Homebuilders looking for infill land in the Houston area have a new option in Bellaire. City Council on Oct. 19 unanimously adopted an ordinance further amending its Corridor Mixed Use, or CMU, zoning district, the strip that runs along Bissonnet Street from North First Street to Chimney Rock Road, Community Impact reported.
The vote came after the council postponed action in late September to clean up the wording.
How it got here
According to Community Impact, the council approved a first set of CMU amendments in March, on the recommendation of the Planning and Zoning Commission. Those changes removed unnecessary language from city code, clarified where multifamily dwellings are allowed, set new dimensional requirements and revised setback rules.
The council then said it wanted to allow single-family detached homes and townhouses in the CMU district, either as stand-alone projects or as part of a mixed-use development. City staff and the P&Z commission wrote and reviewed a new proposal to do that.
Staff brought the ordinance to a public hearing Aug. 3 and for a vote Sept. 21. Both times, council members found inconsistencies in the proposed single-family rules, Community Impact reported. Some sections used standards meant for townhouses, and others didn't match the R-6 Small-Lot Residential Attached District standards the new provisions were based on. The council deferred action in September to give staff time to fix them.
What changed in the final version
At the Oct. 19 meeting, Director of Development Services Travis Tanner told the council the ordinance is a hybrid of CMU and R-6 rules, so not every R-6 detail applies the same way in the CMU district. To address the council's concerns, Tanner said staff made these revisions, according to Community Impact:
- Made the additional-height language for items like cooling towers and chimneys consistent with the R-6 district, rather than with standards for the largely non-residential uses in the CMU district.
- Removed language allowing requests for additional height by specific use permit, which fits non-residential uses better than residential.
- Removed the front height-setback plane language, which also fits non-residential uses better, especially if homes won't front Bissonnet or Bellaire.
- Raised allowed lot coverage to 80% from 75%, matching the R-6 district.
Council member Ross Gordon, who had pushed for the fine-tuning, thanked the Development Services Department and the P&Z commission before the vote. "I think it now fully accomplishes our objective and is consistent, so I'm excited to move forward," he said.
The corridor
Community Impact describes the CMU district as a hotspot for dozens of Bellaire's mixed-use developments. It runs along Bissonnet Street, one of Bellaire's main corridors, in the close-in neighborhoods southwest of central Houston.
Why it matters for contractors
In a close-in suburb, every new type of buildable site counts. Opening a commercial corridor to detached homes and townhouses adds another type of site to the mix for infill builders, and gives property owners along Bissonnet another way to redevelop besides retail or office.
The details matter for anyone pricing a job. The 80% lot coverage limit gives builders a bit more room to work with than the 75% in the earlier draft, which can help on small lots. Basing the rules on the R-6 small-lot attached district means townhouse builders who know R-6 should find the standards familiar, though Tanner was clear that not every R-6 rule carries over. Builders should read the adopted ordinance closely before designing, especially for height allowances on rooftop equipment and chimneys.
For subcontractors, more townhouse and small-lot single-family projects on a busy corridor means more of the tight-site, phased work that's common in Houston's inner-loop neighborhoods: careful staging, limited laydown space and close coordination with neighbors and traffic on Bissonnet.