If Okies can do it . . .

Oklahoma City plans to re-route an interstate highway away from downtown:

In Oklahoma City, the interstate will be moved five blocks from downtown to an old railroad line. The new 10-lane highway, expected to carry 120,000 vehicles daily, will be placed in a trench so deep that city streets can run atop it, as if the highway weren't there.

The old highway will be converted into a tree-lined boulevard city officials hope will become Oklahoma City's marquee street.

By tearing down the Crosstown Expressway, the city hopes to spur development of 80 city blocks stretching from downtown to the Oklahoma River — an area that contains vacant lots, car repair shops and a few small homes.

"We've always been a good place to live, but we've never had a city we could show off," Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett says. "Moving the expressway makes it possible for a day to come when hundreds or thousands of people will live downtown."

The project will cost $557 million, mostly federal and state funds. The city will pay to spruce up the boulevard, build parks and put a pedestrian bridge over the new below-ground interstate.

If Oklahoma City can do this, why not Austin? 

There's no question something needs to be done about I-35.  I-35 narrows to a six-lane bottleneck at the Lady Bird Lake bridge.  Six lanes that double as a major interstate corridor and Austin's principal commuter highway.  Six, even eight, lanes for central Austin is a joke -- I-35 has six lanes as it cuts through the cow pastures north of Waco.  Just one fender bender can tie up traffic for miles.

Let's tally the costs of the current configuration:

1.  Congestion.

People underestimate the magnitude of the costs of I-35's congestion, I think.  I-35's daily traffic count hits 200,000 in some places.  Just one 10-minute delay for 15,000 drivers -- which would be "good" traffic flow on I-35 -- wastes 2,500 man-hours.  I imagine that on a typical day, I-35's aggregated waste equals several years of work time.

2.  Pollution.

It's not just greenhouse gases.  You can smell I-35 downtown.  All those semis parked on the upper deck, belching diesel fumes.  When the weather's just right, the gas and diesel fumes blanket downtown.  And let's not forget noise pollution.

3.  Disruption of central Austin's street grid and neighborhoods.

I-35 cleaves Austin in two, segregating central and east Austin.  It disrupts the street grid and depresses property values along mile after mile of frontage road.

4.  Aesthetics.

It's butt-ugly.  Especially the upper deck.

There is a solution.  I'd bet it's feasible financially, even if it may be a pipe dream politically.

Replace I-35 through Austin with a congestion-priced parkway.

More specifically, turn it into a six-lane parkway from Round Rock to Slaughter Lane.  Bury the parkway in trenches from Lady Bird Lake north to, say, 51st Street.  Rebuild the urban grid through downtown and reconnect central and east Austin.  Use the freed-up right of way for parks or development.  In other words, repair the scar I-35 has gouged through central Austin.

Use variable congestion pricing to ensure good traffic flow on the parkway.  Reduce the tolls on SH 130 to encourage through traffic to detour around Austin -- turn SH 130 into the interstate, in other words.  (SH 130 was designed so that its capacity easily can be expanded.)  This would allow the parkway to function solely as a commuter road.  It would also get all of the diesel-belching semis out of Austin, along with the noise pollution. 

This would be expensive, of course.  But it would cost less than new construction mainly because there would be no need to purchase land for the right of way; land acquisition is often new construction's biggest budget item. 

The money from the congestion charges could service several billion dollars in bonds.  Between that, money kicked in by the state and feds, and money raised selling right of way, I imagine there would be enough not only to pay for the construction, but to pay for a light rail/commuter line up to Round Rock or Georgetown.

The winners from this plan:  (1)  Everyone who lives in central  or east Austin; (2) commuters from both north and south who value their time more than the congestion toll; (3) through travelers who wouldn't have to choose between steep tolls on SH 130 and time wasted on I-35; (4) commuters from Pflugerville or Round Rock who would like to have other transit options.

The losers would be commuters who actually prefer having their time wasted in traffic to paying a toll.  Commuter rail would give them another option, however.  And express buses would become a more attractive option once they weren't bogged down in traffic.

If you think this is wild-eyed nonsense, it's not:  TxDot floated something similar a few years ago.  And bear in mind that traffic counts on I-35 increase year after year.  The congestion eventually will become intolerable for everyone.  Something will be done.  But what, if not this?  Build a third deck on top of the upper deck?  Demolish the bridges over Lady Bird Lake and replace them with bridges twice as wide? Carve new rights of way out of the neighborhoods lining I-35?

I can't think of any other viable solution, much less one with as many collateral benefits.  Okies understand it.  Nashville, Cleveland, Syracuse and other cities are considering something similar.  This could work in Austin, too, if we can just grow out of our allergy to toll roads.

