A Guide to License Agreements in Austin Site Plan Review

Austin's Downtown Density Bonus Program (DDBP) gives applicants direct guidance about the order of their permit work: "Applicants are advised to start with the License Agreement process before they start the rest of the Downtown Density Bonus process."

That sequencing instruction reflects a feature that is easy to overlook. License agreements are not a step inside site plan review. They are a separate approval administered by Austin Transportation and Public Works (ATPW) as opposed to Austin Development Services (ADS), which governs site plan review. License agreements have their own intake, fee structure, and (for permanent encroachments) their own City Council vote. A site plan cannot be released until the applicable agreement is executed and recorded.

Projects with awnings, balconies, street trees, outdoor dining, subsurface utilities, transformer vaults, sky bridges, or any structure within a public right-of-way (ROW) or drainage easement need to plan for this parallel track at concept design.

How license agreements work

The framework lives in City Code Chapter 14-11 (Use of Right-of-Way), which establishes two instruments.

A license agreement covers temporary or surface-level uses of the public ROW. Trigger features include tower cranes, retention or excavation support systems, streetscapes, awnings, canopies, benches, bike racks, trash receptacles, street trees, landscaping, irrigation, outdoor dining areas, and pedestrian lighting. License agreements carry a 90-day revocability clause, a $10,000 bond, and a Certificate of Insurance (COI).

An encroachment agreement covers permanent encroachments. Trigger features listed on the requirements page include structural improvements, parking garages, enclosed balconies, tunnels, sky bridges, and sub-surface facilities.

Both are filed at Land Management within ATPW, and both block site plan release until executed and recorded. Fees are set by appraisal: a third-party appraiser, retained at the applicant's expense, determines the market value of the affected ROW, and that market value becomes the fee.

Under the Land Development Engineering Requirements section, the Austin Development Services Site Plan Requirements page states the rule directly: "If temporary or permanent encroachments are proposed, submit the applicable agreement to Land Development Engineering. The agreement must be approved before the Formal Site Plan Application is approved and released."

Subchapter E and Great Streets: two streetscape regimes, one trigger

Many triggers originate in code requirements for the strip of public ROW between the roadway and the private property line. Two parallel regimes govern this strip in Austin, and they do not apply to the same property simultaneously.

Land Development Code Subchapter E applies to mixed-use overlay corridors and certain other zones. On Core Transit Corridors, Subchapter E requires a planting zone of 8 feet minimum next to the curb, with street trees at average 30-foot spacing. The code itself notes: "no such feature shall extend beyond the supplemental zone without a license agreement."

The Great Streets Program applies for certain projects downtown. Great Streets sets streetscape standards — wider sidewalks, street trees, lighting, furniture — that downtown projects must build in the public ROW. The DDBP requires Great Streets compliance on a project's frontage as a gatekeeper of any downtown density bonus.

A given project is subject to one regime, the other, or neither. Either way, any feature a developer installs in the public ROW under either regime requires a license agreement.

The drainage easement trigger

The Watershed Protection Department's drainage easements page states the rule: "If your drainage easement does not specifically allow for improvements within the easement area, you may need to request a license agreement to place or construct anything within these areas." Those agreements are processed through ATPW Land Management, not WPD.

When the most efficient placement for a detention vault, retaining wall, or drainage feature is inside an existing easement, a license agreement authorizes it. WPD sets the drainage requirement; ATPW Land Management processes the license agreement; ADS gates site plan release on its execution and recording.

The 2010 South Lamar Office Master Comment Report documents the standard reviewer language: "All buildings, fences, landscaping, patios, flatwork and other uses or obstructions of a drainage easement are prohibited, unless expressly permitted by a license agreement approved by the City of Austin authorizing use of the easement."

Council approval for permanent encroachments

Under Chapter 14-11, permanent ROW encroachments require City Council approval. The ATPW Director can waive separate Land Use Commission (LUC) review under Chapter 14-11-51(D), but the Council vote itself cannot be delegated. The requirement applies uniformly:

Waller Owner, LLC came before Council on April 4, 2024 to authorize a 1,140-square-foot subsurface transformer vault at 92 Red River, part of the Waller Park Place mixed-use development led by Lincoln Property and Kairoi Residential. The vault houses Austin Energy transformers serving the project.
The Board of Regents of the University of Texas came before Council on October 9, 2025 for a 597-square-foot encroachment to run thermal, telecommunication, and fire protection lines under Whitis Avenue.
Manchester Texas Financial Group, owner of the Fairmont Austin hotel, returned to Council in February 2025 to amend an existing encroachment agreement for its $6 million overhead pedestrian bridge connecting the hotel to the Convention Center, authorizing temporary closure during Convention Center expansion.
4th & Waller Owner, LLC came before Council on September 14, 2023 to authorize 321 square feet of awnings and overhanging architectural features designed for energy conservation.

Most items move through the consent agenda once application, appraisal, and departmental review are complete. The vote applies the same way to private developers, institutional applicants, and state agencies.

