Bastrop, Tx–Developers with an eye on Bastrop apparently see a different future than the one often suggested by newspaper headlines and other news reports focused in recent months on economic recession, tight credit, home foreclosures, job losses, falling tax revenues and related issues. In Bastrop, developers are building commercial projects at a brisk pace while others continue to plan ambitious housing projects which could transform the city and its environs almost beyond recognition by today’s residents.
True, housing construction has been at a virtual standstill in Bastrop for two years or so. But commercial construction is booming.
Three corners at the intersection of Texas 71 and Texas 95 (or Jackson Street) are already under development for commercial uses. Work has also begun for a new commercial center on Childers Street, just east of the Wal-Mart Supercenter. A new funeral home is under construction on Texas 71 just east of Jackson Street.
New banks and hotels continue to be attracted to the Bastrop market. Branch banks are either under construction or in the planning stage at the new Burleson Crossing shopping center, next door to the Jalisco Mexican restaurant on Texas 71 and on Loop 150 in front of the Chestnut Square entertainment center at Texas 95.
Hampton Suites, La Quinta and Quality Inn are among the hotel chain outlets either under construction or in the late planning stages for new Bastrop locations from Burleson Crossing to the Texas 71/Jackson Street (Texas 95) intersection. Hoteliers may be attracted in part by the prospect that Bastrop will begin construction of a new convention/civic center on Chestnut Street before year’s end.
Beyond those projects and plans lie the ambitions of residential developers, led by the dreamers behind the XS Ranch, Colorado Bend and Bastrop Village West projects. The XS Ranch project on almost 10,00 acres north of Bastrop could yield some 7,700 residential sites in the next two or three decades, according to a presentation to the Bastrop City Council last week. As currently planned, the major entrances to the project will be near Waugh Way off Texas 95 north of Bastrop and across a new Colorado River bridge just west of the city, according to officials.
Work on the long-planned Bastrop Village West at the intersection of Texas 71 and FM 20 could begin soon, according to city officials.That’s a project planned for some 700 acres just west of the current city limits. And last week the city council approved the final stage of a pact which allows Bastrop to provide water and sewer service to a 550-acre tract on the Colorado River between Tahitian Village and Texas 304. Called Colorado Bend, the project is designed as primarily a housing development with some areas set aside for parks and neighborhood commercial services.