The Dallas North Tollway is expected to continue its northward expansion all the way to Grayson County, officials say

DALLAS — Ben Rogers — co-host of the Ben and Skin Show on 97.1-FM The Eagle — looks back fondly at his time growing up in the Dallas suburb of Richardson.

He remembers how, at the time, everything north of Campbell Road was considered “pretty far north.” 

Now, the Dallas North Tollway (DNT), which has always contributed to the growth of Dallas’ northern suburbs, will soon continue the northward expansion it has seemingly forever creeped along with — this time all the way to Grayson County near the Texas-Oklahoma border. 

“Imagine how crazy that is now,” Rogers said of the idea that Campbell Road was once the far throes of Dallas civilization. “Now I live over 20 miles north of that — and still tell people that I live in DFW.”

These days, Rogers lives near the Prosper-Celina border adjacent to the Tollway. Like so many others before him, his move was driven in part by a desire for better connectivity to the rest of the Metroplex via the Tollway. He said he previously lived in Frisco near State Highway 121 and Custer Road, but that moving to the Celina area, he said, gave him and his family better access to the region’s highways.

“It took a long time just to get over to the north/south arteries of the Metroplex,” he said of life in Frisco. “I always said, if I was willing to move further up north to get a little more house for my money, it would definitely be worth it if I was right on the Tollway or right on 75. For me, it was a value proposition. I knew that I could move north and get more house for my money; it was just a matter of finding the right school district and a community that was directly adjacent to the Tollway.”

Rogers’ story is a familiar one.

While Dallas-Fort Worth and Texas as a whole have experienced rapid growth in recent years, a number of the cities along the Dallas North Tollway — including Frisco, Plano, Celina, and Prosper — regularly make lists of the fastest-growing cities in the state and country. It seems likely that trend will only continue as the Tollway marches farther north. 

North Texas Tollway Authority (NTTA) spokesperson Michael Rey said work is now underway to extend the Tollway 13.7 miles north of U.S. 380 to serve as a direct link between Downtown Dallas and the northern suburbs in Collin and Denton Counties. 

This phase of the project extending the Tollway from US 380 to FM 428 is expected to be complete in the fall of 2027. Then, Rey said, the NTTA plans to extend the Tollway from FM 428 to Grayson County line.

“The DNT serves as a spine connecting downtown Dallas to ever-expanding northern suburbs,” Rey said. “The high-grade development that has occurred along that spine is a testament to the value of the Tollway.”

Rey said work to add a new lane to the Dallas North Tollway between the Sam Rayburn Tollway and U.S. 380 in each direction was also recently finished, and that it should help traffic flow better north of Dallas. 

“This project added an additional lane in each direction, and will help traffic flow as population growth continues in northern Collin and Denton counties,” Rey said. “Along with widening the DNT mainlanes, the project team reconstructed the intersection and DNT bridge over Fields Parkway in Frisco. All DNT construction/widening/improvement is planned and executed to accommodate explosive population growth in the area and to improve access to business and entertainment venues.”

Taking a look at how various cities along the Tollway have grown — and responded in kind to North Texas’ population boom at large — in recent years, and it becomes clear: The Tollway is, and always has been, a major driver in North Texas’ continued growth.


Frisco



Frisco, originally a rural farming community, saw its population jump more than 250% since 2003 from 66,400 residents to 237,324 in 2024, according to data from the city. City officials attribute the boom to the city’s proximity to the Tollway, to Preston Road and to State Highway 121.

Located about 30 miles north of Dallas, Frisco has grown into a destination all its own, thanks to attractions like Toyota Stadium, Stonebriar Centre, National Videogame Museum, The Star and the Ford Center, where the Dallas Cowboys hold their practices. The Professional Golfers of America also moved its headquarters to Frisco in 2022, and the city will soon be home to a Universal theme park.

“The Dallas North Tollway is one of the fundamental reasons Frisco exists,” said Frisco Mayor Jeff Cheney. “The DNT corridor is a primary connector in the heart of the DFW region, including Plano, Prosper and Celina, and has spurred multi-million dollar developments along the way.”

Altair Global CEO Chad Sterling recently told the Wall Street Journal about what attracted the company to Frisco, where it relocated its global headquarters to in 2019.

“There’s not a lot of red tape that you have to go through,” Sterling told the Wall Street Journal. “The process is very easy. And, certainly, from a tax standpoint, the low rate is very advantageous.”


Plano



Plano, another city along the Tollway about 20 miles north of Dallas that’s seen rapid growth in recent years, saw its population jump 122% between 1990 and 2020, from 128,713 to 285,494.

Plano boasts the Shops at Willow Bend, Legacy Hall, The Shops at Legacy East, Legacy West, and serves as the headquarters for companies including Toyota North America and the regional headquarters for Liberty Mutual Insurance and JP Morgan Chase.

“Even back in the late ’80s, early ’90s, we saw the momentum shifting with large corporate tenants and players here in Plano that were kind of built here and built around here even before the Tollway came through Plano,” said Plano Director of Economic Development Doug McDonald. “The evolution and construction of the Tollway through Plano only enhanced [the growth].”

He said the growth in businesses moving there, the housing stock, the quality of schools and other factors have also attracted people to Plano. 

“It is kind of the prime spot for growth and for investment,” McDonald said. “It has continued to be really the hotspot for growth here in North Texas… the momentum has shifted up in North Texas where really initially Downtown Dallas was the center of North Texas and now as growth has continued to go up north in the suburbs up in the north, the center of gravity has somewhat shifted.”


Celina



Celina, which is about 50 miles north of Dallas along the DNT, was among the fastest-growing cities in the country between 2023 and 2024. The once-quiet, small, farming community saw its population jump 18.2% from July 1, 2023, to July 1, 2024, to 51,661, according to U.S. Census data.

