and a bunch of bulldozers and construction workers building homes. I love the growth but did they have to strip all the green? Hopefully they replace a majority of it. Who knows though.
The bottom line is the more educated the public becomes on development issues, and the more determined the SA City Council becomes to hold developer's feet to the fire, the less and less this will happen. Even if the developer could legally do what it did, there are ways to encourage better development. For instance, if the developer knew that the result of clearcutting and regrading that site would mean that every other project of theirs that needs council action (for zoning, platting, or variances) for the next generation will be scruitinized, delayed, and more extensive conditions placed on the project in exchange for support, you wouldn't have like this happen.
And it is more than stripping the green. They changed the way the land works. Natural drainageways are gone. When I went out and looked at the site, the erosion and sedimentation controls were minimal and complete dog . Any rain event would result in sediment leaving the site (against EPA / TCEQ stormwater discharge guidelines) and silting up streams.
One solution that works well in Austin - in the more sensitive watersheds (anything over the aquifer recharge, contributing, or transition zones, for example) you are limited by City Code to a max of 4 feet of cut or fill on the site, in order to preserve the natural character of the land. Any more or less, and you have to apply for a variance that goes before the City's environmental board, then Planning and Zoning, and in some cases City Council too. This gives the City an opportunity to review what the developer wants to do, and in extreme instances like this one where the developer is completely in rape and pillage mode and refuses to revise the plan to a more reasonable design, they can deny the variance and keep like this from happening.
You have to have the political willpower to do it, though. If the developer can simply appeal to City Council and make a few key campain donations in exchange for the variance, you're ed.
In Austin, there was basically a green revolution in 1992, when the SOS (Save Our Springs) Ordinance was passed in a Citywide election. It limited impervious cover (paving and buildings) in the most sensitive watersheds to 15%, and established a non-degradation water quality standard for runoff leaving the site. (There could be no net increase in pollutant levels in the runoff from pre-development conditions.) Any variances to this ordinance had to be granted by a supermajority of the councilmembers (6-1 or 7-0). The interesting thing was this was citizen-initiated. Every Councilmember who was up for election and didn't endorse the measure was voted out of office.
I don't think San Antonio as a city (or perhaps more percisely as a voting populace) will ever be this passionate about developemnt issues until a much higher percentage of the population has a college education. The higher the education level of the parents, the higher the income. Once a family income is sufficiently high enough that your primary concern isn't having enough money day to day to put food on the table and clothes on your kid's backs, then secondary issues like the environment or development standards get more attention. Until that happens though, COPS, MetroAlliance, and the HO/TPA will continue to dominate the political debate and frame issues before Council almost exclusivly in their terms. Other people and groups may show up and talk, but until there are the voting numbers behind them to get councilmembers' attention, it won't be very effective.
With that in mind, I think the best hope for San Antonio's future is the building and opening of the A&M campus on the South Side, and the continued expansion of UTSA's downtown and northside campuses. In the past, you had a vast majority of college-bound seniors leaving San Antonio to attend school in other cities. With more local choices, and greater capacity, this rate will trend closer to other major metropolitan areas, and more of San Antonio's best and brightest will stay in town. This translates to more college graduates staying in town post-graduation too.
Last edited by Mark in Austin; 03-29-2005 at 10:57 PM.
It's not so much college education or money issues that are resulting in no aggression towards development laws.
It's the simple fact that the southside, eastside, and inner westside (not far west) have been ignored so long by the city, why should they care about the land in the northside?
Also, SA's city council used to be and might still be very CORRUPT.
I agree to a point, but trust me, as a professional who works in the field, the level of education has a direct impact on what issues a family deals with on a day-to-day basis.
It is why there is a concerted effort under way to focus on raising the levels of hispanic college graduates over the next 20 years in Central Texas. Hispanics will be the fastest growing demographic group, but have as a group the lowest High School graduation rate in the area and one of, if not the lowest College Degree ratesin the area.
You can directly link education, income, and economic vitality of a region. It is no coincidence that in areas with a higher level of education per capita, the development rules and environmental requirements are higher.
There is a general trend that the more attention people pay to councilmembers on a day to day basis, and the more attention that is focused on each decision or vote councilmembers make, the harder it becomes to buy and sell councilmembers or thier votes. The only way for people to pay more attention is to have more of the combination of interest and time to do so. Interest and time directly correlates to income and by extension education levels.
Last edited by Mark in Austin; 03-29-2005 at 11:11 PM.
I concur.
No question.
