Could we actually get smaller minimum lot sizes?
The Lege might achieve what Austin urbanists could never have dreamed of.
Lege Update ––
Compatibility reform unanimously passes Senate:
By a 31-0 vote, the TX Senate just passed a bill aimed at city restrictions on a building's height based on proximity to single-family homes
— Joshua Fechter 📝 (@JoshuaFechter) April 26, 2023
The idea: to allow more apartment construction amid the state's housing crunch
Background:https://t.co/FS8SrNstn4 @TexasTribune #txlege
Does Minimum Lot Size have a chance? Yesterday a veteran lobbyist told me that a bill that would cap minimum lot sizes needed a "miracle" to pass this session but surprisingly it made it out of committee in the House today, although it has yet to get out of committee in the Senate.
The original version, which is the one still circulating in the Senate, would cap the minimum lot size at 1,400 sq ft. The version that passed the House committee bumped that up to 2,500 sq ft. Either one would be a huge improvement over Austin's 5,750 sq ft minimum lot size.
ADUs: A bill that will make it easier to build ADUs also has strong prospects of passage. It has made it out of committee in the House and the Senate and is expected to pass the Senate tomorrow. It still needs to go through the "calendars" committee in the House to get a vote on the House floor. That seems probable, but not guaranteed.
If the Legislature actually reduces compatibility to 50 feet and reduces minimum lot sizes to 1,400 sq ft ... that's just incredible. That would be a far more progress on land use reform than ever imagined by CodeNEXT or any other local effort.
