Austin - 10 years behind on roads? (Houston, San Marcos: house, living, zoned)

[Driftwood1]

Originally Posted by southwest1230

Funny! Yes, we had a consortium of folks on horses in 1901 that, with the aide of clairvoyance and a few nips of irish whisky, were able to forsee Mopac's needed extension past the river way back when......They wrote down their plans, sealed it in a time capsule for 80 years, after which it was dug up and used as the basis for the very road structure you see today. So you can blame the whole thing on a bunch of drunken cowboys way back when......Hey, someone has to take the blame for this! LOL!

Funny indeed,
My hometown had a subway system in 1897... Texans were still on horseback...

[southwest1230]

Originally Posted by mimimomx3

It's not a popular sentiment, with so much pro-growth and $$$ at stake, but I don't see any reason to shell out more money to 'improve' existing highways such as mopac, 360, 35. So what if you sit in traffic for 3 hours? People make choices to live far from where they work, and there are consequences to those choices. If you make the choice to live in Round Rock and work in Oak Hill, you ARE going to sit in traffic. That's your choice. If it gets that bad, people will either: force employers to offer flextime, work from home, carpool, or move close to where they work. Why should I subsidize a shorter commute time for someone? New roads are great, but I see no reason to spend money to 'upsize' what we already have. People who move to Austin should realize that traffic in the inner city core stinks and changing that is impractical and expensive.

Moderator cut: copyrighted image

Our point on this board is that they should have made in larger in the first place. It would have been far cheaper to add lanes when they first built the interstates. Now, you are right, it would be very expensive, maybe TOO expensive to add lanes, modernize and simplify access points, remove others, and such. Lets not EVER give up hope and write off the problem as something that commuters are gonna have to deal with as the price of commuting. It will get much worse in the next 3-5 years too,and affect EVERYBODYS commute, even little shopping thingies on week-ends. That's sort of happening now, actually. And the longer they avoid dealing with it, and say its the commuters problem for commuting, rather than working at home, the worse it will get for us all!

BTW, here is an interesting picture of I-35 in 1970.....Looks like it makes
more sense than the stuff they built since, huh?

[Trainwreck20]

I think Mimi's point is, if you don't build it, eventually they will stop coming . There was (is) quite a bit of that in the 90s. Eventually, if you stress the road structure enough, people find (or fund) alternative means of transportation, telecommute, or stop coming to Austin. If the addiction to cars is just fed with more roads, we continue to be addicted to cars. I personally really hate the prospect of new roads...they solve nothing in the big picture and create more problems... If they had to come to me to get money (instead of building toll roads) I would turn down those bonds .

[twange]

Originally Posted by southwest1230

Lets not EVER give up hope and write off the problem as something that commuters are gonna have to deal with as the price of commuting. It will get much worse in the next 3-5 years too,and affect EVERYBODYS commute, even little shopping thingies on week-ends. That's sort of happening now, actually. And the longer they avoid dealing with it, and say its the commuters problem for commuting, rather than working at home, the worse it will get for us all!

I agree and I think this is the most interesting point.

It's really, really presumptuous(and maybe even a little provincial?) to just assume that everyone stuck in traffic here is the result of people choosing to live far away from their workplace. Neither me or my wife have long commutes - her's is 8 minutes, I work at home or at coffeehouses. We have one car and so I walk, bike or ride the bus. Rush hour traffic is not really an issue for us. But whenever we want to go to a different part of the city (eating, shopping, checking out a trail somewhere, visiting people) it's a huge pain in the *ss. Even on weekends, traffic seems really problematic.

I understand and accept a certain amount of traffic inconvenience when dealing with "any" city. But I think the point here is that Austin has deep design flaws that are simply inadequate in dealing with the city "as it is right now". Never mind what it might become.

There always seems to be this conflict between public and private interests. It seems to be very acute here in Austin where folks seem to be very change averse. Everybody wants to be the last one to find something cool. I can totally understand that but it's so obvious that the city will continue to grow. We can sit here and talk about how that may or may not suck, but the truth is, Austin better do something about these issues or this place will quickly go from one of the most desirable places to live to one of the least.

I really don't think that proper growth planning and quality of life are mutually exclusive.

[twange]

Originally Posted by Trainwreck20

I think Mimi's point is, if you don't build it, eventually they will stop coming . There was (is) quite a bit of that in the 90s. Eventually, if you stress the road structure enough, people find (or fund) alternative means of transportation, telecommute, or stop coming to Austin. If the addiction to cars is just fed with more roads, we continue to be addicted to cars. I personally really hate the prospect of new roads...they solve nothing in the big picture and create more problems... If they had to come to me to get money (instead of building toll roads) I would turn down those bonds .

I agree about roads. The more you build the more people drive on them. But I disagree that people will stop coming. People kept/keep coming to NYC even though most people live in very uncomfortable conditions at first. They come based on perceptions and the idea of something better. Austin has the perception of being a great place to live. Who wouldn't want their town to be perceived like that?

More, better public transportation would help, at least in Central Austin.

[Trainwreck20]

Ahh, but now NYC has a great public transportation system by force of demand.

Anyway, I am not sure what I think, but I think the vinegar may work better than the sugar for our transportation woes....

[twange]

Originally Posted by Trainwreck20

Ahh, but now NYC has a great public transportation system by force of demand.

Anyway, I am not sure what I think, but I think the vinegar may work better than the sugar for our transportation woes....

By "vinegar" I take your meaning as attempts at stonewalling growth? Or are you referring to toll roads vs. building new roads. If the former, I think that could prove disastrous to the city. I think managing growth would be better(i.e. keep the development downtown) For the record, I'm not a "growth for growth's sake" advocate, but this city's is on the radar big time and could develop into one of the country's model mid-sized places to live...or it could turn into Phoenix. Bad, bad, bad.

[achtungpv]

Originally Posted by twange

For the record, I'm not a "growth for growth's sake" advocate, but this city's is on the radar big time and could develop into one of the country's model mid-sized places to live...or it could turn into Phoenix. Bad, bad, bad.

Even though Austin is progressive for Texas, I don't see it as being progressive enough to do what it takes to avoid turning into a Phoenix-lite. Unfortunately, Austin is surrounded by Texas and a little bit of that "keep yer hippie ideas away from here" mentality still seeps into the water supply.

[mimimomx3]

Originally Posted by Trainwreck20

I think Mimi's point is, if you don't build it, eventually they will stop coming . There was (is) quite a bit of that in the 90s. Eventually, if you stress the road structure enough, people find (or fund) alternative means of transportation, telecommute, or stop coming to Austin. If the addiction to cars is just fed with more roads, we continue to be addicted to cars. I personally really hate the prospect of new roads...they solve nothing in the big picture and create more problems... If they had to come to me to get money (instead of building toll roads) I would turn down those bonds .

Um, what HE said. Exactly. The car addiction has to stop...and will stop, as soon as we run out of gasoline/oil.

[twange]

Originally Posted by achtungpv

Even though Austin is progressive for Texas, I don't see it as being progressive enough to do what it takes to avoid turning into a Phoenix-lite. Unfortunately, Austin is surrounded by Texas and a little bit of that "keep yer hippie ideas away from here" mentality still seeps into the water supply.

I sure hope you're wrong. That would be such a tragic bummer.