The AULCC coordination layer

A third coordination body sits beside ADS site plan review and the Land Management license queue: the Austin Utility Location and Coordination Committee (AULCC). AULCC review is required when a site plan involves ROW work tied to a license agreement, or when the project requires a tower crane — meaning most mid-rise and high-rise construction downtown, since tower crane swing radius crosses the ROW.

Inside the Downtown Austin Project Coordination Zone (DAPCZ), AULCC review triggers at 25 feet of ROW use; outside downtown, the threshold is 300 feet. AULCC meets weekly on Thursdays at One Texas Center, and each utility representative is given at least two weeks to comment.

The 2010 South Lamar Master Comment Report shows the three tracks in motion. At Update 3 of review, ROW reviewer Reza Sedghy left a comment open: "If License Agreements or Encroachment Agreements are required, all agreements must be approved and recorded before ROW permits can be approved." A separate ROW comment noted: "AULCC is pending (UCC-161027-06-01)." Site plan reviewer George Zapalac had the drainage easement license agreement still open. The Sidewalk Easement and the Unified Development Agreement were both awaiting recordation. Transportation reviewer Natalia Rodriguez was tracking street tree count along the South Lamar frontage. None were design comments — they were administrative records on different departmental timelines.

How the parallel track fits with recent site plan reform

The last several years have brought meaningful changes to ADS site plan review. In 2023, the City retained McKinsey & Company on a $2.5 million contract. The findings were widely covered: nearly 1,500 steps from start to finish, 11 departments involved, a customer satisfaction score of 3 out of 10, and carrying costs of $9,700 per month for single-family projects and $546,000 per month for multifamily.

The first reform phase, October 2023 through May 2024, cut initial review time 56 percent — from 87 to 99 days down to 32 — with follow-up cycles dropping from 50 days to under 15. Site Plan Lite Phase 2, effective June 16, 2025, adjusted drainage thresholds and impervious cover assumptions for residential resubdivisions and multifamily projects of 5 to 16 units. The Expedited Site Plan Review pilot launched in October 2025, targeting housing projects at no more than 30 percent design completion and aiming to cut the 12-to-14-month baseline to six months.

These reforms focused on ADS's internal review process. Because license agreements are administered by ATPW Land Management on its own intake, review, and Council cycle, that track runs independently of the ADS clock. Both must complete before site plan release.

How peer Texas cities handle ROW encroachments

Texas Transportation Code Section 311.001 grants home-rule municipalities "exclusive control over and under the public highways, streets, and alleys of the municipality" and the authority to regulate or remove encroachments. The statute grants the authority; the specific mechanism is set locally:

San Antonio, under Code Chapter 37, allows the director to administratively approve permits for encroachments on streets, alleys, or drainage easements without Council action.
Houston processes encroachment permits through the Office of the City Engineer in up to 10 business days, with a base permit fee of $1,376.35 per street.
Round Rock executes encroachment agreements through the City Manager, without Planning and Zoning Commission or Council review.

Austin's Council-approval requirement provides a uniform public hearing record and a single approval gate for every permanent encroachment, regardless of size or applicant.

For developers and land use professionals

Identify triggers at concept design:

Drainage easements. Pull the plat. If the building footprint, retaining walls, patios, or landscape features touch any existing drainage easement, a license agreement is required.
ASMP street classification. Check the Austin Strategic Mobility Plan (ASMP) classification of every frontage. Core Transit Corridor frontages trigger Subchapter E planting-zone street trees and a license agreement.
Downtown frontage. Great Streets may apply, and streetscape installation triggers a license agreement separately from any DDBP density bonus path.
Permanent structural projections. Structural improvements, parking garages, enclosed balconies, tunnels, sky bridges, or sub-surface facilities past the property line are permanent encroachments and require an encroachment agreement with Council approval.
Tower cranes and excavation support. Tie-back anchors and tower crane swing radius routinely cross adjacent ROW, triggering AULCC review and a license agreement.

Plan for the timeline. These reviews take place in parallel to, and separate from, the site plans they accompany. Expect multiple rounds of review, akin to that for the accompanying site plan, at the beginning of the license agreement or encroachment process.

Budget the appraised value as a real line item. Six figures is common on commercial corridors; larger packages run higher. Add the appraiser engagement, the bond, the COI, and the public notice fee on top.

Coordinate the intake. Submit the license or encroachment agreement application to Land Management at or before site plan intake. The DDBP guidance — start with the license agreement first — applies equally well outside downtown when permanent ROW encroachments are part of the program.

Takeaways

License agreements are a separate approval, not a step inside site plan review. They have their own intake at ATPW Land Management, their own appraisal-based fee, and their own Council approval cycle for permanent encroachments. The site plan cannot be released until they are executed and recorded. Plan for them at concept design, not at first comment.

The trigger list is broader than most teams expect. Street trees, awnings, balconies, transformer vaults, outdoor dining, retaining walls in drainage easements, tower cranes, and underground parking past the property line all sit in the same family. Whether a project lives under Subchapter E, under Great Streets, or with no streetscape overlay at all, the license agreement is the instrument that authorizes any feature in the public ROW. Starting with that process — as the City's DDBP guidance recommends — is sound sequencing on most urban projects in Austin with ROW frontage.