January 21, 2025 • 25 mins
The episode explores Austin's Project Connect, a light rail initiative designed to improve transportation and connectivity throughout the city.
With the 16,000-page draft environmental impact study released, we provide a detailed overview of station highlights and their potential impact.
• Station breakdown starting from Yellow Jacket Station
• Key features of connectivity and sustainability
• Community concerns regarding station locations
• Discussion on the downtown development implications
• The role of UT stations in serving a large student population
• Encouragement for ongoing dialogue among stakeholders
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Doors are closing Austin's light rail initiative.
With the draft environmentalstudy recently released, we dig
through its 16,000 pages toprovide you with everything you
need to know about ProjectConnect.
All of this on Transit.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
Tangents.
Hey everybody and welcome tothis episode of Transit Tangents
.
My name is Lewis and I'm Chris,and today we are going to take
a much deeper dive into ProjectConnect in Austin, the plan for
Light Rail here in the city.
We just got a 16,000 pagedocument dump along with the
(00:53):
draft environmental impactstatement.
We've been going through allsorts of it, as many folks in
Austin have.
Speaker 2 (01:01):
We are combing through the 16,000 pages so you
don't have to yes yeah, yeah,yeah, although, to be totally
fair, there's more to it.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
I'm sure have, we are .
We are combing through the 16000 pages, so you don't have to.
Yes, yeah, yeah, although, tobe totally fair, there's.
There is more to it, I'm sure.
Um, but we're trying to pickthe stuff that, uh, we found
most interesting throughout.
So, uh, what we're going to dois essentially kind of dive
through station by station.
We now have literal, block byblock maps, um, so we're going
to show some of those uh, we didsome work with some maps to
give some aerials of everythingand kind of just explain what
(01:28):
the exact layout and stationlocations look like, as well as
get into some of theenvironmental impacts, get into
some of the effects on roadways,displacements, all those sort
of things.
Displacements and even, you know, not fully related to the draft
EIS, but some good news evenfrom the state legislature.
So some cautious good news,we'll see.
(01:49):
But let's start off, though, bykind of going station by
station through this, startingoff with Yellow Jacket Station.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
Which is going to be on the blue line.
Yes, one of two lines, blue andorange.
Blue line will go out towardsthe airport and, as you said,
starting with the Yellow JacketStation, this is the one that is
the furthest southeast onRiverside Drive, closest to the
airport Not to the airport, mindyou Right, as everybody's
(02:19):
grumbling in town, but prettyclose to the airport Totally.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
And there are plans for an airport extension at some
point, but it won't be donenecessarily in the first phase.
Yellowjacket station is goingto be home to one of the few
park and rides.
A lot of the park and rides I'mskeptical of.
This one actually makes somesense.
It is right along the highway,the station area not super dense
.
There is some room fordevelopment.
(02:42):
There are a few hotels close bywhich could be helpful.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
But overall, you know , this station is here in a lot
of reasons, as because themaintenance facility is right
there basically the operationsand maintenance facility, which
we'll refer to as OMF here andthere, is located in this area
in sort of a light industrialpark.
It's a lot.
It's a row of warehousebuildings right next to sort of
(03:05):
the city and state homelesscamps, the marshalling yard the
marshalling yard and a few otherthings, and so a lot of space
in this area, a lot ofunderutilized space in a lot of
cases, especially when we'relooking at the warehouse section
of this part of town Totally,but as we kind of move in,
heading west, closer to downtown, the next stop on the line is
(03:27):
the Grove station.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
Now, this is now the preferred station.
Initially, there was somedebate within the Austin Transit
Partnership, the folks who areactually responsible for kind of
the delivery of the light rail,where there may have been two
different stops in this area,one at montopolis and one at
farrow drive.
Instead, they're kind ofpicking one spot in the middle,
(03:50):
which is the grove, in big partbecause the city just purchased
a large parcel of land and a anoffice building that the city
now has plans to develop into awhole bunch of affordable
housing, which would be verywalkable to this station.
Kind of funny.
Right now, though, the stationis currently just looks like a
bunch of grass.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
Yeah, grass and trees and like kind of in between big
neighborhoods.
I was sort of against this atfirst because I am in favor of
more stations.
But looking at the map, lookingat future development, I think
this does make sense.
It is more aligned with thedirection these neighborhoods
are going, totally.
Speaker 1 (04:26):
It also is a little bit better for the ACC campus
that's in the area.
It's not perfect still likethey'll probably need to run
some sort of shuttle, but underthe other setup where you'd have
a Faro stop and a Montopolisstop, it was really not
convenient at all for ACC.
So there may be some potentialbenefits with that as well.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
The next stop on Riverside Drive, past the Grove,
is the Pleasant Valley stop.
This is where Pleasant Valleyand Riverside meet, where the
station is going to be,interestingly enough, huge,
median, wide, wide open space,and this is because Riverside
was actually meant to be ahighway originally.
So, seeing this right of waythat already existed being
(05:07):
transitioned to light rail, youknow we like to see that.
It feels good, it feels nice,yeah, yeah yeah, this is also
the intersection of a trailthat's going to be created.
I think it's called the.
Is it the Country Club Trail?
Yeah, the.
Speaker 1 (05:19):
Country Club Creek Trail.
Speaker 2 (05:20):
Creek Trail.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
It's currently like a small trail that's in Roy G
Park right now.
It's going to be extendedthrough a big portion of
Southeast Austin including a lotof areas that have a lot of
apartment buildings, ending inMabel Davis Park, which adds to
some potential ridership foreven like folks on bikes to be
able to get from those areas tothe station.
So with that, I'd love to seesome like bike lockers or
(05:42):
something at this station.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
I'd characterize this area as like the strip mall
capital of Austin.
It is all huge parking lots.
You have a massive HEV in thisarea which, for those not from
Austin, is our big grocery storechain here.
You've had a lot of apartmentbuildings here.
A lot of them are being torndown, the older ones for larger
development, which will bring inmore people and potentially
(06:06):
drive that ridership.
But all in all you just have alot of fast food, restaurants
and surface parking lots.
Speaker 1 (06:12):
But where you see surface parking, yeah, I see
potential, but I will say,though, too.
So I lived on Crossing Placefor a year not too long ago.
Bus ridership in the area veryhigh, affordable apartments in
the area, quite a few,especially for Austin.
So some of that is being torndown and I hope that there is a
(06:35):
and I'm sure, given City Council, I have the faith in doing this
like good transitions for folkswho inevitably may be kicked
out of their homes.
Frankly, to build some of thisnew development.
