West Dallas has been one of the city’s most closely watched neighborhoods for years, caught between rapid investment and a strong community interest in preserving affordability. A 200 unit mixed-income apartment community here took on both challenges directly, pairing a Planned Development rezoning with an application to the city’s Mixed-Income Housing Development Bonus program.
The two processes work together but aren’t identical. The PD rezoning establishes the development standards for the site, while the MIHDB application unlocks additional density and height in exchange for a defined share of affordable units. Threading these together requires close attention to how the city’s planning staff, and often the surrounding community, will read the project’s affordability commitments alongside its design.
JDJ Consulting helped structure the PD and MIHDB applications so the affordability terms were clear and defensible throughout the review process, which mattered given how closely West Dallas developments tend to be scrutinized. The completed community now stands as a genuine mixed-income project in a neighborhood where that balance is hard won. It reflects what’s possible when a development team treats the entitlement process not as an obstacle but as the mechanism for building something the neighborhood can actually support.