Apartments in Prosper — at least those included in new developments — are about to get taller.
The Prosper Town Council approved changes to its zoning laws, banning additional “garden-style” apartment complexes, where several buildings four stories or less take up a large swath of land. It also limits new multifamily developments to certain parts of town. The changes will only apply to new developments that have not yet been approved by the town council.
The updated ordinance raises the maximum height allowance of multifamily buildings from three stories to eight stories.
Additionally, the new developments will have to be able to accommodate retail tenants on the first floor and be part of a planned development district — a type of zoning that allows for a mix of commercial and residential land use.
David Hoover, Prosper’s director of development services, said the town’s multifamily standards were more than a decade old. The amendments, passed unanimously at the Aug. 27 council meeting, will facilitate newer styles of multifamily housing developments, he said.
“The type of development that long ago that was being pursued is extremely different from the types of development that are being pursued in today’s world,” Hoover said.
Under Prosper’s updated ordinance, that means taller apartment buildings with parking garages that are part of the structure, instead of complexes with multiple buildings and parking lots.
“We have less and less land to dedicate 20 acres of land to an apartment complex,” Hoover said.
Town officials removed density limits to account for multifamily structures that are more than three stories and added a requirement that the ceiling height of the first floor be at least 14 feet.
Any new multifamily projects will also have to be part of an approved planned development district, a process that requires approval from the zoning commission and town council.
Hoover said town staff will “encourage” developers to use the first floor of multifamily structures for retail.
New multifamily development will also be limited to the downtown area, along the Dallas North Tollway, or the Prosper Town Center area at Preston Road and U.S. 380.
Hoover said he thinks most of the new multifamily projects in the town will be along the tollway.
“We don’t envision there being a whole row of eight-story apartment buildings up and down the tollway. It would have to fit appropriately with the development,” Hoover said at the council meeting.
About half of Prosper’s roughly 27 square miles of land has yet to be developed, according to town officials, and Hoover said he thinks the number of existing multifamily housing units in Prosper is “probably too low.”
He said there are about 1,300 multifamily housing units in the town and an additional 1,300 units in different stages of development as part of approved projects.
There is also potential for thousands more through planned development districts that have the appropriate zoning for multifamily housing, he said, adding that he does not expect all of those to become apartments.
“When you add all those together, we’re starting to get to where we think is a pretty good number of multifamily for the community,” Hoover said.