I'm specifically talking aboutthe River Park development,
which looks beautiful, but theredefinitely needs to be a real
plan in place for that.
I want to say that at theoutset, there are also a ton of
(06:55):
other apartments that arestaying put, that will stay
there In addition.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
Oh, go ahead.
I was going to say just to say,you mentioned the bus ridership
.
This is a primary corridor forthe 300 and the 20.
The 20 is notable becausethat's the bus that takes you to
the airport, from the airportto Republic Square and downtown
Austin.
But these are two of.
They're not the busiest, butthey're two of the busiest lines
in the city.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
I want to say they're both near the top five
ridership and in addition tothat we're also going to see the
new 800 rapid route bus runningright through this area as well
, which will add even more tothis.
So this is definitely going tobe a busy stop.
It's already a busy transit hubin the city, but let's move a
little bit further west, closerto downtown.
(07:40):
This will be the last stop,really right on Riverside, and
it's going to be Lakeshore,serving some of the area that
has already been developed inthe Riverside corridor.
So the strip malls start to geta little bit smaller as we work
into this area and you start tosee some more mixed-use
development, some more newerapartment buildings.
This area is also kind of hometo the Oracle campus, so you
(08:03):
have a decent amount of folksworking in the area too.
It'd be a little bit of a walkto the Oracle campus Oracle's
maybe a little closer toPleasant Valley.
Yeah, but yeah From here.
Though there was plans foranother station along Riverside,
it seems as though thepreferred version right now
shows not having a stop atTravis Heights.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
Yep, for those who again not having a stop at
Travis Heights.
Yep, for those who again notfamiliar with Austin, travis
Heights is a historicallysignificant neighborhood.
A lot of really nice largehomes.
It feels very suburban eventhough it's literally right next
to downtown.
Yeah, but like large, singlefamily lots, a neighborhood
that's probably not going togenerate a ton of ridership.
Yeah, something notable, though, before we get to this area is
(08:45):
when the rail line is crossingI-35.
So this is the main interstatethrough town.
I-35 is going through its majorredevelopment.
This entire intersection isgoing to have to incorporate
this new line going through, andwhat we're seeing on the
renderings is a completeredesign of this intersection to
be a single point intersectionwhich, as far as I'm aware, I
think is the first of its kindin Austin.
(09:08):
I think so too.
I can't think of one other one.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
I've never driven through one before.
It will be interesting to seehow the signal timing of this
works.
The whole light rail in generalis supposed to have signal
prioritization.
I remember at one of the ATPmeetings I went to a year or two
ago they said that the trainswon't stop between stations,
meaning they won't sit at a redlight.
I'll'll believe it when I see itbut uh and we'll talk more
(09:32):
about the timing of things laterbut this, if anything, is going
to be a spot where there's I.
I highly doubt they're going tobe able to make that happen,
but it's going to be reallyinteresting and maybe they'll
elevate it all the way throughhere.
We'll see.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
Right now it's not looking right now.
No, right now it looks likeit's going to be at grade
crossing the bridge.
However, just on the other sideof this, when we hit Travis
Heights, this is where the railline will start to be elevated.
Yes, as we go into stations onthis sort of south waterfront
district of town.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
Totally, which literally brings us to the
waterfront.
Stop.
This area presently is anabandoned Austin American
Statesman building, which is thelocal newspaper yes, actually
not abandoned?
Speaker 2 (10:10):
Oh wow, it is a car storage facility.
Local newspaper yes, actually,it's not abandoned, I found out.
Oh wow, it is a car storagefacility right now.
Speaker 1 (10:14):
Great land use right Right on the most prime Really
high-end cars.
Speaker 2 (10:18):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
If you're not from Austin, this is probably one of
the most prime pieces of realestate in the city, I would
imagine.
It sits right on Town Lake.
You've got views of downtown.
This is where people go towatch the famous bats under the
bridge, under the South CongressBridge in Austin, the Yeti
flagship store there, rightacross the street exactly.
And what's really exciting isthe plans for what is kind of
(10:43):
being called the South CentralWaterfront District.
It's essentially plans todemolish the existing car
storage facility inside of theAustin American Statesman
Building to build likeessentially extend downtown
across the river.
Speaker 2 (10:57):
Yep, you'll have a blocked section of streets,
you'll have parks and apartmentsand offices and everything you
would expect to be as part of asort of downtown extension.
Right, and all of this is goingto happen unless our least
favorite transit villain in town, bill Alshire, wins his lawsuit
against it.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
That's a whole other topic.
He'll probably try to findsomething.
I think, given the recentelections with our city council,
there's probably going to be aton of political.
There is going to be a ton ofpolitical will, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (11:26):
I think so too.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
We'll jump right back into the episode in just a
second, but first, if youhaven't liked this video or left
a comment, please do so.
It helps us out quite a bit andwe also have some exciting news
.
Speaker 2 (11:34):
Yeah, If you want to support the show.
We have swag, we havemerchandise Go check out our
store where you can get hats,t-shirts, hoodies, a bunch of
other things coming new designsfor that all going to be coming
up in the next few weeks lastly,if you want to support the show
directly and get access toearly episodes, you can do so on
patreon.
But without further ado, let'sjump right back into the episode
um, but this is where the lightrail line, like I said,
(11:58):
elevated through this districtbrand new development and this
is where the line is going tosort of split.
Um, you have one line, whichwe'll talk about later, that's
going to go down congress avenue, but the line we're going to
continue to talk about is wherewe go into downtown.
So this is actually going tocross Lady Bird Lake, town Lake
I usually refer to it as TownLake, I don't know why I said
Lady Bird, but it's going tocross the lake via a brand new
(12:23):
bridge and this is going to be,I think, a multi-use bridge.
It should have some pedestrianbike access that connects the
hike and bike trail on eitherside.
I do believe it's taking outthe Alta coffee shop and boat
dock.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
The boathouse is going out.
That's kind of like one of thebigger like only like city
things that are going to be torndown.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
There are some we'll kind of get into some eminent
domain that will need to be usedfor the line later on.
Speaker 1 (12:51):
But this is one of my , this is one of my top two
gripes about, about projectconnect is that I love that
little boathouse and then theother we'll get to later.
Okay, well, hopefully they'llmake a nice boathouse nearby um,
uh, but the the light railbridge will spit you out onto
trinity street in downtown.
Um, and the next two stopswe're going to kind of talk
about together because they'repretty close together.
Frankly, the first um is beingcalled cesar chavez.
