Growth in North Texas isn’t automatic, and it isn’t uniform. Two stories from this month show both sides of that: one where a well-funded project ran straight into organized opposition and folded, and one where a decade-old failure is finally getting resolved.
If you want the fuller picture of how far new master-planned growth is reaching, we covered that in June with a look at Preston Harbor, Windsong Ranch, and the wave of resort-style communities heading north along Preston Road. This one picks up where that story left off, with what’s happening when growth meets resistance, and what happens when a failed project finally gets a second act.
Where Growth Got Stopped: Project Tomahawk in Prosper
Growth doesn’t win every fight, and Prosper just proved it. A developer called White Rose Partners proposed Project Tomahawk, a $500 to $580 million, 225,000-square-foot data center on 37 acres near Parvin Road and FM 1385. The site was attractive because of its proximity to a Brazos Electric Power Cooperative substation.
Residents didn’t want it. More than 400 written comments came in opposed to the project, and over an hour of public comment at a September 1 meeting included Prosper’s own mayor, David Bristol, speaking against it as a private citizen. The Planning and Zoning Commission voted 7-0 to recommend denial, citing concerns about noise, water use, power draw, and proximity to homes. Days before the Town Council was set to vote, White Rose Partners withdrew the proposal entirely.
“We don’t want to go into communities where we’re not wanted.” — Jeff Eigenbrood, White Rose Partners
Prosper’s stance wasn’t necessarily anti-development. It was a call for clearer rules. As Mayor Bristol said at the meeting, residents were asking for something simple: write the rules first.
It Wasn’t Just Prosper Saying No
Here’s the part that made this story more interesting to me than a typical zoning fight. Prosper wasn’t the only one pushing back, and it turns out this whole thing is bigger than one town’s Planning and Zoning meeting. Texas as a whole has started asking a lot more questions about data centers this year, water use, power draw, who actually benefits, and Prosper’s pushback landed right in the middle of that larger mood shift.
And here’s a fact I did not expect to find: there’s a public, crowdsourced map where people all over the country report data center projects happening near them, and it was started by Erin Brockovich. Yes, that Erin Brockovich. Texas has more reports on that map than any other state, and the number one complaint isn’t water or noise, it’s that people feel like they’re the last to know a project is even happening. That’s basically the exact same complaint Prosper residents made at their own meeting. It’s a good reminder that what felt like a very local fight is actually part of a much bigger pattern playing out town by town.
So what happens to White Rose Partners now? As far as I can find, nothing yet. Prosper’s town government says the application is officially closed, and if White Rose wants to try again on that same land, they’d have to start completely over, new application, new public notices, a whole new hearing. I didn’t find any word of them eyeing another spot nearby. For now, Project Tomahawk is simply done.
Where an Old Problem Finally Got Solved: The Hole in Frisco
Meanwhile, one of the area’s longest-running growth failures is finally getting resolved. For nearly a decade, a five-story-deep pit sat abandoned along the Dallas North Tollway at Lebanon Road in Frisco, the leftover excavation from the failed $2 billion Wade Park development, which collapsed into bankruptcy in 2017. Locals called it “the hole on the toll.”
New developers are now filling it in as The Mix, a $3 billion, 112-acre mixed-use project with 2 million square feet of office space, 375,000 square feet of retail, two hotels, townhomes, and an 8-acre central park designed by the same landscape firm behind Klyde Warren Park. Frisco approved a $113.4 million performance-based incentive package in October 2024, broke ground in January 2025, and construction passed its one-year mark this summer.
What This Means For Buyers Watching These Corridors
These two stories are really one story told two ways. Growth here isn’t automatic, and it isn’t guaranteed just because a project has money behind it. Prosper just showed that a community that shows up and speaks up can stop something in its tracks, even a $580 million project. And Frisco is showing the flip side: sometimes the best growth story is just finally cleaning up an old mess rather than adding something shiny and new.
For buyers, I’d take away this: don’t assume a proposal is a done deal just because it’s been announced. Prosper is proof that entitlement and community pushback can unravel even well-funded plans, so it’s worth watching what actually gets approved, not just what gets proposed.
If Frisco’s Tollway corridor is anywhere on your radar, The Mix is worth keeping an eye on over the next year. A project that finally closes the book on a decade-old failure has a way of changing how people see an entire corridor, often before that shift ever shows up in home prices.
Bottom Line
If Prosper is anywhere on your radar, or if you’re watching what’s happening along the Tollway in Frisco, this is the moment that shape is getting decided. Questions about how any of this affects timing, value, or whether a specific growth corridor is worth watching for your own move? Let’s talk.
Source: Community Impact, Community Impact Frisco, CBS Texas, The Real Deal, Bisnow, Dallas Business Journal, Data Center Frontier, brockovichdatacenter.com, September 2026
