Buda — City leaders are working to ensure that Buda continues to be a place where residents can “breathe easy here.”
On March 7, Buda City Council held a joint workshop with the planning and zoning commission to discuss the city’s comprehensive plan, downtown master plan and 1626/967 corridor plans.
Halff Associates first held a city council vision workshop in September 2022. In the months since, they have attended local events and held focus groups, committee meetings and an open house at city hall to collect feedback.
Halff also conducted an 18-question online survey that lasted from Nov. 30 to Feb. 3. There were 786 respondents; 48.47% live in northwest Buda, 24.30% live east of I-35, 19.59% live in central and south Buda and 7.63% do not live within city limits. Of the respondents, 35.24% have lived in Buda for more than 10 years, approximately 53% for either 1-5 or 6-10 years and 7.63% for less than a year.
Some of the key takeaways from the survey included:
• Nearly 79% of respondents said they would recommend someone to move to Buda.
• An overwhelming 63.95% of respondents said that traffic conditions are the most critical issue facing Buda today, followed by housing affordability at 12.36%.
• The top three areas where respondents felt most satisfied with the city’s performance were quality of life (parks, events, programming), encouraging city involvement and public safety services; the bottom three areas where respondents felt least satisfied with the city’s performance were street maintenance, ensuring quality development and planning for the future needs of the community.
• When considering the quality of recent residential and commercial developments in the city, 42.29% of respondents said that they are generally of the quality expected of the community but could be better.
• The respondent’s top three priorities for Buda for the next 10 years were quality schools and education, traffic congestion and parks and open space.
• 58.23% of respondents said that over the next 20 years they want to see “moderate change that adds vibrancy instead of intensity” to downtown Buda, while 24.71% said that downtown should stay mostly the same size and character that it is today.
• Nearly 60% of respondents said that the preservation and revitalization of historic buildings would encourage more investment and vitality in downtown, with other top priorities including parking solutions and enhanced streetscapes.
• Sit-down restaurants, brew pubs/wine tastings and retail/shopping opportunities topped the list for what respondents want to see more of in downtown.
• Retail, walkable mixed-use developments and single-familyonly housing were the respondent’s top three choices for what kind of development character they want to see built along the FM 1626 corridor.
• East of I-35 and 967 towards downtown were the top two locations respondents chose for trail projects.
Additionally, there were 45 participants at the January 2023 open house with 61% living in the city. At 46%, the participant’s favorite downtown goal was extending and expanding the downtown experience. Participants ranked new street connections/ improvements and enhancements to the downtown area as what they would choose to spend the most money on, and their top three priorities for the future included the ability to walk to destinations, community character and parks and open space.
“What was really interesting to me in the survey results was just how much it aligned with our recent strategic planning and budget workshop,” council member Evan Ture said. “We set out our priorities and some of these things [in the survey] just hit right along with what were key concerns and needs for citizens, so that excited me.”
As for the next steps, more meetings and public workshops will be held before the final draft. To sign up for the Buda Development Services newsletter for updates, surveys and events, or to get more information on the comprehensive and downtown master plans including documents and a project timeline, visit www.ourbuda.com.