Celina was the fastest-growing U.S. city among cities and towns with a population of at least 20,000 between July 2022 and July 2023, according to the U.S Census Bureau.

Celina Mayor Ryan Tubbs touted the city’s location between Preston Road and the Dallas North Tollway as “the Golden corridor.”

Said Tubbs: “Being able to access [State Highway] 121 if you’re going out to the airport, Preston Road for all of the commercial that’s coming in, and then DNT as well, whether that’s future office space, entertainment areas, healthcare… Geographically, we’re positioned really well, which makes us attractive.”

Tubbs said the NTTA is working to expand the Tollway from U.S. 380 to FM 428 in Celina, near where Methodist Celina Medical Center opened earlier this year. Methodist Celina Medical Center quickly became the city’s third-largest employer with about 250 full-time employees. 

Tubbs described the city’s relationship with the Tollway as “mutually beneficial.”

“I think the tollway kind of followed the demand,” he said. “They saw the urban sprawl going north and decided to make this $400 million investment in our communities on top of the future investment to come. We still have a few more miles going to our county line that the Tollway is going to build those frontage roads and then come back through and extend the toll road itself.”

Tubbs said the city is seeing “a lot of interest” in buying land for commercial purposes off the Tollway.

He previously estimated the city could surpass 3,000 single-family housing permits this year as well.

“Everyone sees regionally how much we’re growing, and I think we just attribute that to the culture that we’ve created here, to be able to have the land, of course, first of all, to be able to purchase a new home, and then when you look at price affordability in the Metroplex,” Tubbs said. “We’re doing everything we can to meet that from an infrastructure perspective of today and looking towards the future.”

To help accommodate that growth, voters in Celina in May passed a $2.3 billion bond package for Celina ISD to fund the construction of 11 new campuses, among other initiatives.

Tubbs said Celina is also planning for future growth by working to identify additional future water sources and expanding infrastructure.

“We’re seeing what we can do to identify those future water sources while expanding our current infrastructure for water reclamation facilities, ground storage tanks, elevated storage tanks, as well as different pipelines to all our different communities,” he said.

In his interview with the Wall Street Journal, Altair Global CEO Sterling said there’s still room for the area north of Dallas to grow, too.

“There’s still a lot of growth north of the Celina area pretty much to the border of Oklahoma that’s still out there to be had,” he said.


Prosper



About 40 miles north of Dallas, the upscale former farming community of Prosper — also located in the “Golden” corridor” of Preston Road and the DNT — saw its population jump 1,339% between the 2000 and 2020 Census counts, from 2,097 in 2000 to 30,174 in 2020, according to the city.

Prosper Director of Development Services David Hoover said at a Focus North Texas conference earlier this year that the city’s future land use plan primarily accounts for residential development, with the exception of the city’s six miles of DNT frontage.

“The Tollway is going to be very important for us long term because that’s where our primary economic engine is going to wind up being for the town,” Hoover said. “We have way more retail than what a town of our size would typically have.”

Hoover specifically touted the Gates of Prosper, a large retail area with a variety of restaurants and stores including a Walmart, Target, Kohl’s and more, as one of the drivers of that retail spike. Located along Preston Road near the Tollway, The Gates of Prosper is owned by Blue Star, the development arm of the Dallas Cowboys.

“Going forward, about the only place we have left that will anywhere near that type of difference is going to wind up being along the Tollway,” Hoover said.


The Tollway’s Impact on North Texas’ growth throughout the years

The first section of the now-33-mile Dallas North Tollway opened to connect Downtown Dallas to Interstate 635 in 1968. The Tollway was eventually extended to Legacy Drive in Plano in 1994, then to Gaylord Parkway in Frisco in 2004 and with the bridge extending the Tollway over U.S. 380 into Prosper opening in 2023.

The estimated timeframe for the tollway to be paid off and turned into a freeway was 2005, when toll prices were previously raised in 1975, as WFAA reported. That didn’t happen, but developers say the Tollway has paid off in other ways. 

Ebby Halliday realtor Johnny Mowad said new residents are attracted to the suburbs north of Dallas for their schools and available housing, and easy connectivity to jobs and entertainment, which the Tollway provides. 

“The suburbs to the north of Dallas, like Frisco, Plano, Celina, and Prosper, continue to be some of the most dynamic growth areas in the country,” Mowad said. “People are attracted by top-rated schools, master-planned communities, abundant new housing, and the lifestyle these areas offer. The Dallas North Tollway has been a major driver of that growth. It provides a direct, efficient connection into the economic core of Dallas, which makes the northern suburbs especially appealing to families and professional.”

He said the Tollway has been particularly impactful in Collin County. 

“It has powered impressive land value gains, delivered master-planned developments and driven infrastructure-led growth,” Mowad added. “From Frisco’s bustling activity centers to new waves of expansion in Prosper and Celina, the Tollway is truly the backbone of this region’s dynamic real estate landscape… The extension to U.S. 380 in 2007 unlocked vast tracts of previously undeveloped land and propelled rapid suburban expansion… At that intersection, land prices nearly doubled within a year, showing just how directly access translates to value.”

Mowad said the shift from working from home that started during the COVID-19 pandemic has driven some demand back to Dallas proper, although the Tollway still provides vital connectivity.

“As the work-from-home era declines and employers bring teams back together, demand is swinging back toward Dallas proper,” Mowad said. “Buyers increasingly want shorter commutes and closer access to everything the city has to offer. The exciting story is that North Texas delivers the best of both worlds, the vibrant growth of Collin County and the enduring appeal of Dallas as the economic and cultural hub.”