FORT WORTH (1080 KRLD) - The Fort Worth City Council will vote Tuesday night on an incentive package to try to spark development around TEXRail stations.
"We're not just incentivizing to incentivize," says Robert Sturns the director of Fort Worth's Economic Development Department. "There has to be some true, verifiable gap in the financing of the project that says, 'Yes, the city needs to participate to make this happen.'"
Sturns says the deal would let developers apply for a 50 percent reduction in the improved property value of a site. The proposed site would need to be at least three stories and include both a residential and commercial component.
Sturns says the package is a departure from the city's standard tax abatements. He says the plan before the city council comes from studying similar programs by other cities in the Metroplex and across the country.
"You're starting to see this focus on mass transit, the ability to take these stations and really have some transit-oriented development around the station, I think are really going to be key to their success," he says.
According to the US Census, about 82 percent of adults in Fort Worth drove to work alone in 2017. Just .8 percent used mass transit.
Sturns says the focus on development near TEXRail stations stems from demand from a younger generation that is less interested in driving alone to work or play.
"You truly see these areas where people can do everything within a quarter-mile or mile radius," he says. "That's the trend of where people are going. That's where the population is going, and we need to do the things that incentivize that type of development. Really key transit-oriented development around the stations, I think are really going to be key to their success."