Like a lot of folks, I moved to Lake Highlands because I wanted good public schools in a neighborhood that was a reasonable distance from downtown.
We mainly tried to find something in our size and price range. When our house came on the market, I did a quick walk-through and told the real estate agent to make an offer even before we got back into our cars. I’ve spent longer deciding whether to buy a pair of shoes.
That was more than four years ago, and Moss Haven Elementary has proved to be a fine school, Getting downtown is even better now that the high-five interchange is finally passable.
But what I hadn’t reckoned on in Lake Highlands was the long commute for many of the other everyday amenities I’d taken for granted growing up in Preston Hollow and living elsewhere in North Dallas.
True, Lake Highlands finally has a Starbucks, but it’s an awfully long hike to find a bagel or a bookstore or an interesting restaurant.
I wish I could say things were looking up, but the trend has not been encouraging. Since we moved here four years ago, the closest restaurant to us on Greenville Avenue has been converted into a pawnshop. And the so-called development that is finally starting to happen in a nearby retail strip is yet another chain drugstore.
So you’ll understand if I’m less than convinced that the proposed Lake Highlands Town Center at Kingsley and Skillman is ever going to make it off the drawing board.
Community interest is definitely high; it was standing room only at Lake Highlands Freshman Center on the blustery night that Councilman Bill Blaydes unveiled the plan at a town hall meeting.
Blaydes got a heartfelt standing ovation when his council predecessor, Alan Walne, publicly thanked him for bringing the project closer to reality.
“Something like this has the possibility to bring us back to a level that many of us remember,” said Mr. Walne, reminiscing about the way Lake Highlands looked when his parents moved to the area in 1956.
Judging by the enthusiastic reaction of the largely gray-haired audience, many residents would like to see the neighborhood “restored” to its glory days. And many seemed to believe that razing three apartment complexes to build the new Town Center would be a huge step in the right direction.
Clearly, District 10 is oversaturated with apartments, some of them substandard. But how realistic is it to pin hopes on the proposed Town Center?
Sure, developers could lure new merchants to the area. People could line up to pay $800 to $1,200 rent for lofts and up to $600,000 for new town homes. They could commute from the new DART station and enjoy a new city park.
Maybe DART will “identify the funding” it needs to build the new station. And maybe the Planning Commission and City Council will support the rezoning. Maybe the new tax increment-financing district will materialize so developers will want to move forward with what’s being billed as a $280 million project.
Or maybe they build it and no one comes. Then all that will have really happened is that some apartments were torn down.
Maybe that’s the point.
