Business
Chuy's seeks bigger signs for new McKinney restaurant
A sign company for Chuy's Tex-Mex asked McKinney's Board of Adjustment to allow two wall signs more than three times the size the rules allow.
A new Chuy’s Tex-Mex planned near Custer Road and U.S. 380 asked the city for permission to put up two wall signs far larger than McKinney’s sign rules normally allow.
The request matters to anyone who drives West University Drive: it is a test of how much extra signage the city will grant a restaurant that says its building simply does not face the road the usual way.
Humble Sign Co., acting for Chuy’s, filed the request with the Board of Adjustment. The board is a city panel that can grant exceptions to zoning and building rules. It was scheduled to hold a public hearing on the request at 6 p.m. Wednesday, August 19, 2026, at City Hall, 401 E. Virginia Street.
City rules cap signs on a building’s non-street-facing walls at 25 square feet. That limit comes from the Unified Development Code, the city’s zoning rulebook, in Section 504.
The company wants two illuminated signs on the east and west walls of the restaurant at 8405 West University Drive. The agenda describes them as about 82 square feet each. The application itself lists them at 86.2 square feet each, more than three times the 25-square-foot cap.
Humble Sign Co. argues the size is needed because of how the building sits on the lot, not for branding. “This request is not based upon convenience, branding preferences, or economic considerations,” the application letter says.
The company says the corner lot has frontage on both West University Drive and Custer Road, and the building was turned at an angle to fit parking and access. As a result, it says, walls the code counts as “non-street-facing” are actually visible to drivers and “function as public-facing façades.”
One sign is built into the restaurant’s tower. The other, on the east wall, is meant for westbound drivers, who the company says cannot see the main street sign until they are right at the entrance.
The site is just east of the Whole Foods Market center, near La Cima Lake, according to maps filed with the request.
Property owners near the site were mailed a notice and could support or protest the request in writing or in person, the city’s notice says.
What the board decided on August 19 is not yet in the public record. The city has not posted minutes or video for that meeting, and this board’s minutes usually appear as an attachment to its next agenda. This story will be updated when they do.
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