Tonight, after more than 8 months of hard work, our neighbor, Sal Costello and his entourage of supporters were finally able to put a crack in the Toll Road Plan.

Agenda item #9, proposed by Texas Senator Barrentos Gonzales, the CAMPO chair for 30 years, set out to direct the CTRMA to cancel previous plans to place a Toll Booth on Mopac South at William Cannon Blvd.

The options on the table were:

1) To add Managed Lanes to MOPAC south

2a) De-Toll MOPAC at William Cannon
2b) Delay the toll until new lanes were added from William Cannon to Barton Skyway (recommended by their Technical Committee, which are mostly TxDOT people who are trying to find new ways to raise funds - hardly practical, however, because it's very unlikely that any new lanes will ever be built on the south stretches of MOPAC, because of water quality concerns.)

Then, on a second montion proposed by Mayor Will Wynn, CAMPO also agreed to remove the ANY toll lanes on MOPAC south of Town lake, and to change the CAMPO 20 year plan (2025) to include 2 (New) Managed lanes for MOPAC north of Town Lake, which will NOT include any overhead segments, will not widen the current right of way, and will include noise abatement walls.

Daryl Slusher added a friendly amendment to guarantee that room will be left for at least 2 lanes of rail (since we all expect that MOPAC rail to be moved to 130, leaving Cap Metro a place to build a future commuter rail).

This was a GOOD night at CAMPO and one of the few times all the votes were unanimous. This is a start in the right direction.

The last item on the agenda was not covered well by the media, but it was a simple demand for straight answers from TxDOT. Austin City Council member Brewster McCrackin offered a public hearing, followed by a resolution that asked TxDOT, amoung other things, if Toll road commitments would actually result in lower funding for road maintenance (recent investigation of TxDOT internal budget figures suggest that they have already lowered funding for road we already use, but more than half !)

The result will be to have Mike Aulick ask TxDOT some very pointed questions and give them a 3 week deadline. Following their answers (never been very clear, so we aren't expecting anything different), there may be some new changes from CAMPO.

The ''Pink Elephant'' in the room suddenly is becoming visible and the board is already starting to put blame on TxDOT and the CTRMA for faulty plans. They are slowly starting to admit, (1) Austin never needed to commit to all these Toll Roads, just to secure our rightful share of TxDOT Mobility funding and (2) there are these things called Managed Lanes (which haven't been fully investigated or explained, yet) which offer CAMPO much more flexibilty in how to control traffic, which actually addresses TRAFFIC CONGESTION !!


There will be more about Managed Lanes, but the next thing Circle C Ranch needs to be looking at, is the un-holy mess that TxDOT is proposing for the Y at Oak Hill. Right now, they are earmarking $279 MILLION dollars for improvements to the intersection of Hwys 71 and 290. As a result, it will probable be a big mess and kill off all but the biggest stores we all shop at.

Managed Lanes

The first option was to Approve Managed lanes for South MOPAC and William Cannon in particular.

This is awkward, because Managed Lanes have not been clearly defined. Currently, they could be HOV lanes, they could be two lanes going one way, one lane going the other, they could be reversible lanes (like Houston has), or they could be Tolled during rush hour, free after hours. Who knows !?

A managed lane is much more flexible, in fact, they don't have to charge a Toll on a Managed lane - they can just designate it for HOV use (High Occupancy Vehicles).

The Mayor pointed out that environmental concerns will make it highly unlikely that any new lanes will be added to MOPAC south in the next 20 years, thus, adding Managed Lanes wasn't a viable option in South Austin.

So, for now, MOPAC isn't an issue. However, most of Hwy 71 is still up in the air. Tolls are highly likely and it could cost you $1 just to get through the Y at Oak Hill. Getting to the airport could still cost you $10 round trip - just for the Tolls.


Yeah, this still stinks, but the next phase is going to take a bigger committment. It takes a whole lot of time and volunteers, but it will take a dedicated lobbiest to keep after these people. The Texas Legislature could make a much bigger mess and the Trans Corridor bill is worrisome. (Hwy 130, at $33/mile, includes some really bad options - like being about to condem your land and start building on it in 90 days, paying you only what the county property taxes list it for, and leaving you very limited opions for a court settlement long after the fact).

To his credit, Sentor Gonzalo Barrientos has just announced that he's going to offer a bill to a local gas tax option. Gas taxes are how we normally pay for highways in Texas and despite what Governor Perry says, we need to double it from 20 cents to 40 cents or more.