Related purchased the eight-acre site on East Jefferson Boulevard from Cienda Partners last year. It has skyline views and is just across the Jefferson Boulevard Viaduct from downtown Dallas. Cienda still owns more than 30 acres in the area, which are being marketed to apartment and office developers.

A Miami developer is moving ahead with plans to build its first project in north Oak Cliff.

Last year Related Group purchased an 8-acre building site next to the former Oak Farms Dairy property, across the Trinity River from downtown.

Children are curious. Nourish that curiosity with dynamic, engaging lessons, teacher development and on-site support services, and it’s a recipe for future success.

With that premise, Dallas Independent School District, Southern Methodist University (SMU) and the Toyota USA Foundation, in collaboration with nonprofits and the local community, began a new effort in 2018 to co-create a pre-K through eighth grade school in West Dallas called the West Dallas STEM School (WDSS).

A couple miles West of downtown Dallas, on the South side of the Trinity River, Mable Armstrong was using her time and the few resources she had to provide food for the homeless. When her husband, Dr. James Armstrong Sr., wasn’t pastoring the flock of Community Fellowship Church, he was buying up drug homes in the community. This was the only way to really get rid of them, after all.

Mintwood — founded three years ago by executives from one of the area’s biggest apartment firms — is just completing its first ground-up apartment building in North Oak Cliff and is about to start another in the same neighborhood.

The deck park under construction south of downtown Dallas is planned to connect neighborhoods divided by Interstate 35E and bring a new public space to the city.

The 5-acre Southern Gateway Park — under construction over the Interstate between Ewing and Marsalis avenues — is scheduled to open late next year or in early 2024.

There is a lot at stake in this project, not only from a financial standpoint but also from a community wellness standpoint. “This could have easily been another black eye not only for Oak Cliff, but for Dallas and the community as a whole,” Barry said.

For those of us who have been watching this for a long time, it’s clear that southern Dallas’ moment is arriving. Even in a volatile economy where interest rates are rising, deals are in the works that will change southern Dallas for generations. It’s not about when anymore. It’s about how much.

And it’s not just in one part of southern Dallas; it’s all over. Think of Mike Hoque’s proposed 270-acre University Hills development to his planned development just south of City Hall.

In the business community, there is a growing concern about being able to meet the challenges of tomorrow without furthering STEM education opportunities.

“The dam broke, and everybody started coming over the river,” said Cienda Partners co-founder Barry Hancock. “We’ve had a good run in Oak Cliff, and we are partial to it.”

Cienda Partners just did its biggest deal yet in the neighborhood, after more than a decade of buying and selling Oak Cliff real estate.

“We couldn’t be more excited for having a firm as well regarded as Related Group come to Dallas and pick Oak Farms for their first project,” said Cienda Partners’ co-founder Philip Wise. “It’s been in the works for over a year, and they continue to be impressed with the site.

“They have never really been in Dallas and needed a project that was exciting.”

Over the course of eight years, Cienda Partners closed 10 transactions to accumulate 34 acres for its Oak Farms development. Now, the Dallas-based family office is moving into the development phase of its vision as a new-to-town developer looks to bring fresh multifamily to the project.

This traditionally neglected and underserved part of Dallas was cut in two by the freeway in the 1950s. Now, it is set to become home to the city’s second deck park.

La Fonda on the Plaza’s 100th anniversary party wasn’t so much a celebratory blowout as it was a reunion.

More than 375 people, including Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham and family members of the hotel’s owners through the years, attended the event March 26.

But this is a crucial moment for the park. Now is the time for the park to secure an additional $60 million in public transportation funds to complete the deck infrastructure and unlock greater private support.

That requires a public and political commitment to this project at a level we just aren’t seeing.

Dallas should be ready to demonstrate that it is willing to do for southern Dallas what it has done for Uptown and downtown. Our whole city will be better for it.

Former Oak Farms dairy property across the river from downtown Dallas is slated for mixed-use construction. Investors who own one of the most high-profile building sites in North Oak Cliff have gotten new financing for the property.

North Oak Cliff has become a laboratory of public-private partnerships to build workforce rentals. Dirt keeps flying in north Oak Cliff, where construction crews are building more than 600 luxury apartments throughout the neighborhood.

Santa Fe icon La Fonda on the Plaza turns 100 this year, and the storied hotel is celebrating its staple-status with a custom tequila crafted by Herradura and a celebratory signature cocktail. If you’ve been to “The City Different,” you’ve definitely seen the luxury property at the southeast corner of Santa Fe Plaza and, if you haven’t checked in or even ventured inside yet, this is your year.

Owners of La Fonda on the Plaza closed on the purchase of Old Santa Fe Inn for an undisclosed price Monday. The sale includes the former Albuquerque Journal North bureau office the newspaper recently vacated. That space will be converted into five new rooms for the 58-room hotel that the local Barker real estate family created in 2003.