This neighborhood profile ran in the March issue of REAL magazine.
It’s crystal clear why people have flocked to the Block House Creek area for hundreds of years: the deep, sparkling, undying stream at its geographic center.
Here, Tonkawas and Comanches camped. Republic of Texas rangers under Capt. John J. Tumlinson built a fort at the springs before being called into the final battles of the Texas Revolution. T
he fort’s block house was destroyed after the soldiers abandoned it. After the Civil War, Williamson County Judge A.S. Walker established a ranch under the same cottonwoods, pecans and oaks. His renovated family house now serves as a light-filled community center.
Even now, suburban residents — who started arriving in the 1980s — march up and down the creek’s emerald greenbelt. At one point, the undercover melts away because one man has cleared the brush, in part to prevent wildfires.
“I’m trying to make it like the Garden of Eden,” says James Kirk, whose house backs up to the greenbelt. “It is godsent.”
A three-mile sidewalk loop, not the greenbelt, serves as the main pedestrian link for the carefully planned residential district. The Block House Creek subdivision lies between Cedar Park and Leander. Because it falls within Cedar Park’s extraterritorial jurisdiction, it will likely join that energetic city some day.
A big chunk of that granite, presumably ejected from the train, now sits in one of the subdivision’s well-tended parks.
To the south is a brushy ranching holdout, bordered by a New Urbanist experiment on the other side of New Hope Drive. To the east is the looming Cedar Park Center alongside the newer, tolled U.S. 183-A. To the north is Horizon Park, a similar if more informal subdivision.
Although built in roughly two stages in tandem with a municipal utility district and an owner’s association — the two groups now seem closely allied — Block House Creek feels made from whole cloth. The older part hosts 960 houses, the newer 1,228.
“In November 1983, my family was the sixth family to move here,” says Cecilia Roberts. “All the future planned amenities and the Leander schools were a big draw for our family. We loved the fact that the lots were so large and the house we purchased was on a treed corner lot across the street from the planned 20-acre park.”
Most of the gently arcing streets are named for apt historical or geographical features. One subsection is called the Vineyards. Resident Ursula Logan is tickled to tell folks she lives at the corner of Chardonnay and Zinfandel. Indeed, ancient indigenous vines are preserved in Tumlinson Park.
“I don’t think we need to do that,” she says.
During a Saturday morning tour, Logan and current neighborhood group President Corin Silva explained how the area’s culture developed organically. A softball league, for instance, grew out of one person’s passion for the sport.
Silva says many of the residents are from California and that Block House Creek reminds them of the safe, affordable suburbs outside that state’s big cities before some of them deteriorated. Hence, the zeal to keep this area up.
“I always dreamed of having a piece of land with room to grow,” says Byron Koenig, who moved here with wife Diane from Round Rock in 1999. “We are limited to space living in the neighborhood. But, as of now, we could never leave the neighborhood because this is our new family.”
Small improvements are often credited to Scout troops.
“We have very active Girl Scouts, Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts,” Diane Koenig says. “My husband was the Cub Scout master and is now the Boy Scout master. I am a co-leader for my daughter’s Girl Scout troop.”
Neighbors put on an Easter Extravaganza for 500 kids and stage New Year’s Eve, Fourth of July and Christmas affairs, along with a popular car show.
“We had regular block parties on our street,” says Ann Ardis, who lived here in the 1980s and whose husband, Bill, built many of the early homes. “Long days eating grilled burgers, roasted corn, everyone bought their favorite side, homemade desserts and sangria. We would spend the entire day visiting with neighbors in our own special ‘oak tree island.’”
Students here often walk or ride their bikes to Block House Creek Elementary before graduating to Wiley Middle School and Rouse High School.
“It’s like a mini Zilker Park to me,” Roberts says. “For the price point of home, there are more amenities in comparison to any other subdivision in the area. There are so many families that have connected for a lifetime, and it is a place to call home and you want to go home. I see it being like Travis Heights or Brentwood one day in the near future!”
Typically for the local culture, when some kids were getting into trouble on their BMX bikes, they were recruited to design and build their own bike park. “We repurposed the kids,” Logan jokes.
Some big box stores have landed along old 183 to the north of Crystal Falls Parkway in bustling Leander. Silva says neighbors welcomed their proximity and convenience. Hundreds of subdivisions surround Austin. Yet few of them seem so carefully tuned to the historical past and the sustainable future, or at least this sliver of suburban Eden.
One subject is not broached easily with outsiders: the commute. It takes Silva 45 minutes to reach downtown Austin early in the morning, while Logan’s drive is closer to an hour a bit later. It means fewer trips into the city.
“When we arrived, we felt near to the coolness of Austin,” Silva says. “Now we are hiring bands and bringing Austin cool out here.”
Block House Creek
Est. population: 8,700
Founded: 1983
Look: Carefully tended family homes strung along looping streets shaded by new and heritage trees. Virtually no retail, but close proximity to parks, greenbelt and a three-mile pedestrian loop.
Sources: Block House Creek Owners Association