Frisco approves 229 townhomes in Firefly Park mixed-use project

Frisco officials approved a major amendment to Firefly Park on June 22, clearing the way for 229 townhome lots and eight homeowners association lots inside the 217-acre urban village at the Dallas North Tollway and Highway 380, also known as PGA Parkway. The change came less than a month after the May 28 groundbreaking, keeping the housing plan in motion even as the larger development shifts from concept to construction.

The new lots deepen the residential side of a project that has been sold around office, retail, hotel and entertainment uses. At full buildout, Firefly Park has been described as a $2.5 billion to $4 billion development with about 4 million square feet of Class A office space, 400,000 square feet of retail, dining and entertainment, 1,200 hotel rooms, 230 townhomes and 1,970 residential units. Wilks Development says the site will also include a 45-acre park with ponds, trails and an art walk, putting housing into a setting designed to function as a dense mixed-use district rather than a conventional subdivision.

The first phase is expected to be complete by late 2027 and includes 120,000 square feet of retail, 170,000 square feet of office, 233 high-rise units, 187 mid-rise units, 230 for-sale luxury townhomes, a 177-room hotel and the 45-acre park. That mix points to the kind of buyer Firefly Park is designed to attract: people willing to buy into a higher-end, urban-style setting near PGA Parkway and the Dallas North Tollway, where daily life will be shaped by more apartments, more rooftops and more traffic than a typical single-use office campus.

The housing shift also shows how much of Firefly Park is still being calibrated after the bulldozers started. Wilks Development bought the land in 2015, and Mayor Jeff Cheney has said the original 2017 concept was rejected before the project was redesigned to center the floodplain and park space instead of treating them as obstacles. Cheney has called Firefly Park one of Frisco’s “most crucial pieces of property,” and city leaders have framed it as a major economic-development asset that could help pull employers, visitors and new residents into the city’s next growth corridor.