It's's basically just north ofCesar Chavez, on Trinity, kind
(13:12):
of along the convention center,and the next is at the corner of
Congress and 3rd Street.
So there is some potential forthe station at Cesar Chavez to
change a little bit.
There's some negotiations toinclude it into a development
that's being built.
So it would actually kind of gounderneath a building that will
be constructed, but for rightnow it just it would actually
kind of go underneath a buildingthat will be constructed, but
for right now it just looks likeit kind of takes a sharp turn
(13:34):
onto 3rd Street, obviously withthe convention center next door.
You're going to get a lot oftraffic there.
It's also just downtown.
Speaker 2 (13:42):
I would also be interested to see how this area
looks in the future because,we've mentioned before, the
convention center is beingcompletely demolished and going
to be almost doubled in size.
It going underground, aboveground right.
Huge redevelopment of thissection of downtown yep.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
Um, it's also going to be the closest stop to rainy
street too.
So, folks, uh, if you'rewanting to look to go out on
rainy street or rainy street forthose of you not from the area
is an area that has justexploded in growth.
Um, massive residential towers,mixed-use towers, soon to be
home to the tallest building inTexas, and an IHOP and an IHOP
weirdly yes, right there, andthen obviously we mentioned it a
(14:19):
little bit here, but theCongress station as well, again
serving downtown, which we don'tneed to get into too much depth
of what it is there.
Speaker 2 (14:27):
Yeah, and these two stations are very close together
, which isn't necessarily a badthing, but if you're using this
section of the rail line, I feellike you're probably coming
through town.
Your destination is the end ofthis line, or it is Rainy Street
or something, Right?
Speaker 1 (14:40):
They're pretty close together.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
But I do think having the one on Congress is going to
be beneficial as well.
I mean, this is the central hubof Austin, so if you're coming
into town from the north tosoutheast west, wherever and you
end up in Austin like Congressis the heart Right?
It's like where we want to godowntown.
That's like where you startExactly.
It's easy access to SixthStreet.
It's easy access to everythingon Second Street, on Fourth
(15:02):
Street.
All of these are like majorthoroughfares with tons of shops
, businesses, theaters, allkinds of stuff um.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
Once the line follows third street, it eventually
will then head north again onguadalupe um, and this section
is where it gets a littleinteresting, so can I pause for
a second?
Speaker 2 (15:20):
that's where you know that you live in austin.
When you call it guadalupe.
Speaker 1 (15:23):
Yeah, when I first moved here, I was like guadalupe
and everyone's like no, no, no,no, it's guadalupe.
And I was like what?
Yeah spelled guadalupe butpronounced guadalupe for some
reason.
Uh, anyway, the uh.
This is where things start toget interesting, because we also
need to think about what theroads are going to look like,
for car traffic is as much as Idon't want to think about it,
but uh, so guadalupe and lavacaare kind of the major north
(15:48):
south roads going throughdowntown for cars and for buses
right now, and they both operatein one ways, with Lavaca going
north and Guadalupe going southall the way until you hit MLK
Boulevard.
This new plan calls for thelight rail to run both north and
south on Guadalupe, withdedicated bus lanes on either
(16:08):
side of the light rail that arebasically seemingly looking like
transit priority lanes.
The reason I am deducting thisfrom looking at the maps here in
the renderings is it is showingbuses only like kind of motions
on the road for going straight.
It is showing some car motionson the street, but it's only
(16:29):
right turns for the most part.
What that leads me to believeis they're leaving access to
parking garages and things likethat for people who live in the
area.
Um, what that leads me tobelieve is they're leaving
access to uh parking garages andthings like that for people who
live in the area so that theycan use the street, but not for
general through fair down theroad.
Um, that means Lavaca, and theyshow this in the renderings.
As well as being converted intoa two way street, uh, that'll
(16:50):
have two primary lanes in eitherdirection, with some turning
lanes, uh, mixed in as well.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
So really turning in guadalupe into a transit
corridor yeah, it's going totake some getting used to for a
lot of people in austin.
I think this is actually whenthis is starting to be built out
.
I think a lot of people aregoing to be unsure about this
yeah, I mean frankly, uh, peopleare afraid of change in general
and like honest, it's not thatoften that I'm driving through
this part of town.
(17:16):
It's usually not that bad, so Idon't, I don't know I think, as
a somebody who's I do have todrive through this part of town
a fair amount again.
Don't live near a transit stopum it, it.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
It's going to be a challenge for people, I think I
also think, though, that they'renot just going to, like
willy-nilly, throw up somedifferent lanes and not have a
plan for it.
So we'll ultimately see.
I mean there's.
I mean people will definitely.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
Yeah, they're going to find reasons to complain, for
sure, yeah and also, uh, thiswhole area has a lot of
potential for some futurechanges.
There's a couple of lots herethat are our prime areas to be
redeveloped.
So, um, what we might see inthe future, hopefully, is a one
more more transit stop somewherenear Republic Square, but
something to kind of round outdowntown, because we only have
(17:59):
the two stops in downtown in thecore.
But there is a little bit of agap here.
So it's not on this initialplan, but hopefully maybe in the
future there's another stop.
Speaker 1 (18:08):
Yeah, we'll see.
I think the addition of thenext stop we're going to talk
about, the Woolridge Squarestation, answers some of that.
But I do agree that, like theRepublic square, not having a
stop is interesting but, givenall of the road redesigns
downtown, uh, we just don't know, like I think.
I think that they may, mightknow more than I mean, I know,
that they know more than we know, frankly.
(18:29):
So I'm hoping that the leavingthe Republic square stop out has
something to do with how thebuses are going to be rearranged
or something.
There's still a lot in fluxhere, but we'll see.
But we'll continue to movealong the line here.
So, if I can see the skyline,is it?
Speaker 2 (18:44):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (18:46):
Continuing to move along the line here.
The next two stops are atWoolridge Square and 15th Street
.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
I would call this like the Capitol stop, basically
this is going to be the closestone to the Texas State Capitol.
The Governor's Mansion is righthere.
Woolridge Park is nice.
I also like to call this theprison stop, because it's
literally on the same block asthe county jail.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
That's the 15th Street, one right.
Or is that the Woolridge Square?
That's the Woolridge Square.
This is Woolridge Square.
It's the closest.
That's the world.
Okay, world square yeah, yeah,it's.
Speaker 2 (19:14):
It's the closest one to the county courthouse in the
county jail, which isinteresting.
But this section of downtowndoes have a lot of potential for
development as well, and Ithink a stop here is going to
help spur some of thatdevelopment right.
So I do think this is a.
