This may belong in the D&D, but i figured it'd get more exposure here. http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tm...307/pl_usatoday/texasissettosupersizehighways -- Texas is set to supersize highways Mon Mar 7, 7:52 AM ET By Larry Copeland, USA TODAY Texans are known for doing things in a big way. But the state is planning a futuristic highway system that's gargantuan even by Texas standards: 4,000 miles of expressways, mostly toll lanes. The Trans-Texas Corridor, almost a quarter-mile wide, would carry cars, trucks, trains and pipelines for water, oil, natural gas, electricity and fiber optics. The roads would be built over the next 50 years at a cost of up to $185 billion, mostly with private money. The network eventually would crisscross the state, diverting long-distance traffic onto superhighways designed to skirt crowded urban centers. Trucks and trains carrying hazardous materials also would use the highways. The state's goal: relieve some of the nation's worst traffic congestion, fed by Texas' booming population and the exchange of goods with Mexico that has been accelerated since 1994 by the North American Free Trade Agreement. Gov. Rick Perry, creator of the Trans-Texas Corridor, calls it a "visionary transportation plan" that could become a national model. Perry touts it as the USA's most ambitious transportation project since President Dwight Eisenhower and Congress launched the interstate highway system in 1956. "We looked at our interstate system and thought, 'This system is 50 or 60 years old.' At the choke points in our cities, it has basically reached the end of its useful life," says state Rep. Mike Krusee, an Austin Republican and author of the legislation authorizing the corridor. "We thought it was time for us to think 50 years in advance." But criticism is rolling in from farm groups, environmentalists and some local politicians, targeting the project's proposed route, width and financing - and even the need for it. "We think it's financially ... irresponsible," says Dick Kallerman, transportation issues coordinator for the Lone Star Chapter of the Sierra Club (news - web sites). "We're a sprawl state. The whole state should be making efforts to build in more compact ways." The state is holding 640 public meetings, and initial federal approval is expected in the spring of 2006. A private consortium led by the Spanish firm Cintra has been selected to build the first segment, a 316-mile, $7.2 billion toll road that would roughly parallel Interstate 35 from Dallas to San Antonio. The precise path has not been determined but initial plans put it 30-50 miles east of I-35. An I-35 parking lot I-35 between here and San Antonio is one of the most crowded, deadly stretches of interstate in the country. More than 210,000 vehicles a day - many of them 18-wheelers - travel along the portion that runs through Austin, according to the Texas Department of Transportation. That number is projected to grow to 234,000 in 2030 and 320,000 in 2050. The metropolitan areas linked by I-35 - also including Dallas, Fort Worth, Waco and Laredo - are home to about half of Texas' 22.5 million people. "In the next 20 years, we'll add 9 million more, and about half of them will also live in that corridor," says Robert Nichols, one of five members of the Texas Transportation Commission overseeing the project. Perhaps the most noteworthy aspect of the plan: Private contractors would bankroll and build the highways, then charge tolls for up to 50 years. The contractors would rent the right of way from the state. Highways traditionally have been financed by federal and state governments. This way of paying for roads is the wave of the future, says Tim Lomax, a research engineer at the Texas Transportation Institute at Texas A&M University who studies national traffic congestion and commuting. Mary Peters, head of the Federal Highway Administration, says a $284 billion transportation bill pending in Congress gives state and local governments more flexibility to use toll roads. "Giving drivers a choice between sitting in congestion or spending about what it takes for a good cup of coffee helps people who need a quick route to work, their errands or a child's ballgame, and it helps free up traffic for everyone else regardless of which lanes they choose," she says. Farmers, ranchers object Not all Texans buy this vision of the future. Among them: • The 385,000-member Texas Farm Bureau opposes the project, saying it would consume 140 acres of prime farm- and ranchland per mile. "If the corridor splits your farm right down the middle, how do you get farm equipment from one side of the corridor to the other?" asks Steve Pringle, the bureau's legislative director. "You might have to go 20 or 30 miles one way or the other to get across." The farm bureau is supporting legislation that would cut the highways' width by 40% and require an exit for every state highway and local road. • David Stall founded Corridor Watch to monitor the project and says it has "hundreds and hundreds" of members in 133 of Texas' 254 counties. "It's not being taken on as a transportation project, it's a revenue scheme," he says. The state can condemn private land for the corridor, then sell or lease it to private businesses such as gas stations or restaurants. "There was no traffic