Georgetown Edition | March 2026

BY GRACE DICKENS & BEN THOMPSON

Diving in deeper

What’s next

Nearly 400 acres of UT land in North Austin is set to be rezoned for research and science uses, a move that would clear the way for the future UT Medical Center’s development. First announced in 2023, the new medical center, including a UT hospital and MD Anderson Cancer Center, is envisioned as a multibillion-dollar addition to UT’s academic health system. The project was originally planned for the former Frank Erwin Center site on 19 acres of UT Austin’s downtown campus o I-35. Further details about the medical center project, such as its exact location or scope, haven’t been released as of early 2026. For now, UT is seeking to rezone several of its properties near The Domain, including the Pickle campus, specically for research and science uses. Eltife said the UT Medical Center would be situ- ated west of the Pickle campus. University-owned land in that area includes The Shops at Arbor Walk retail plaza, an oce building at Braker Lane and

MoPac, and undeveloped land o Braker and Stonelake Boulevard. Those properties cover about 374 acres and are all included in the zoning case moving through city reviews. Austin’s Planning Commission advanced the rezoning item Feb. 24, and City Council is now scheduled to consider the request in late March. A UT representative declined to comment about the zoning case or its impact on the medical center project after the commission’s vote. The plot covers ve tracts that currently hold industrial, institutional and mixed-use zoning. The change would label them all as Research and Sciences Mixed Use, or RSMU, in the area’s North Burnet/Gateway Regulating Plan. The zoning case is progressing as UT Austin embarks on its rst campus master plan initiative in over a decade, a project aimed at “building cohesive connections” between the main downtown campus and other properties, according to the university’s Feb. 23 announcement.

The medical center still plans to open in 2030, despite the new location, and will still be in partnership with MD Anderson. There are currently no plans for the Erwin Center site, Eltife said.

“We have a generational opportunity to reimagine what it means to be a patient, to train future doctors, and to innovate and build for a future shaped by the greatest acceleration in knowledge and technology in human history.” DR. CLAUDIA LUCCHINETTI, UT’S SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT FOR MEDICAL AFFAIRS AND THE DEAN OF DELL MEDICAL SCHOOL

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