New Life for Historic Lake Cliff

Kyle Alcott
Dallas Morning News

A city will endure only if it can renew itself, if it can change as the generations change.

Photo Credit: Staff Photos

Dallas today is a changing city. It is growing in extraordinary ways, shifting its shape from its first full century as a sprawling city of single-family neighborhoods into a more densely developed urban place.

But the bright, shiny growth of downtown and Uptown masks a problem that Dallas must address if it is going to thrive as a place of true economic diversity and ensure long-term prosperity: The city must help develop more neighborhoods that will lure a stable middle class.

Southern Dallas is rich with communities that can meet this challenge.

Our “Bridging Dallas’ North-South Gap” project has focused for almost eight years on the need to close the economic and quality-of-life gaps between Dallas’ southern and northern halves.

As part of this long-term effort, we’ve repeatedly advocated for concentrating extra effort on neighborhoods along the edges of more successful areas.

Today we spotlight one community that illustrates exactly what we mean when we talk about building on success to help restore middle-class investment in Dallas.

Before Oak Cliff had the name Oak Cliff, Thomas Lafayette Marsalis Sr. had a vision for the area just south of downtown. He and a partner bought up more than 2,000 acres, divided a share of it into lots and put them up for auction to start a community they advertised as “a beautiful suburb of Dallas.”

Photo Credit: Staff Photos

At the heart of Marsalis’ vision was Lake Cliff, a place he envisioned as a vacation destination. Those dreams were slowed by economic depression in the 1890s, but Lake Cliff and the area around it did thrive into the early 20th century.

Today, Lake Cliff is still home to some of Dallas’ most significant single-family historic homes, but unlike its neighbors, which have surged forward in renewal, much of the area around Lake Cliff is in bad shape.

Just to the west, Bishop Arts gets as much attention as any other part of Dallas for its resurgence. Kessler Park and Stevens Park are wealthy and stable. And Methodist Medical Center is an anchor that has helped maintain the blocks around it.

But cross Zang Boulevard into Lake Cliff, and you will find an area still very much in the grip of poverty, which has crept steadily for decades into the formerly strong middle-income neighborhood.

Many of the old mansions along Marsalis were turned into apartments decades ago, and a large number are now in decay. Run-down, all-bills-paid apartment complexes line Lancaster Avenue and side streets. Old phone booths that haven’t worked in years still stand on street corners. Crimes from burglary to assault to drug-dealing are common. Absentee landlords are a huge problem.

There are signs, though, that change could sweep this area with just a little more attention.

Lake Cliff has so much going for it: proximity to downtown, its elegant park and lake, beautiful historic homes, a short distance to Bishop Arts and a new streetcar line, among many other things.

The old Oak Farms Dairy just north of Lake Cliff is coming down, and the land is in the hands of investors who plan to turn it into a mixed-used development. The owner, a company called Cienda, is also considering using the site for the first high-rise office building to be constructed in southern Dallas in half a century.

For those who have spent years supporting this area, the growing sense that Lake Cliff’s time has come is more than welcome. But there is also concern that poverty and crime are too deeply entrenched.

Rob Garza is an architect who saw the beauty and potential of Lake Cliff’s historic district 25 years ago when he bought his first home there. He has served in just about every volunteer capacity there is to help this place improve.

Where others see trouble, he sees opportunity.

“We see all the potential change that can take place, especially in the area east of Marsalis,” he said. “There are quite a few empty lots, run-down properties, slumlords, drug houses — really the whole gamut.”

But there are also a number of families looking at the classic homes in the historic district as a good place to raise a family, he said.

Because he has been so deeply involved in Lake Cliff as a resident, an investor and a city volunteer, Garza has both a bird’s-eye and on-the-ground perspective of the area.

But his optimism can be hard for everyone to understand.

Sheila Jones has owned a day care on Marsalis for 15 years. Many of the children she takes care of are dropped off by parents who live in the suburbs and work downtown but can’t afford the prices that downtown day cares charge. So they bring their children to Lake Cliff.

She wants to be hopeful about the area. But looking at the scene around here makes it tough.

“I would love to see change because my business is here,” she said. “It’s just the upkeep of the area. There are just trashy areas and things like that.”

Jones is right that the work to turn around Lake Cliff will be difficult. It will require investors who will take a chance on properties that are priced to reflect the area’s potential more than their real value.

But some investors have shown they are willing to pay that premium, in large part because they know they can build something far more valuable than what is currently on the ground.

Last year, City Council member Scott Griggs led a successful community process to rezone 900 acres in what has become known as the Oak Cliff Gateway. The rezoning has created the opportunity to increase the population density in Lake Cliff, something that needs to happen to help draw more economic diversity into the area.

Much of the Lake Cliff area is already designated for development tax subsidies. Cienda’s work in the area signals the first major developer to take advantage of this opportunity. Meanwhile, homebuyers in the Lake Cliff’s protected historic district can qualify for incentives to restore their properties.

This is a strong foundation for what could become a truly excellent Dallas neighborhood. The historic district offers a large neighborhood of architecturally significant single-family homes that could be complemented with new mixed-use properties. All of this could exist in an area where stores, restaurants and other amenities could be in easy walking distance from residences.

The city could help by following Garza’s recommendation to calm traffic flow along Marsalis and other major streets. Additional pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure would help link the area to downtown and likely attract younger, middle-class buyers to the area.

In addition to better sidewalks and bike paths, improved lighting, police cameras and other measures to increase the sense of safety and cut down on crime would be welcome.

More attention to code enforcement is also necessary. Many houses in the area were sloppily retrofitted into apartments, and many apartment buildings are long past their prime.

Concentrating such resources in Lake Cliff — including robust incentives for restoring housing stock, tax subsidies for developers, additional funding for improved infrastructure and tough code enforcement — could provide the support needed to tip it back into prosperity.

Anytime change comes to an area like this, concerns of gentrification are raised. Those are valid. But this isn’t about pushing the poor out. It’s about shifting the tide for a few blocks near downtown that have been in decay for too long. Such a shift can help radiate change throughout southern Dallas and create wealth for residents of these areas who have invested in the place they call home.

It’s just a matter now of giving Lake Cliff a nudge and tipping it back into prosperity to become once more the great Dallas neighborhood it should be.