Davis/Bishop Corridor study: ‘Progress is meeting Oak Cliff’

The tension between history and gentrification was thick in the air last week during the first neighborhood meeting to discuss the Davis/Bishop Corridor. Larry Good, president of Dallas architecture firm Good, Fulton & Farrell, has headed up the committee of 12 Oak Cliff “stakeholders”, as he calls them, since May, and he made the presentation of the committee’s proposal.

People seemed to like the committee’s goals, which were presented right off the bat. They include statements like “Protect the stability of neighborhoods in the corridor, including architectural integrity” and “Encourage shopping and dining locally, supporting neighborhood establishments.”

But as Larry began showing conceptual designs of four- and five-story buildings, with retail on the bottom and residential living spaces on top, and talking about these kinds of places eventually being built on Davis, Bishop and near Kidd Springs Park, the audience began murmuring and shifting in their seats — then, of course, speaking their minds when the microphone was passed around. Much was said (and I’ll go into more detail throughout the week on Back Talk Oak Cliff), but one woman summed it up with: “That looks like Uptown, not Oak Cliff!”

Good repeatedly told those present that if the consensus — which he defined not as “100 percent agreement” but instead “to get as many people nodding in agreement” as possible — does not want zoning that would allow for these types of development, then it simply wouldn’t happen. But Good asked neighbors a couple of times whether they wanted to maintain the status quo, or whether they wanted the landscape of Oak Cliff to change. The way Good spoke, it was clear that he didn’t believe something in between was much of an option.

I had the opportunity later in the week to talk to Butch Boss, one of the 12 stakeholders on the committee, a resident of Winnetka Heights, and a longtime supporter of historic preservation in our neighborhood. For Boss, the most profound comment of the night was made by a woman he spoke with: “Oak Cliff isn’t meeting progress; progress is meeting Oak Cliff.”

In other words, Boss says, changes are coming, and now is the neighborhood’s chance to decide not whether those changes are going to happen, but how.

Comments

[ericthegardener]

This is exactly the type of OC specific story that I'd like to see more of on Backtalk Oak Cliff.

Thank you very much!

[Cooper]

I was just reading D Magazine's DallasDirt real estate blog and there was a comment from someone also saying that they want Oak Cliff developments to "look like vibrant Oak Cliff, not Uptown." Can someone explain what that means? I'm not criticizing. On the contrary, as a former and soon-to-be-returning Kessler Park resident, I'm genuinely curious to know specifically what Oak Cliff people want Oak Cliff to "look like."

To me, Uptown doesn't seem like a negative, especially given the alternatives -- Plano, for example. Uptown is full of old restored/repurposed homes next to newer, well-maintained, high-end apartments that provide necessary density to attract and retain restaurants, stores, galleries and other trappings of a vibrant neighborhood.

The top questions I get from people when I tell them that we're moving back to Oak Cliff are where do you shop for groceries, where do you eat, and what's close by? There's only so much to do in the wonderful Bishop Arts area.

[Kelly Tomlinson]

I would rather the developers went back to Plano than make MY neighborhood look like Uptown. After pouring over the corridor proposal, the two main things I dislike are exactly why they want to do it. Four and Five story buildings with a 10 foot set back and 80% lot coverage means they get more return on their investment. It also means I got to live next to it while they move on to Pleasant Grove or Forney. I get transient apartment dwellers instead of owners in my neighborhood. Unless they make them overpriced condos, then I get people who only come outside to get in their car. If this is the direction developers want to take Oak Cliff then I will have to disagree. I'd rather have bright yellow tire shops than 5 stories of yuppies on Davis.