08 Jul Project Connect Debate

Even after Austin City Council unanimously voiced 
its support for the current Project Connect urban rail plan last month, the debate over the proposed route rages on. 

Shades of Green radio brought the issue to the airwaves last week with a debate between John-Michael Cortez, community involvement manager with Project Connect, and Lyndon Henry, a member of the Austin citizen group, Our Rail. The podcast is incredibly informative and is a really great way to get caught up on the issues, so we recommend listening to it here>>

Here are some of the highlights: 

• Austin is ranked fourth amongst major U.S. cities for time wasted in traffic.
• The first proposal for urban rail in Austin was made in the 1970s and it is only just coming to fruition now.
• Austin is the only city in the state in which the transit authority must obtain approval from the voters before building a new rail project.
• Each day in Central Texas, 70 new cars are added to the roads.
• This exploding growth is why Austin can't build a transit system for today, Cortez said. The city must build a system for the future that reflects anticipated growth.
• Those projections of future growth are absurd, Henry said, claiming that Project Connect's prediction that the Highland corridor (where the new rail line is set to be built) will be home to such "fantastical" growth is overblown. The Lamar corridor, Henry said, is where the growth is now, so that is where the line ought to be built.
• A lot is riding on the success of this new line. Good ridership numbers are needed to draw in federal funding, which will be necessary if Project Connect hopes to build additional rail lines in the future, which it plans to do. 

And since the $1.4 billion project still has to go before the voters in November, it is unlikely that this debate is going to fall out of the limelight any time soon.