This is an important week for the future of downtown development. Over the last few years, the City has advocated dense downtown development as an alternative to suburban sprawl, traffic, and high infrastructure costs. On December 17, the Austin City Council is scheduled to vote on proposals to require developers to provide community benefits such as affordable housing, child care services, or cultural spaces.
While the proposal sounds reasonable, it is unclear whether the proposal will result in high density and new services (good) or higher downtown costs and reduced density (bad). The fact is that the proposal has real . . .