Regional Boards > Mid-South
Austin, TX
texaskdog:
--- Quote from: bwana39 on March 30, 2020, 01:13:50 PM ---
--- Quote from: longhorn on March 30, 2020, 10:49:24 AM ---I don't believe many here truly understand the anti freeway bias that exists in Austin. Especially west of MoPac.
--- End quote ---
Austin is / was a college town and a state Capitol when state capitols were seats of small government. As long as the Universities were the center of Austin, it was a liberal, intimate collegial environment. State government was small. The real government (the legislature) met for 6 weeks every other year. Back when, they might have an ocasional special session, but the bulk of the time, none of the legislators were there. Boards and commissions back when, the comissioners met in convenient places (often the chaiman's location) and held public but little publicised meetings. Let's just say, state government was smaller and not concentrated in Austin.
Plus before the 1980's Austin was an intellectual not a productive place. Dell and Whole Foods (which is mostly owned by Amazon) are the only fortune 500 companies headquartered there; even now. It is that education that has led to Austin's growth.
Intelectuals EVERYWHERE hold a freeway bias. They seem to not want to build any more and even tear down what is there.
--- End quote ---
They wanted to remove the upper deck of I-35. Where you gonna put that traffic? plus even if you have a plan you're talking 3 years of orange cones to get there
bwana39:
About the only route for another Austin Interstate would have been to route I-20 along US 79 from Shreveport. US-80 was already established as a MAJOR east / west thoroughfare.
As far as that goes the three predominate historic auto routes east to west through Texas were the Dixie Overland Highway (US80 now I-20) and the Bankhead Hwy (US 67 from Texarkana to Dallas Now I-30)then MOSTLY concurrent with DOH to ElPaso, and the OLD Spanish Trail (US 90, now I-10) . The interstates followed them.
longhorn:
--- Quote from: Echostatic on March 30, 2020, 12:49:13 PM ---
--- Quote from: longhorn on March 30, 2020, 10:49:24 AM ---I don't believe many here truly understand the anti freeway bias that exists in Austin. Especially west of MoPac.
--- End quote ---
It's a miracle we have half the freeways we do. MoPac would never have been built today, or any freeway segments of 290, or Loop 360. The US 290 freeway extension to Circle Dr, Oak Hill Parkway, took over two decades to get through local opposition. Same thing with 45SW, the highway in my flair. I-35 funding got passed, but the local response has been strongly against widening I-35 (somehow.) Hell, even the SH130 widening was an intense debate, and it's miles outside of town.
It would at least make sense if we had a decent transit system, but we've been voting down major transit packages since 2000. People complain about traffic nonstop, then advocate against widening freeways, then vote against public transit. It's ridiculous.
--- End quote ---
Well, there is this incompetent agency called Cap Metro that populace do not trust one bit to run mass transit.
longhorn:
--- Quote from: bwana39 on March 30, 2020, 01:13:50 PM ---
--- Quote from: longhorn on March 30, 2020, 10:49:24 AM ---I don't believe many here truly understand the anti freeway bias that exists in Austin. Especially west of MoPac.
--- End quote ---
Austin is / was a college town and a state Capitol when state capitols were seats of small government. As long as the Universities were the center of Austin, it was a liberal, intimate collegial environment. State government was small. The real government (the legislature) met for 6 weeks every other year. Back when, they might have an ocasional special session, but the bulk of the time, none of the legislators were there. Boards and commissions back when, the comissioners met in convenient places (often the chaiman's location) and held public but little publicised meetings. Let's just say, state government was smaller and not concentrated in Austin.
Plus before the 1980's Austin was an intellectual not a productive place. Dell and Whole Foods (which is mostly owned by Amazon) are the only fortune 500 companies headquartered there; even now. It is that education that has led to Austin's growth.
Intelectuals EVERYWHERE hold a freeway bias. They seem to not want to build any more and even tear down what is there.
--- End quote ---
Just reminiscing what Austin used to be, when it was a fun city and Mueller Airport was only 15 minutes from downtown.
Bobby5280:
I strongly believe Austin needs 1 or 2 East-West freeways connecting to and thru the metro area.
US-290 needs to be improved to Interstate standards 100% of the way between Austin and Houston. That is do-able. It's also feasible to improve TX-71 to Interstate standards from the I-10 exit in Columbus, TX up to the Southern side of Austin. The Austin metro has over 2 million people. Houston's metro has over 6 million. Plus the zone between Austin and San Antonio is growing rapidly.
US-290 needs to be improved to Interstate standards going West out of Austin, to/near Johnson City, Fredericksburg and then I-10. That's the harder project to build, but it needs to be built somehow. There is one expansion project to convert US-290 into a freeway just past the "Y" split at Circle Drive. But it's going to be difficult pushing the expansion farther West through Bear Creek and Dripping Springs. Parts of the existing route can be expanded, but others may require a new terrain path.
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version