‘Under duress’: Residents express frustration with north Fort Worth housing development
Residents in far north Fort Worth expressed their frustration Tuesday with a proposed housing development they say will exacerbate traffic problems plaguing the area’s quality of life.
The council voted unanimously to approve a zoning change that will allow roughly 2,000 homes to be built near the intersection of Bonds Ranch and Morris Dido Newark Roads.
Kevin Ingle with the Bonds Ranch Neighborhood Association said he felt under duress to accept the agreement between the city and the developer that would allow for slightly less dense housing and a promise to help build out Bonds Ranch Road to accommodate more traffic.
Ingle said he wasn’t upset with the developer, but with the city council for not looking out for the best interest of citizens.
James Biedenharn, a real estate agent who has worked in far north Fort Worth for the past 20 years, said the area is already struggling to handle the current amount of traffic.
Residents currently wait a half-hour to get out of their neighborhoods onto major east-west thoroughfares, Biedenharn said. He added that traffic backs up onto U.S. 287 at the Bonds Ranch Road when train traffic boxes in the freeway off ramp.
It’s going to lower the value of homes and lessen the quality of life, Biedenharn said.
Residents he helped find homes in the area are now reaching out to sell their homes, he said.
However, District 7 council member Leonard Firestone, whose district includes far north Fort Worth, said the city’s hands were tied by a previous agreement made with the developer in 2008.
That agreement said the city would work with the developer to annex the land, provide water and sewer infrastructure and commit to rezoning the property to allow for three houses per acre to be built there.
Furthermore, the land is currently part of an “extraterritorial jurisdiction,” meaning the developer could have free reign to build whatever they want on the property with no city input.
Firestone argued that annexing the property and working with the developer give the city more leverage over how the project will take shape.
He also said the city is working to build out the area’s infrastructure to get ahead of the new development.
Firestone acknowledged residents’ complaints calling the zoning case a “no-win situation.”
After the meeting he said the city needs to get more aggressive with how it handles right-of-ways when it comes to road expansion. These are the property rights just outside a main road or thoroughfare.
Firestone argued the city should get more aggressive with eminent domain so that one property owner doesn’t hold up a road expansion project that would benefit the rest of the community.
This story was originally published June 14, 2022 at 10:52 PM.
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