This is kind of a sleepy partof downtown.
I think we're going to see alot more apartment buildings and
shops and everything startpopping up once the light rail
is finished here right now.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
A lot of people refer to it as the lawyer district uh
, especially the area just westof this, and it's it makes sense
.
I mean it's this is walkingdistance to the state capitol
building um, a lot of law firmsthere's also referred to as the
law ghetto the law ghetto.
Oh that's.
Speaker 2 (19:48):
That's better than the lawyer district there's a
whole section behind this parkthat is all um old historic
homes, and every single one ofthose homes is a law office or
some type of commercial office.
It's not a real neighborhood,right.
Speaker 1 (20:01):
The other thing I'll say about this area 15th Street
Station, surrounded by parkinggarages, so hopefully the land
use changes a bit over time.
Speaker 2 (20:09):
And that's going to serve a lot of the state office
buildings as well.
There's the brand new CapitolMall project in Austin, where
you have a ton of new stateoffice buildings in this area
and a central mall-like corridor.
The light rail doesn't go tothat mall, but it's very close.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Right.
One thing I hope with this area, especially at 15th Street, is
they do something to try to makethe walking environment a
little bit better, becausepresently it is terrible All
stroads.
As we move north, though, weget into some more exciting
developments that some peoplealso might have issues with in
the future.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
This is going to be controversial.
It's absolutely going to becontroversial.
You know what?
I don't care.
I love it, I like this one alot, but people will be upset
about it.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
So we're now moving into kind of the UT area, so two
stations kind of serving the UTarea, the first being UT
Station, the second one kind ofserves the north end of the area
and kind of some of West Campusas well, being 29th Street.
This whole stretch, though mostof it is known as the Drag
locally.
It's an area where you've gotthe University of Texas on one
(21:11):
side of the street, you havelike a strip of businesses and
restaurants and shops andwhatnot on the other side of the
street and the West Campusneighborhood kind of just set
behind those businesses, whichis the most dense neighborhood
in town.
Yes, probably in Texas, and yeah, I mean it's tons of student
housing, apartments, all sortsof things over there.
(21:33):
So what's really exciting in myview of this is that, uh, we're
essentially pedestrianizingthis whole section.
So, um, and and with that it'snot, I guess, fully
pedestrianized you're gonna havethe light rail running up and
down the middle, um, you're then, in the renderings here, gonna
have bus lanes in eitherdirection, which to me, is
crucial because this is some ofthe highest ridership of bus bus
(21:55):
riders in the city as well.
It would have been a miss, inmy opinion, to move the bus
routes off of the street andfurther away from campus, so I'm
glad to see that they'reincluding that here as well.
As the, the biking is a littleunclear.
It seems like there's plans toeither do a bike path or have it
be bike and bus shared in thissection, so we'll see ultimately
what happens.
(22:16):
The traffic through this areais going to need to be rerouted
through West Campus, which has apretty broken grid at the
moment.
So I'm curious how they worksome of that out.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
Yeah, it's gonna be really interesting.
West Campus, a lot of narrowstreets, so it's going to be a
huge redesign of this area.
I think a lot of traffic isgoing to be pushed toward Lamar,
which is another majorthoroughfare just on the other
side of West Campus, so we'llsee how the traffic patterns
change here.
This pedestrianized version ofthe drag seems to extend up to
29th Street.
Yep, again, this is a streetfull of restaurants and bars.
(22:47):
There was a huge controversyover one particular restaurant
called Dirty Martin'spotentially being demolished.
Dirty Martin's is not going tobe demolished.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
Right, although they still have a sign.
I took some photos and stufffor B-roll earlier and they do
have a Save Dirties sign stillup on the side.
They are also the ones who areworking with Bill Altschreier on
the lawsuit.
They're listed as I'm not a lawperson, plaintiffs or
co-plaintiffs I don't know whatit is but they're involved in
(23:17):
the lawsuit and they're going tohave a station right next to
the restaurant, literally likeright next to Dirty.
Martins is where the 29thStreet station is.
Speaker 2 (23:22):
So 29th slash, dirty Martins station.
Speaker 1 (23:24):
Yes, For those of you not from the area too, just to
give you a concept of how muchridership this area could
potentially have.
You've got 52,000 students atUT Austin and 21,000 faculty and
staff, which is wild, like whenschool is not in session.
Speaker 2 (23:41):
It is noticeable in Austin honestly, as much as
Austin is a tech and governmentcity, ut Austin is the draw for
the city.
It is the economic engine, itis the innovative engine of the
city.
It is really part of the heartof Texas and the heart of Austin
and it is such a massiveemployer, it's such a massive
(24:02):
attractor of people, not tomention sporting events and
conferences and everything elsethat happens here.
So, yes, it is already a highridership and I think this is
going to be the most used partof the system.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
Totally.
Only other thing I'll note hereis the amount of pedestrians in
this area already exceeds thenumber of people traveling in
personal vehicles in thecorridor.
The traffic through thecorridor of people stuck in
personal vehicles is high, butit's terrible to drive through
there anyway.
So I'm excited to see whatplans the city puts forward as
an alternative to that for folksin cars.
(24:35):
But right now people on thesidewalks are crammed in for the
most part, and it's I don'tknow.
The space allocation should bebased on how people are using it
, and the vast majority ofpeople are riding a bus or
walking or biking.
So good to see the correctionhappening here.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
Like we said, there is a lot of information to cover
here.
It is a 16,000 page documentand there is not enough time to
go through a 16,000 pagedocument in our standard sort of
25, 30 minute format.
If we were to do a page, asecond, it would be 4.4 hours
long.
Speaker 1 (25:07):
So what we're doing is breaking this into a part one
, part two.
Part two is out now on Patreon.
If you subscribe on Patreon,you can get access to this now
and watch the second half ofthis.
Otherwise, the rest will beposted in the normal place next
week on Tuesday.
So without further ado.
Thank you all so much forwatching.
Let us know your thoughts sofar here too.
(25:29):
We'd love to hear them in thecomments and whatnot.
But thank you all so much forwatching and enjoy the rest of
your Transit.
Tangents Tuesday.
Doors are closing Austin's light rail initiative.
With the draft environmentalstudy recently released, we dig
through its 16,000 pages toprovide you with everything you
need to know about ProjectConnect.
All of this on Transit.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
Tangents.
Hey everybody and welcome tothis episode of Transit Tangents
.
My name is Lewis and I'm Chris,and today we are going to take
a much deeper dive into ProjectConnect in Austin, the plan for
Light Rail here in the city.