But in terms of the city as a whole not being aggressive in terms of land development laws.
It's simple.
A. A lot fo the lower income areas of SA have been ignored. They worry about their own problems before what's happening in the northside.
B. A corrupt city council.
C. , even the northsiders who live in the area of 400,000 dollar homes with their educated smarts don't give a crap about restrictions.
I know you say that in jest.it used to be that if you lived outside loop410 you were living large
now, if you live inside 1604 you are dog .
However, Elm Creek is the wealthest area of San Antonio. Wealthier than The Dominon.
Elm Creek is inside 1604 and outside 410.
Is Elm Creek off of Huebner or Wurzbach?
I think Huebner.
Buddy, I don't have time to propery explain everything to you right now, (I have to go finish writing a Development Agreement between a city and my client) but in short responses:
A. Yes, lower income areas of SA have been ignored. But bringing a bookstore to the southside won't change anything. Per capita incomes have to rise. That won't happen until education levels rise, or growth restrictions and/or land prices on the north side encourage gentrification (not as likely given the current lack of land use restrictions on the nroth side). The Toyota plant will help a little; but a major University Campus on the south side will be an economic generator like no other. Not only will it employ staff that will want to be reasonably close to work, but it will pump out thousands of highly skilled, highly educated potential workers that that employers looking to locate or relocate place a premium on.
B. Corrpution works best with an ignorant, apathetic, or disptracted public. All of these things trend downward as education levels trend upward.
C. There is a different demographic that is evolving / emerging over the past decade or so in new growth areas (like Stone Oak) that would make it a closer vote even in Austin if the SOS Ordinance was on the ballot today instead of 1992. Basically, sprawl areas vote red. Compare Williamson and Travis Counties as a good example of this trend: Williamson is almost exclusively sprawl and commuters driving into Austin. Overwhelmingly Red. Travis, although it has a growing Sprawl percentage, is still not a majority sprawl county. Majority Blue. When you focus in on Austin, overwhelmingly blue. Sprawl Republicans almost always are against stricter development standards in general (typical thought pattern: restrictions make it less attractive for businesses, and therefore force me to pay more in property taxes [which have to go up in order to support the infrastructure costs associated with sprawl, but this connection is often not made]), but almost always want the development to happen as far away from their particular neighborhood as possible.
What business leaders in Austin (mixed Repub and Demo), and increasingly across more of cental Texas, have come to understand is that the natural beauty of the City - the Hill Country, the green space preserved for endangered species and water quality reasons, tree preservation, etc is in fact one of the big reasons, along with a highly skilled and educated population, that employers list as factors associated with relocating to the area. San Antonio's leaders haven't come to that conclusion yet. Or if they have, they lack the political muscle necessary to transform that knowledge into a vision for the City. I hope it happens though. San Antonio has amazing potential.
Last edited by Mark in Austin; 03-29-2005 at 11:56 PM.
There are laws on the books put there by San Antonio to protect trees and the aquifer. However, as MIA pointed out, they are able to do what they want because of vested rights aka grandfathering.
I agree completely with you Mark. Untill the education level of this city rises, corporations will do what is best for their bottom line with little to no regard to what is best for the people of the city as whole. No one here even knows what vested rights are except a core group of activists and the engineering community. The candidate who leads the polls in the race for mayor down here would never be doing so if the people here cared enough about local politics to hold him accountable for the environmentaly shaddiness he has shown.
All the development you get so giddy over in this thread, it's all over some oft he most sensetive land in Bexar county. Yet, the city many times little to no power to enforce laws that are on the books because if the land was even in the most preliminary developmental stages when those laws were placed on the books, they are usually granted vested rights due to state laws.
The PGA village situation was brought on because Payne Dawson was able to get their client vested rights to the land they owned, which allowed the developer to hold the city hostage to the idea of building housing communites over very sensitive laws. Nevermind that the only reason they had those vested rights was due to a loophole placed into effect partialy by a member of the Dawson family.
By the time city council went back to close the loophole, many companies represented by Payne Dawson had already taken advantadge of the situation in order to get their vested rights and the ability to ingore the aquifer protection ordinences as well as the tree protection ordinence.
I'm no fan of urban sprawl. Especially when it's placed right over some of the most sensitive land we have.
The people have started to speak out some. While turnount being incredibly low, the results of a recent election defeating the locating of a new community college in the nursing field away from downtown or the east side when there were sites in both location that made logical sense is a good sign.
However, they have a long way to go.
I think you're right on the ball, Mark.
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