study that says any community was clamoring for a project like TTC." Like other opponents, Stall acknowledges that Texas has traffic problems, but he says this is the wrong way to fix them. "It's being rammed through," he says, "and the people of Texas don't know what it is." • Some environmentalists oppose the corridor because they believe the demand for it will fade in coming decades. "The age of cheap fuel is over," says Kallerman of the Sierra Club. "Expensive fuel will mean fewer vehicles. People will find alternatives. If they turned TTC to just rails, the Sierra Club would stand up and cheer." • Communities along I-35, including Dallas, Laredo and others, have formed the River of Trade Corridor Coalition, worried that the project would siphon thousands of trucks off I-35. They want the truck and car lanes built within 3-5 miles of I-35, says Dallas City Council member Sandy Greyson, who chairs the group. "If it's 30 to 50 miles out, it would just devastate the cities and towns along I-35," Greyson says. Take Pearsall, a town of 8,000 between San Antonio and Laredo. It's partnering with a local company to build a truck stop that could generate $100,000 a year in sales tax revenue for the city, City Manager Albert Uresti says. That's a sizable chunk in Pearsall's $6 million annual budget. "Since NAFTA, we've done a lot of investing along I-35," Uresti says. "If you build another road parallel to this road, it's going to have devastating consequences. The tax base will be hurt. Jobs are going to be lost. I just don't see a big need for it. Maybe you need it around Austin, but to build a second road here doesn't make sense."
loving it! no reason that big rigs should be driving through the center of major commercial centers unless it's their starting point or their destination. otherwise...go AROUND us.
I believe the flying cars will finally begin becoming mainstream by that time. And if they do, then all that money would have been wasted on a giant highway system whose usage will be limited and diminishing. -- droxford
No joke. Or, if the highway comes anywhere near Austin, where a car will get a flat tire and they will shut down the highway completely in both directions for over 2 hours even after the driver has changed the tire and gone on his way. I can't wait! I'll be in my 70's and driving 20mph below the speed limit anyway!
I don't know why anybody would even bother driving from Dallas to San Antonio (first segment of the TTC). Southwest can probably get you there for less than you'd spend on gas and car wear and tear. Plus you'd be there in an hour, not 4 or 5.
yeah..but you gotta leave your house an hour before the flight..pay for parking or transportation to the airport...then the flight...then rent a car or get some transportation to your destination in SA...that costs time and money, too. and HOPEFULLY, you'll have your luggage when you arrive. a 4-5 hour drive is a wash with a SWA flight.
why not?? my thought is just limiting the number of big trucks we have to drive next to in the city everyday is worth it. for safety on the roads, alone...not to mention the reduction in traffic.
Texas has a chapter of the Sierra Club? Good grief that's embarrassing. I thought those people only lived in California.
ive flown to houston (from dallas) a few times. i was lucky enough to be able to get transportation to and from the airport, and had a car avalible if i needed it. the 45 minute flight, and 1 hr wait at the airport beats the 4 hr drive. so 100 yrs from now they'll be free? all of us will be dead and gone by then, in 50 years most of us will be gone. i agree, we will probably have flying cars by then anyway.
Who the heck gets to the airport an hour early for a southwest flight? That's quite unnecessary, especially for flights intra-Texas which leave almost every 30 minutes.
my only problem with this is that it is going to be financed by private companies - that will then charge tolls. This is like giving free money (a LOT of it) to a few corporations . I think that is ridiculous.
Max is right. Depending on where you live in Houston it's about an hour drive to the airport...plus 30 minutes of wait time prior to takeoff...plus an hour flight...plus another half an hour to get off the plane and into a car...then another 30 minute drive to the ultimate destination. With no delays, that's a 3.5 hour commute. Compare that with a 4-4.5 hour drive, and it's not a terrible idea to drive. There have been plenty of times where I take the 1 hour flight from point A to point B and end up wishing I had driven instead.
i didn't say get there an hour early...i said leave the house about an hour before the flight leaves, depending on where you are in town. i'm out on the west side...by the time i get to hobby, depending on time of day, it takes me no less than 30 minutes.
in my own car. with my own music. not bothered by the guy with the flu sitting next to me on the plane. not dealing with delays. knowing exactly where my luggage is at all times. and roadside stops for sweet-tarts and a dr pepper!
Yeah I had in my mind the downtown Houston to Downtown Dallas southwest flights. 20 minutes to airport, 20 mins before flight takes off, 45 minute flight, 20 mins to car, 15 mins to downtown. That's 2 hours. I will agree that flying commercial can be a pain at times.