We just got a 16,000 pagedocument dump along with the
(00:53):
draft environmental impactstatement.
We've been going through allsorts of it, as many folks in
Austin have.
Speaker 2 (01:01):
We are combing through the 16,000 pages so you
don't have to yes yeah, yeah,yeah, although, to be totally
fair, there's more to it.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
I'm sure have, we are .
We are combing through the 16000 pages, so you don't have to.
Yes, yeah, yeah, although, tobe totally fair, there's.
There is more to it, I'm sure.
Um, but we're trying to pickthe stuff that, uh, we found
most interesting throughout.
So, uh, what we're going to dois essentially kind of dive
through station by station.
We now have literal, block byblock maps, um, so we're going
to show some of those uh, we didsome work with some maps to
give some aerials of everythingand kind of just explain what
(01:28):
the exact layout and stationlocations look like, as well as
get into some of theenvironmental impacts, get into
some of the effects on roadways,displacements, all those sort
of things.
Displacements and even, you know, not fully related to the draft
EIS, but some good news evenfrom the state legislature.
So some cautious good news,we'll see.
(01:49):
But let's start off, though, bykind of going station by
station through this, startingoff with Yellow Jacket Station.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
Which is going to be on the blue line.
Yes, one of two lines, blue andorange.
Blue line will go out towardsthe airport and, as you said,
starting with the Yellow JacketStation, this is the one that is
the furthest southeast onRiverside Drive, closest to the
airport Not to the airport, mindyou Right, as everybody's
(02:19):
grumbling in town, but prettyclose to the airport Totally.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
And there are plans for an airport extension at some
point, but it won't be donenecessarily in the first phase.
Yellowjacket station is goingto be home to one of the few
park and rides.
A lot of the park and rides I'mskeptical of.
This one actually makes somesense.
It is right along the highway,the station area not super dense
.
There is some room fordevelopment.
(02:42):
There are a few hotels close bywhich could be helpful.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
But overall, you know , this station is here in a lot
of reasons, as because themaintenance facility is right
there basically the operationsand maintenance facility, which
we'll refer to as OMF here andthere, is located in this area
in sort of a light industrialpark.
It's a lot.
It's a row of warehousebuildings right next to sort of
(03:05):
the city and state homelesscamps, the marshalling yard the
marshalling yard and a few otherthings, and so a lot of space
in this area, a lot ofunderutilized space in a lot of
cases, especially when we'relooking at the warehouse section
of this part of town Totally,but as we kind of move in,
heading west, closer to downtown, the next stop on the line is
(03:27):
the Grove station.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
Now, this is now the preferred station.
Initially, there was somedebate within the Austin Transit
Partnership, the folks who areactually responsible for kind of
the delivery of the light rail,where there may have been two
different stops in this area,one at montopolis and one at
farrow drive.
Instead, they're kind ofpicking one spot in the middle,
(03:50):
which is the grove, in big partbecause the city just purchased
a large parcel of land and a anoffice building that the city
now has plans to develop into awhole bunch of affordable
housing, which would be verywalkable to this station.
Kind of funny.
Right now, though, the stationis currently just looks like a
bunch of grass.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
Yeah, grass and trees and like kind of in between big
neighborhoods.
I was sort of against this atfirst because I am in favor of
more stations.
But looking at the map, lookingat future development, I think
this does make sense.
It is more aligned with thedirection these neighborhoods
are going, totally.
Speaker 1 (04:26):
It also is a little bit better for the ACC campus
that's in the area.
It's not perfect still likethey'll probably need to run
some sort of shuttle, but underthe other setup where you'd have
a Faro stop and a Montopolisstop, it was really not
convenient at all for ACC.
So there may be some potentialbenefits with that as well.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
The next stop on Riverside Drive, past the Grove,
is the Pleasant Valley stop.
This is where Pleasant Valleyand Riverside meet, where the
station is going to be,interestingly enough, huge,
median, wide, wide open space,and this is because Riverside
was actually meant to be ahighway originally.
So, seeing this right of waythat already existed being
(05:07):
transitioned to light rail, youknow we like to see that.
It feels good, it feels nice,yeah, yeah yeah, this is also
the intersection of a trailthat's going to be created.
I think it's called the.
Is it the Country Club Trail?
Yeah, the.
Speaker 1 (05:19):
Country Club Creek Trail.
Speaker 2 (05:20):
Creek Trail.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
It's currently like a small trail that's in Roy G
Park right now.
It's going to be extendedthrough a big portion of
Southeast Austin including a lotof areas that have a lot of
apartment buildings, ending inMabel Davis Park, which adds to
some potential ridership foreven like folks on bikes to be
able to get from those areas tothe station.
So with that, I'd love to seesome like bike lockers or
(05:42):
something at this station.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
I'd characterize this area as like the strip mall
capital of Austin.
It is all huge parking lots.
You have a massive HEV in thisarea which, for those not from
Austin, is our big grocery storechain here.
You've had a lot of apartmentbuildings here.
A lot of them are being torndown, the older ones for larger
development, which will bring inmore people and potentially
(06:06):
drive that ridership.
But all in all you just have alot of fast food, restaurants
and surface parking lots.
Speaker 1 (06:12):
But where you see surface parking, yeah, I see
potential, but I will say,though, too.
So I lived on Crossing Placefor a year not too long ago.
Bus ridership in the area veryhigh, affordable apartments in
the area, quite a few,especially for Austin.
So some of that is being torndown and I hope that there is a
(06:35):
and I'm sure, given City Council, I have the faith in doing this
like good transitions for folkswho inevitably may be kicked
out of their homes.
Frankly, to build some of thisnew development.
I'm specifically talking aboutthe River Park development,
which looks beautiful, but theredefinitely needs to be a real
plan in place for that.
I want to say that at theoutset, there are also a ton of
(06:55):
other apartments that arestaying put, that will stay
there In addition.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
Oh, go ahead.
I was going to say just to say,you mentioned the bus ridership
.
This is a primary corridor forthe 300 and the 20.
The 20 is notable becausethat's the bus that takes you to
the airport, from the airportto Republic Square and downtown
Austin.
But these are two of.
They're not the busiest, butthey're two of the busiest lines
in the city.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
I want to say they're both near the top five
ridership and in addition tothat we're also going to see the
new 800 rapid route bus runningright through this area as well
, which will add even more tothis.
So this is definitely going tobe a busy stop.
It's already a busy transit hubin the city, but let's move a
little bit further west, closerto downtown.
