Georgetown Edition | February 2025

Development

A new mixed-use development could come to Georgetown after city ocials approved a waiver allowing a proposed 3.5-story building to exceed downtown height restrictions. “This is a real exciting corridor [where] we’re seeing a lot of redevelopment,” Georgetown Planning Director Soa Nelson said at a Dec. 10 City Council meeting. Georgetown City Council and the city’s Historic and Architectural Review Commission approved a development’s courthouse view protection waiver on Dec. 10 and Dec. 12, respectively. The waiver was needed for the building’s planning process, as the applicant and property owner Brian Birdwell is proposing an architectural feature atop the building called a cupola, which would reach up to 71 feet. Taller building planned downtown

A rendering shows the mixed-use building’s covered rooftop area and cupola, which was inspired by the city’s design guidelines.

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Sorting out details

The inspiration

The city’s unied development code suggests a maximum vertical height of 50 feet in the zone of the proposed building—o South Austin Avenue and Sixth Street—to allow for the Williamson County Courthouse’s dome to be viewable through- out dierent parts of Georgetown, Nelson said. However, in the 2024 downtown master plan, city ocials suggested adjusting the UDC to allow for dierent types of developments to be built downtown, she said. Nelson said city ocials agreed the UDC’s Austin

Avenue view corridor was “limiting the amount of building height that would be permitted in that area, which would limit the ability to actually bring the vision for a mixed-use development area into fruition.” Ocials will look to remove the Austin Avenue view corridor restriction and adjust downtown Georgetown’s maximum allowed height for buildings, Nelson said. A site plan and permitting is required before the building moves forward, a city ocial said.

According to city documents, the building’s preliminary designs include a covered restaurant, rooftop bar, oce space and a courtyard bar. “We’re trying to really make a statement feature as you enter into the historic district in Georgetown,” Birdwell said at the Dec. 10 meeting.

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