As growth plans for Downtown Austin reached their height, the City Council approved the East Austin Overlay District and began the process of Neighborhood Planning. Several elements came together to demand the changes in East Austin. This one-time stagnant area ceased growing when downtown Austin had become nothing more than an oversized country town with a Capitol Building and a university. The adjacent East Austin area had little impetus to change. However, it did have an aging municipal airport (Mueller Airport) that was land-locked, noisy and unable to provide long-term future service for the growing Austin area. When Bergstrom Air Force Base closed, it gave Austin an outstanding opportunity to move its airport into that facility located in Southeast Austin, which it did. When the airport move was completed, this opened the door for dynamic business and residential growth on the old airport grounds in East Austin which are strategically located between downtown Austin and The University of Texas campus, with IH35 being the dividing line and providing excellent intra-city transportation. These events made the city’s plan for the East Austin Overlay that much more viable. The development progress made to date has literally transformed East Austin into a vibrant and growing area.

Austin City Council and residents of East Austin have struggled to balance the growth so that low-income residents are not priced-out of their neighborhoods with the higher-priced homes and related higher property taxes that inevitably accompany growth. Many of the bungalow frame houses and large Victorian homes built in the 1930’s have been restored while at the same time many of these houses are being replaced with modern urban dwellings. The influx of new investments has changed the face of East Austin with city leaders assisting in the city’s revitalization program. Average home prices increased 100% between 1999 and 2005. The ambitious effort to redevelop the Robert Mueller Municipal Airport site into a mixed-use urban village was “icing on the cake.” The 711 acre Mueller site, vacated when Austin’s airport relocated in 1999, has been developed into an award-winning master plan community, making this urban renewal a very desirable area in which to work and live. There are many wonderful neighborhoods in East Austin which have continued to preserve their natural beauty for the last sixty years while the adjoining neighborhoods, businesses, and streets have changed; Wilshire Woods, Cherrywood and French Place neighborhoods are great examples of this.