(07:40):
This will be the last stop,really right on Riverside, and
it's going to be Lakeshore,serving some of the area that
has already been developed inthe Riverside corridor.
So the strip malls start to geta little bit smaller as we work
into this area and you start tosee some more mixed-use
development, some more newerapartment buildings.
This area is also kind of hometo the Oracle campus, so you
(08:03):
have a decent amount of folksworking in the area too.
It'd be a little bit of a walkto the Oracle campus Oracle's
maybe a little closer toPleasant Valley.
Yeah, but yeah From here.
Though there was plans foranother station along Riverside,
it seems as though thepreferred version right now
shows not having a stop atTravis Heights.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
Yep, for those who again not having a stop at
Travis Heights.
Yep, for those who again notfamiliar with Austin, travis
Heights is a historicallysignificant neighborhood.
A lot of really nice largehomes.
It feels very suburban eventhough it's literally right next
to downtown.
Yeah, but like large, singlefamily lots, a neighborhood
that's probably not going togenerate a ton of ridership.
Yeah, something notable, though, before we get to this area is
(08:45):
when the rail line is crossingI-35.
So this is the main interstatethrough town.
I-35 is going through its majorredevelopment.
This entire intersection isgoing to have to incorporate
this new line going through, andwhat we're seeing on the
renderings is a completeredesign of this intersection to
be a single point intersectionwhich, as far as I'm aware, I
think is the first of its kindin Austin.
(09:08):
I think so too.
I can't think of one other one.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
I've never driven through one before.
It will be interesting to seehow the signal timing of this
works.
The whole light rail in generalis supposed to have signal
prioritization.
I remember at one of the ATPmeetings I went to a year or two
ago they said that the trainswon't stop between stations,
meaning they won't sit at a redlight.
I'll'll believe it when I see itbut uh and we'll talk more
(09:32):
about the timing of things laterbut this, if anything, is going
to be a spot where there's I.
I highly doubt they're going tobe able to make that happen,
but it's going to be reallyinteresting and maybe they'll
elevate it all the way throughhere.
We'll see.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
Right now it's not looking right now.
No, right now it looks likeit's going to be at grade
crossing the bridge.
However, just on the other sideof this, when we hit Travis
Heights, this is where the railline will start to be elevated.
Yes, as we go into stations onthis sort of south waterfront
district of town.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
Totally, which literally brings us to the
waterfront.
Stop.
This area presently is anabandoned Austin American
Statesman building, which is thelocal newspaper yes, actually
not abandoned?
Speaker 2 (10:10):
Oh wow, it is a car storage facility.
Local newspaper yes, actually,it's not abandoned, I found out.
Oh wow, it is a car storagefacility right now.
Speaker 1 (10:14):
Great land use right Right on the most prime Really
high-end cars.
Speaker 2 (10:18):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
If you're not from Austin, this is probably one of
the most prime pieces of realestate in the city, I would
imagine.
It sits right on Town Lake.
You've got views of downtown.
This is where people go towatch the famous bats under the
bridge, under the South CongressBridge in Austin, the Yeti
flagship store there, rightacross the street exactly.
And what's really exciting isthe plans for what is kind of
(10:43):
being called the South CentralWaterfront District.
It's essentially plans todemolish the existing car
storage facility inside of theAustin American Statesman
Building to build likeessentially extend downtown
across the river.
Speaker 2 (10:57):
Yep, you'll have a blocked section of streets,
you'll have parks and apartmentsand offices and everything you
would expect to be as part of asort of downtown extension.
Right, and all of this is goingto happen unless our least
favorite transit villain in town, bill Alshire, wins his lawsuit
against it.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
That's a whole other topic.
He'll probably try to findsomething.
I think, given the recentelections with our city council,
there's probably going to be aton of political.
There is going to be a ton ofpolitical will, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (11:26):
I think so too.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
We'll jump right back into the episode in just a
second, but first, if youhaven't liked this video or left
a comment, please do so.
It helps us out quite a bit andwe also have some exciting news
.
Speaker 2 (11:34):
Yeah, If you want to support the show.
We have swag, we havemerchandise Go check out our
store where you can get hats,t-shirts, hoodies, a bunch of
other things coming new designsfor that all going to be coming
up in the next few weeks lastly,if you want to support the show
directly and get access toearly episodes, you can do so on
patreon.
But without further ado, let'sjump right back into the episode
um, but this is where the lightrail line, like I said,
(11:58):
elevated through this districtbrand new development and this
is where the line is going tosort of split.
Um, you have one line, whichwe'll talk about later, that's
going to go down congress avenue, but the line we're going to
continue to talk about is wherewe go into downtown.
So this is actually going tocross Lady Bird Lake, town Lake
I usually refer to it as TownLake, I don't know why I said
Lady Bird, but it's going tocross the lake via a brand new
(12:23):
bridge and this is going to be,I think, a multi-use bridge.
It should have some pedestrianbike access that connects the
hike and bike trail on eitherside.
I do believe it's taking outthe Alta coffee shop and boat
dock.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
The boathouse is going out.
That's kind of like one of thebigger like only like city
things that are going to be torndown.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
There are some we'll kind of get into some eminent
domain that will need to be usedfor the line later on.
Speaker 1 (12:51):
But this is one of my , this is one of my top two
gripes about, about projectconnect is that I love that
little boathouse and then theother we'll get to later.
Okay, well, hopefully they'llmake a nice boathouse nearby um,
uh, but the the light railbridge will spit you out onto
trinity street in downtown.
Um, and the next two stopswe're going to kind of talk
about together because they'repretty close together.
Frankly, the first um is beingcalled cesar chavez.
It's's basically just north ofCesar Chavez, on Trinity, kind
(13:12):
of along the convention center,and the next is at the corner of
Congress and 3rd Street.
So there is some potential forthe station at Cesar Chavez to
change a little bit.
There's some negotiations toinclude it into a development
that's being built.
So it would actually kind of gounderneath a building that will
be constructed, but for rightnow it just it would actually
kind of go underneath a buildingthat will be constructed, but
for right now it just looks likeit kind of takes a sharp turn
(13:34):
onto 3rd Street, obviously withthe convention center next door.
You're going to get a lot oftraffic there.
It's also just downtown.
Speaker 2 (13:42):
I would also be interested to see how this area
looks in the future because,we've mentioned before, the
convention center is beingcompletely demolished and going
to be almost doubled in size.
It going underground, aboveground right.
Huge redevelopment of thissection of downtown yep.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
Um, it's also going to be the closest stop to rainy
street too.
