Below is a Rand McNally street map, over which I have superimposed (to approximate scale) a plat of the City of Cottonwood Shores, updated this year by Willis Engineering, after the recent Cottonwood annexation of 26 acres on Thanksgiving Mountain.  The Cottonwood map shows the current location of the Marble Falls ETJ.  The green outline is the limit of the Cottonwood map which is why more of the Marble Falls ETJ is not depicted.  When compared with the City's map, published in the newspaper, these boundaries appear consistent with the city's.

As can be clearly seen at the bottom of this map, the Marble Falls ETJ is less than 1 mile from the boundaries of Horseshoe Bay.  The yellow ruler depicts a 1/2 mile distance according to the Rand McNally scale..

While Marble Falls may not have any plans to annex Horseshoe Bay, and I do believe that, the article did not specifically address the location and potential extension of their Extraterritorial Jurisdiction which is in very close proximity to Horseshoe Bay right now.  With the continued expansion to the south and west, Marble Fall's ETJ will be encroaching into areas of Horseshoe Bay.   How soon depends on lots of anticipated and unpredictable events.  George Russell's statement that with Cottonwood Shores sitting between Horseshoe Bay and Marble Falls he didn't know how Marble Falls would get to Horseshoe Bay seems to be using a RR 2147 pathway for perspective.  It's clear that they are not blocked on the south side of Cottonwood Shores. 

I know and respect George Russell.  If he says that Marble Falls doesn't have any designs on annexing Horseshoe Bay, I believe him.  Will other expansion that the City of Marble Falls does, in the area south of town, move their ETJ further to the west?  I think that is a very real possibility.  George was not specifically asked about that potential.  His only reference was to the annexations the City has undertaken this year, saying that those annexations will not move the City Limits any closer to Horseshoe Bay.  Nothing in those remarks spoke to the next few years. 

A significant amount of the land between US 281, south of RR 2147 and west to Horseshoe Bay, on the north side of Hwy 71 is either already in the hands of developers, or is on the radar scope of a number of developers.  The SE and NW corners of 71-281 are in the hands of developers.  The 1,056-acre NW corner tract come all the way to 2147, west of the existing city limits.  There is a planned golf course community, with nearly 1,000 homesites, multi-family and 120-acres of commercial development, including a proposed hospital site.  It is scheduled to begin construction this fall.  That tract is already in Marble Falls' ETJ and will likely be annexed.  That annexation would move their city limits closer to Horseshoe Bay.