“We keep saying for Buda; this serves so many other communities.” - LaVonia Horne-Williams
BUDA — Buda City Council voted to approve a request by Balanced Site Design (BSD) on behalf of H-E-B to change the zoning from Interstate Commercial to Planned Development in regards to the upcoming project.
The planned development — a proposed 135,000 square-foot grocery store, with a drive-thru restaurant, pharmacy and garden center — is located between Old San Antonio Road and southbound IH-35.
According to agenda documents, the property was previously used as a landfill and requires “significant remediation in order to develop it,” including digging 20 feet below ground to remove contaminated dirt and replacing it with at least six feet of new soil. In addition to this, the applicant notes that it is expensive to provide irrigation, due to Texas Commission on Environmental Quality regulations, so it wants to instead focus on the perimeter of the future parking lot rather than installing landscape throughout. Because of these issues, BSD is requesting council to waive 28 of the requirements for the current zoning overlay of Gateway Corridor. One of these requests is amending the lighting temperature, which is to comply with the International Dark Sky Association regulations. BSD is requesting a limit of 3,500, as opposed to the 3,000 Kelvin limit. Council member Evan Ture expressed his concern, noting that he did not want to affect the city’s status by approving light temperatures outside of the requirements. Assistant director of development services Will Parrish stated that, theoretically, it should be fine because the city submits its ordinances to the organization, which is what grants them the title and the ordinances will not be changing, only being waived one time. Another request is that, while the zoning requires between 50-80% of windows on each ground level, BSD is asking to instead establish a minimum of 20% glazing on the southern facade and 0% glazing on the sides facing Old San Antonio Road and IH-35 — something that council member Matt Smith took issue with: “Why? Why not make it an amazing looking H-E-B, with more glazing that you’ve ever seen and it’s unique to Buda.” “If you think about the sides of our building, which face Old San Antonio [Road] and IH-35, it’s back of house.
That’s why we don’t put glazing on the side of the building because you’ll see the wareroom and there’s nothing to see,” said H-E-B representative Kathy Strimple. “The glazing we’re proposing is functional glazing and it’s the 20% that we have in the proposal is what you typically see on the front of an H-E-B … The windows are being used, [they’re] not Disneyland-type windows.”
“Buda deserves Disneyland, in my opinion,” replied Smith.
“With the zoning request and, obviously, because of the intensity of this use, a Traffic Impact Analysis (TIA) was conducted,” said city engineer and development services director Angela Kennedy. “H-E-B evaluated the cost of all of the proposed improvements; that cost is approximately $903,750 between now and ultimate 2031 development.
Of all of those costs — implementing those improvements — H-E-B’s portion share would be $407,650. The city's would then, if we wanted to implement all of them between now and 2031, be $496,100. These costs are also not all inclusive.”
The intersections that were analyzed include IH-35 Northbound Frontage Road and Main Street, IH-35 Southbound Frontage Road and Main Street, Old San Antonio Road and Main Street and Old San Antonio Road and Manchaca Springs, as well as driveways in the planned development.
According to the TIA, there will be an additional 12,784 average daily trips at all of the intersections. To explain the incoming traffic that is expected, Kennedy stated that Old San Antonio Road would have 7,338 trips in 2026, but with H-E-B, would total 11,778, amounting to 38% of its traffic. This significant increase would cause this area to have delays and, ultimately, not function, said Kennedy.
The $531,250 — $242,750 from H-E-B and $288,500 from the city — 2026 improvements would include:
• Extending the eastbound left-turn lane
• Widening westbound Main Street to add an exclusive right-turn lane
• Modifying signal phasing for permissive and overlap phase for westbound right-turn and southbound right-turn
• Widening southbound Old San Antonio Road to add an exclusive rightturn lane, while removing channelized right-turn “Our goal with this Traffic Impact Analysis was to come up with a solution that could be accomplished by H-E-B that would mitigate the immediate impact of the development, improve traffic operations and be within a budget that the city could contribute to,” said Kennedy.
The TIA is proposing, as part of the planned development, a modified version that requires no right-of-way acquisition prior to store opening, which would extend existing turn lanes on Old San Antonio Road and Main Street. H-E-B is willing to pay $420,000, along with $242,000 from the city.
Buda would be responsible for all costs associated with future improvements associated with the TIA.
Council member Greg Bowles questioned whether the store will have direct access to IH-35.
“We don’t own the property to the south and we have no ability to construct on someone else’s land. So, what we’re proposing to you today is an H-E-B that has three functional driveways. We’d rather have four, but we have a lot of function for that size with three driveways,” said Strimple.
Parrish noted in the presentation that this property is difficult to develop, due to its previous use, so approval would aid further commercial development of the IH-35 corridor that is consistent with the Comprehensive Plan and Future Land Use Map.
Though, if approved, it does result in financial obligation for the city to make improvements to intersections.
Ultimately, the Planning and Zoning Commission recommended to approve the planned development as submitted.
“This is an opportunity to have somebody else work with us to potentially clean that up and make that a viable piece of property as opposed to what that may be right now,” said Mayor Lee Urbanovsky.
As far as the requests for waivers, Urbanovsky explained that this is an H-E-B, so it makes sense that it will take on similar looks to others; therefore, he is not concerned about the proposed amendments.
“I respect the H-E-B brand and that you want to see that it’s an H-E-B and that it stands out as an H-E-B and there's no doubt about it, but I do believe that there’s opportunity here to make it a real Buda H-E-B,” said council member Matt Smith, while noting that last time there was a planned development with this many modifications, it took years to get through and he wants to avoid that at all costs.
“As presented with these modifications, these financial impacts, I can’t get there right now, right tonight.
We need to work through these. We need to take time,” concluded Smith.
Buda resident Carl Urban spoke during the public hearing, where he emphasized that this property has “been trouble for years” and he does think it needs to be developed, but he is requesting the proposed striping on Old San Antonio Road be amended to allow the businesses to gain access to the northbound road, without being ticketed.
“I think they’re putting their best foot forward and I think they’ll listen to us,” said Urban.
Strimple noted prior to the vote that the applicant is asking for this to be the first and final reading, as opposed to having a second reading at a later date because the window of feasibility on the property was set to expire on Thursday, Dec. 5.
“So, we make a decision on [Thursday] whether we’re going to build this store or not. If the answer is yes and we walk away this evening with a positive vote, we’ll close on property Dec. 16,” said Strimple.
To mend potential concerns of the timeline, city manager Micah Grau stated that council will still be able to have further discussion on the specifics of the store at a later date, as the vote for this item is specifically for the zoning case.
“I would encourage council tonight to not approve a [planning development] tonight that you couldn’t live with by itself,” said Grau, as, if approved, these are the base standards that will be moving forward.
“I’m okay with proceeding forward with this, knowing that we have the [incentive] agreement piece to hash out down the road [and] going off some blind faith that H-E-B is w ho they are,” said Urbanovsky.
The item was approved unanimously on first and final reading. To listen to the full discussion, visit bit.ly/3U5nxlZ.