So, folks, uh, if you'rewanting to look to go out on
rainy street or rainy street forthose of you not from the area
is an area that has justexploded in growth.
Um, massive residential towers,mixed-use towers, soon to be
home to the tallest building inTexas, and an IHOP and an IHOP
weirdly yes, right there, andthen obviously we mentioned it a
(14:19):
little bit here, but theCongress station as well, again
serving downtown, which we don'tneed to get into too much depth
of what it is there.
Speaker 2 (14:27):
Yeah, and these two stations are very close together
, which isn't necessarily a badthing, but if you're using this
section of the rail line, I feellike you're probably coming
through town.
Your destination is the end ofthis line, or it is Rainy Street
or something, Right?
Speaker 1 (14:40):
They're pretty close together.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
But I do think having the one on Congress is going to
be beneficial as well.
I mean, this is the central hubof Austin, so if you're coming
into town from the north tosoutheast west, wherever and you
end up in Austin like Congressis the heart Right?
It's like where we want to godowntown.
That's like where you startExactly.
It's easy access to SixthStreet.
It's easy access to everythingon Second Street, on Fourth
(15:02):
Street.
All of these are like majorthoroughfares with tons of shops
, businesses, theaters, allkinds of stuff um.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
Once the line follows third street, it eventually
will then head north again onguadalupe um, and this section
is where it gets a littleinteresting, so can I pause for
a second?
Speaker 2 (15:20):
that's where you know that you live in austin.
When you call it guadalupe.
Speaker 1 (15:23):
Yeah, when I first moved here, I was like guadalupe
and everyone's like no, no, no,no, it's guadalupe.
And I was like what?
Yeah spelled guadalupe butpronounced guadalupe for some
reason.
Uh, anyway, the uh.
This is where things start toget interesting, because we also
need to think about what theroads are going to look like,
for car traffic is as much as Idon't want to think about it,
but uh, so guadalupe and lavacaare kind of the major north
(15:48):
south roads going throughdowntown for cars and for buses
right now, and they both operatein one ways, with Lavaca going
north and Guadalupe going southall the way until you hit MLK
Boulevard.
This new plan calls for thelight rail to run both north and
south on Guadalupe, withdedicated bus lanes on either
(16:08):
side of the light rail that arebasically seemingly looking like
transit priority lanes.
The reason I am deducting thisfrom looking at the maps here in
the renderings is it is showingbuses only like kind of motions
on the road for going straight.
It is showing some car motionson the street, but it's only
(16:29):
right turns for the most part.
What that leads me to believeis they're leaving access to
parking garages and things likethat for people who live in the
area.
Um, what that leads me tobelieve is they're leaving
access to uh parking garages andthings like that for people who
live in the area so that theycan use the street, but not for
general through fair down theroad.
Um, that means Lavaca, and theyshow this in the renderings.
As well as being converted intoa two way street, uh, that'll
(16:50):
have two primary lanes in eitherdirection, with some turning
lanes, uh, mixed in as well.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
So really turning in guadalupe into a transit
corridor yeah, it's going totake some getting used to for a
lot of people in austin.
I think this is actually whenthis is starting to be built out
.
I think a lot of people aregoing to be unsure about this
yeah, I mean frankly, uh, peopleare afraid of change in general
and like honest, it's not thatoften that I'm driving through
this part of town.
(17:16):
It's usually not that bad, so Idon't, I don't know I think, as
a somebody who's I do have todrive through this part of town
a fair amount again.
Don't live near a transit stopum it, it.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
It's going to be a challenge for people, I think I
also think, though, that they'renot just going to, like
willy-nilly, throw up somedifferent lanes and not have a
plan for it.
So we'll ultimately see.
I mean there's.
I mean people will definitely.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
Yeah, they're going to find reasons to complain, for
sure, yeah and also, uh, thiswhole area has a lot of
potential for some futurechanges.
There's a couple of lots herethat are our prime areas to be
redeveloped.
So, um, what we might see inthe future, hopefully, is a one
more more transit stop somewherenear Republic Square, but
something to kind of round outdowntown, because we only have
(17:59):
the two stops in downtown in thecore.
But there is a little bit of agap here.
So it's not on this initialplan, but hopefully maybe in the
future there's another stop.
Speaker 1 (18:08):
Yeah, we'll see.
I think the addition of thenext stop we're going to talk
about, the Woolridge Squarestation, answers some of that.
But I do agree that, like theRepublic square, not having a
stop is interesting but, givenall of the road redesigns
downtown, uh, we just don't know, like I think.
I think that they may, mightknow more than I mean, I know,
that they know more than we know, frankly.
(18:29):
So I'm hoping that the leavingthe Republic square stop out has
something to do with how thebuses are going to be rearranged
or something.
There's still a lot in fluxhere, but we'll see.
But we'll continue to movealong the line here.
So, if I can see the skyline,is it?
Speaker 2 (18:44):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (18:46):
Continuing to move along the line here.
The next two stops are atWoolridge Square and 15th Street
.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
I would call this like the Capitol stop, basically
this is going to be the closestone to the Texas State Capitol.
The Governor's Mansion is righthere.
Woolridge Park is nice.
I also like to call this theprison stop, because it's
literally on the same block asthe county jail.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
That's the 15th Street, one right.
Or is that the Woolridge Square?
That's the Woolridge Square.
This is Woolridge Square.
It's the closest.
That's the world.
Okay, world square yeah, yeah,it's.
Speaker 2 (19:14):
It's the closest one to the county courthouse in the
county jail, which isinteresting.
But this section of downtowndoes have a lot of potential for
development as well, and Ithink a stop here is going to
help spur some of thatdevelopment right.
So I do think this is a.
This is kind of a sleepy partof downtown.
I think we're going to see alot more apartment buildings and
shops and everything startpopping up once the light rail
is finished here right now.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
A lot of people refer to it as the lawyer district uh
, especially the area just westof this, and it's it makes sense
.
I mean it's this is walkingdistance to the state capitol
building um, a lot of law firmsthere's also referred to as the
law ghetto the law ghetto.
Oh that's.
Speaker 2 (19:48):
That's better than the lawyer district there's a
whole section behind this parkthat is all um old historic
homes, and every single one ofthose homes is a law office or
some type of commercial office.
It's not a real neighborhood,right.
Speaker 1 (20:01):
The other thing I'll say about this area 15th Street
Station, surrounded by parkinggarages, so hopefully the land
use changes a bit over time.
Speaker 2 (20:09):
And that's going to serve a lot of the state office
buildings as well.
