The Bankhead Highway has had a lot of names.
From Ocean-to-Ocean Highway to Highway 180, it was the first all-weather, paved highway to run from one end of the country to the other, according to the Texas Historical Commission.
It came around 10 years before Route 66 and connected Washington D.C. to San Diego, California, winding its way through Birmingham, Alabama to Memphis, Tennessee, through Little Rock, Arkansas and, at about halfway, connecting Dallas, Arlington and Fort Worth.
Today, that same road runs through the heart of Arlington under the name Division Street.
'Like the Stockyards or Magnolia'
Used car dealers notoriously sit on either side along a portion of the road that cuts through downtown and becomes East Lancaster Avenue in Fort Worth.
They’re accompanied by some historic buildings from the late 1800s and early 1900s and some newer light industrial businesses and old motels, many of which have garnered poor reputations among residents and frequent visitors.
But to Mauricio Galante, who represents District 1 on the Arlington City Council, the area has untapped promise.
Galante is a self-proclaimed history buff, and he sees parts of the city’s distant past along Division Street coming back to life, stretching from Cooper Street to Collins Street. He can imagine a thoroughfare lined with neon signs, buildings with historic designs, shops, businesses and apartments.
“It could be like the Stockyards or Magnolia in Fort Worth, or like Bishop Arts in Dallas,” Galante told KERA News.
It would be possible with form-based code, a set of regulations the city is considering piloting in one of four areas. Form-based code is an alternative to zoning. It cares less about the purpose of a development than its coherence to a theme, giving greater freedom to developers, fewer hurdles for city planners and creating more attractive, walkable neighborhoods.
The stretch of Division Street, which Galante frequently refers to as Bankhead Highway, is the only area in District 1, with two areas in Council Members Rebecca Boxall’s District 5 and one in Andrew Piel’s District 4.
Only one of those areas will be picked to pilot form-based code, leaving Galante, Boxall and Piel to make their case to the rest of the council as to why that program should be put in their district.
Piel did not respond to KERA News requests for interview.
'Make it a place people want to go'
The largest area falls on Boxall’s District 5, comprised of dozens of blocks from Abram Street north to Division and Mesquite Street east to Johnson Creek.
Boxall thinks that would be the best area for form-based code in the city.
“You could revitalize this area and make it a place people want to go,” Boxall said. “It’s really ideal because it could also be a step in connecting the entertainment district to downtown.”
Right now, the area is largely businesses with a chaotic collection of designs, many older and in need of some restoration, sitting in front of seas of black and gray parking lots with narrow sidewalks unprotected from the streets they straddle. Crosswalks are far apart; buildings are set back far from the road and public spaces are few and far between.
Boxall, an architect, envisions shops and businesses lining the street with parking in the back, parking garages with first-floor retail and dining spaces, wide sidewalks, trees between the road and pedestrians and more appealing architecture. Those things, she said, would help make a walk from Globe Life Field or AT&T Stadium to other parts of the city feel easy after a game or concert.
The architecture could be made interesting, Boxall said. Wider sidewalks, trees, community spaces and an overall inviting atmosphere could make that part of her district a destination for residents and visitors alike.
A crash course on form-based code
Form-based code is different from what many would consider “normal” zoning.
Instead of restrictions based on use, cities set rules based on what they want that part of the city to look like. How far back is a business’ entrance from the sidewalk? Where is the parking? Is there a theme?
All of that comes into play with form-based code, according to Hannah Lebovits, a professor of urban studies at UTA, and Kena Nicole, a graduate student studying city and regional planning and who works as a graduate research assistant with the Institute of Urban Studies.
Lebovits said traditional zoning, also called Euclidean zoning, has a troubling background. While it started as a way to make sure homes weren't built near hazardous structures like gunpowder storage or factories creating air pollution, Euclidean zoning has been used to segregate cities based on things like race and economic class. She said that’s not intentionally how it’s used today, at least not in the vast majority of cases.
In most situations, Euclidean zoning is used because of its simplicity for city planners. There’s more to it, but the basics come down to picking an area, deciding what it will be used for and enforcing that use.
Form-based code approaches it a little differently.
“Form-based code is more concerned with the actual form of physical buildings and space,” Nicole said.
That means the concern is more about what the area looks like than the nitty gritty details of what goes on in those spaces.
“Euclidean zoning is extremely limited in terms of its creativity because it separates spaces by use,” she told KERA News. “It’s very focused on floor-area ratio and setbacks and parking minimums, things that emphasize the use of the space through a very narrow design focus.”
Strong Towns, a non-partisan think tank based in Brainerd, Minnesota, said things like parking minimums can kill interesting or exciting developments. A food hall in Pittsburgh was almost nixed because of parking requirements common of Euclidean zoning but less prevalent in form-based code.
Lebovits said form-based code offers more freedom. She said removing restrictions on use might seem on the surface like the wild west of urban planning, but it ironically gives more hyper-local control to the communities that are form-based and the neighborhoods immediately surrounding them.
Lebovits and Nicole said another frequent byproduct of form-based code is walkability, even when it isn't necessarily a requirement.
How does walkability work?
Walkability isn’t just the presence of sidewalks.
Jeff Speck, an urban planner specializing in walkable cities, told NPR in March 2024 that areas that are truly walkable are safe, interesting, useful and designed in a way that makes distances feel short. Ideally, it calls for different building designs, smaller blocks, wide sidewalks, parallel parking separating bike lanes from roadway and trees or other visually appealing protections between sidewalks and roads.
Those different building designs make the walk interesting, giving pedestrians something to look at as they stroll down the street, distracting them from distances. Smaller blocks break up the space and make those distances feel shorter.
And when people feel safe walking in an area, they’re more likely to actually do that, Speck told NPR.
Boxall and Galante agree that the potential pilot areas in their district would benefit from walkability, including economically.
When an area is set up for foot traffic, where the walk is interesting and safe with store entrances at the sidewalks, businesses can expect more customers stepping inside because something in the window caught their eye or simply out of curiosity.
In many cases, that translates to better income for those businesses, plus more sales tax revenue for the city. Form-based code can encourage that, the city council members told KERA News.
Connecting the city
Walkable areas also make it easier to draw people from one part of a city to another. Both Galante and Boxall want to see that happen in Arlington.
When Mayor Jim Ross announced the renovation of the Caravan Motor Inn (expected to be renamed the Caravan Court Hotel when the renovation is done) at his state of the city address in October, he mentioned the same goal: to see people leave sports stadiums after a game or event and walk until they find themselves in downtown.
That renovation is one of the things that could help, he said. More development, renovation and redevelopment could make the walk down Division Street between downtown and the stadiums a breeze.
Consultants hired by the city recommended on Dec. 17 that the council adopt the downtown are as its pilot area, but the council hasn't approved anything yet. It's not clear if that recommendation will go with what most on the council want. For Galante and Boxall, they want areas outside of downtown to adopt form-based code with the purpose of connecting more of the city together.
Boxall dreams of students at UT Arlington having the paths and roads to walk from campus to the entertainment district — only 1.7 miles, a distance that can feel incredibly short with the right setup.
Galante wants to see that kind of connectivity, too. Reenergizing the historic Bankhead Highway could be a step to connecting the entertainment district to downtown through Division Street, he said.
Got a tip? Email James Hartley at jhartley@kera.org. You can follow James on X @ByJamesHartley.
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