There's the brand new CapitolMall project in Austin, where
you have a ton of new stateoffice buildings in this area
and a central mall-like corridor.
The light rail doesn't go tothat mall, but it's very close.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Right.
One thing I hope with this area, especially at 15th Street, is
they do something to try to makethe walking environment a
little bit better, becausepresently it is terrible All
stroads.
As we move north, though, weget into some more exciting
developments that some peoplealso might have issues with in
the future.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
This is going to be controversial.
It's absolutely going to becontroversial.
You know what?
I don't care.
I love it, I like this one alot, but people will be upset
about it.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
So we're now moving into kind of the UT area, so two
stations kind of serving the UTarea, the first being UT
Station, the second one kind ofserves the north end of the area
and kind of some of West Campusas well, being 29th Street.
This whole stretch, though mostof it is known as the Drag
locally.
It's an area where you've gotthe University of Texas on one
(21:11):
side of the street, you havelike a strip of businesses and
restaurants and shops andwhatnot on the other side of the
street and the West Campusneighborhood kind of just set
behind those businesses, whichis the most dense neighborhood
in town.
Yes, probably in Texas, and yeah, I mean it's tons of student
housing, apartments, all sortsof things over there.
(21:33):
So what's really exciting in myview of this is that, uh, we're
essentially pedestrianizingthis whole section.
So, um, and and with that it'snot, I guess, fully
pedestrianized you're gonna havethe light rail running up and
down the middle, um, you're then, in the renderings here, gonna
have bus lanes in eitherdirection, which to me, is
crucial because this is some ofthe highest ridership of bus bus
(21:55):
riders in the city as well.
It would have been a miss, inmy opinion, to move the bus
routes off of the street andfurther away from campus, so I'm
glad to see that they'reincluding that here as well.
As the, the biking is a littleunclear.
It seems like there's plans toeither do a bike path or have it
be bike and bus shared in thissection, so we'll see ultimately
what happens.
(22:16):
The traffic through this areais going to need to be rerouted
through West Campus, which has apretty broken grid at the
moment.
So I'm curious how they worksome of that out.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
Yeah, it's gonna be really interesting.
West Campus, a lot of narrowstreets, so it's going to be a
huge redesign of this area.
I think a lot of traffic isgoing to be pushed toward Lamar,
which is another majorthoroughfare just on the other
side of West Campus, so we'llsee how the traffic patterns
change here.
This pedestrianized version ofthe drag seems to extend up to
29th Street.
Yep, again, this is a streetfull of restaurants and bars.
(22:47):
There was a huge controversyover one particular restaurant
called Dirty Martin'spotentially being demolished.
Dirty Martin's is not going tobe demolished.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
Right, although they still have a sign.
I took some photos and stufffor B-roll earlier and they do
have a Save Dirties sign stillup on the side.
They are also the ones who areworking with Bill Altschreier on
the lawsuit.
They're listed as I'm not a lawperson, plaintiffs or
co-plaintiffs I don't know whatit is but they're involved in
(23:17):
the lawsuit and they're going tohave a station right next to
the restaurant, literally likeright next to Dirty.
Martins is where the 29thStreet station is.
Speaker 2 (23:22):
So 29th slash, dirty Martins station.
Speaker 1 (23:24):
Yes, For those of you not from the area too, just to
give you a concept of how muchridership this area could
potentially have.
You've got 52,000 students atUT Austin and 21,000 faculty and
staff, which is wild, like whenschool is not in session.
Speaker 2 (23:41):
It is noticeable in Austin honestly, as much as
Austin is a tech and governmentcity, ut Austin is the draw for
the city.
It is the economic engine, itis the innovative engine of the
city.
It is really part of the heartof Texas and the heart of Austin
and it is such a massiveemployer, it's such a massive
(24:02):
attractor of people, not tomention sporting events and
conferences and everything elsethat happens here.
So, yes, it is already a highridership and I think this is
going to be the most used partof the system.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
Totally.
Only other thing I'll note hereis the amount of pedestrians in
this area already exceeds thenumber of people traveling in
personal vehicles in thecorridor.
The traffic through thecorridor of people stuck in
personal vehicles is high, butit's terrible to drive through
there anyway.
So I'm excited to see whatplans the city puts forward as
an alternative to that for folksin cars.
(24:35):
But right now people on thesidewalks are crammed in for the
most part, and it's I don'tknow.
The space allocation should bebased on how people are using it
, and the vast majority ofpeople are riding a bus or
walking or biking.
So good to see the correctionhappening here.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
Like we said, there is a lot of information to cover
here.
It is a 16,000 page documentand there is not enough time to
go through a 16,000 pagedocument in our standard sort of
25, 30 minute format.
If we were to do a page, asecond, it would be 4.4 hours
long.
Speaker 1 (25:07):
So what we're doing is breaking this into a part one
, part two.
Part two is out now on Patreon.
If you subscribe on Patreon,you can get access to this now
and watch the second half ofthis.
Otherwise, the rest will beposted in the normal place next
week on Tuesday.
So without further ado.
Thank you all so much forwatching.
Let us know your thoughts sofar here too.
(25:29):
We'd love to hear them in thecomments and whatnot.
But thank you all so much forwatching and enjoy the rest of
your Transit.
Tangents Tuesday.
Popular Podcasts
Amy Robach & T.J. Holmes present: Aubrey O’Day, Covering the Diddy Trial
Introducing… Aubrey O’Day Diddy’s former protege, television personality, platinum selling music artist, Danity Kane alum Aubrey O’Day joins veteran journalists Amy Robach and TJ Holmes to provide a unique perspective on the trial that has captivated the attention of the nation. Join them throughout the trial as they discuss, debate, and dissect every detail, every aspect of the proceedings. Aubrey will offer her opinions and expertise, as only she is qualified to do given her first-hand knowledge. From her days on Making the Band, as she emerged as the breakout star, the truth of the situation would be the opposite of the glitz and glamour. Listen throughout every minute of the trial, for this exclusive coverage. Amy Robach and TJ Holmes present Aubrey O’Day, Covering the Diddy Trial, an iHeartRadio podcast.
Betrayal: Season 4
Karoline Borega married a man of honor – a respected Colorado Springs Police officer. She knew there would be sacrifices to accommodate her husband’s career. But she had no idea that he was using his badge to fool everyone. This season, we expose a man who swore two sacred oaths—one to his badge, one to his bride—and broke them both. We follow Karoline as she questions everything she thought she knew about her partner of over 20 years. And make sure to check out Seasons 1-3 of Betrayal, along with Betrayal Weekly Season 1.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.