Comments

[cb]

Several years back our neighborhood association talked with TxDOT a number of times about the "ditch" idea for I-35; they seemed enthused. Then those preliminary plans got tossed and that was that. My only quibble is that if it were ever to happen, the "ditching" would need to extend northwards to at least 290 or even to 183, not 51st Street. My neighborhood, Ridgetop, has homes near the interstate that go up to 56th Street, and the folks to the east in Windsor Park have the same problem near Cameron Road.

If you ever want to see something that'll bring you to tears, go down to the Austin History Museum and look at the old pictures they have of East Avenue, which is what became parts of I-35. East Avenue was a beautiful street with a median filled with trees - a far cry from cement monster that took its place. Progess, eh?

[DSK]

I think the first step in "fixing" I-35 is:

Once SH 45 Southeast opens, ban ALL trucks over six wheels from I-35 between SH130/I35 and SH45/I35, unless the trucks are making local deliveries/pickups. Give local municipalities (in addition to DPS) the authority to stop suspect trucks and write hefty tickets for violators.

This is a very easy step in terms of infrastructure. Enforcement would fund itself, until truckers got the hint.
Unfortunately, it is probably a difficult step politically. It shouldn't be, though. Georgia loves building roads as much as Texas, but they have had this type of ban in place for *decades* in Atlanta.

[M1EK]

Yeah, but the truck ban only gets you more cars in the long-run. There's hours of displaced demand ready to fill in those gaps at a moment's notice.

Note that TXDOT's "plan" for I-35 is to depress and expand and not toll and not expand SH130 and not cut the tolls on SH130. They got 1 out of 5, at best, from your plan.

A 'depressed parkway' would also be a very hard sell in the Land Of The Frontage Roads. Remember 'parkway' means no frontage roads, in TXDOT parlance. If that's not what you mean, you need to choose a different word; and if it's what you DO mean, they're not gonna like it.

Congestion pricing will never be permitted in Austin until it's worked in a dozen US cities including a couple in Texas. Don't hold your breath (it just failed, politically, in NY state after all). I still have to argue against lying trogolodytes on other forums who claim that the 2000 bond election "diverted freeway money to tollways".

[Gritsforbreakfast]

"if we can just grow out of our allergy to toll roads"

And also happen to find an extra $1 billion or so lodged in the couch cushions.

I suggest you contact the folks at the SOS Alliance and ask for a list of suggested road projects to de-fund in order to pay for this!

OK City's temporary bout with rationality, however, does not change my overall view that the single best thing to come out of Oklahoma is, in fact, I-35. ;)

[jman]

My suggestion, just charge a toll at all of the on-ramps for I-35, or any interstate highway for that matter, inside of a city with more than 500k people.

35 is supposed to be used as a freeway to travel long distances between other cities, but since we use it as a commuter freeway it makes it have so much more traffic. Maybe they should toll something like $5 to get onto I-35 inside of austin city limits. I know, I know, it's never gonna happen. OR they could just close off all of the on ramps in the city. I always view interstate freeways as they should have one onramp at the beginning of the city and one at the end of the city.

Hmm, maybe they could still have free on-ramps, but have those on-ramps be ones that add lanes to the freeway at the same time.

Anyways none of this is ever gonna happen but whatever, its nice to wonder what if.

[M1EK]

jman, all you're doing then is turning it into even MORE of a commuter 'free'way since the folks from Round Rock get even more of a free ride.

[snowed in]

The real problem here is that state and local leaders here have not had the collective spine necessary to get anything done with regard to I-35 in decades. (Seriously...check out the historical pictures at texasfreeway.com, which include the previously referenced East Avenue pictures, and you can see that aside from the upper deck, I-35 has not been improved at all in central Austin since the early 70s.)

The other half of the problem is that with their inaction, those responsible have painted themselves into a corner by not giving themselves any good options with regard to the 35 bottleneck. Divert traffic to Mopac? Nope, it already has enough traffic, thanks, and SOS'll scream if the connector required to handle all the traffic gets built. Divert some/all traffic to 130? Nope, you aren't going to get a lot of voluntary participation, especially from truckers already paying $4.40 a gallon for diesel, and if you require traffic to move to a toll road from a free road, as was suggested, for just truckers or for everyone, you will have a full-scale revolt on your hands. Like Sal Costello? Picture him multiplied by 1000. What about 183? Nope, they're tolling it too...same result. How about we create a new right-of-way? Well, where do you put it? East of the current 35? Sure, that'll play well...where East Austin isn't being gentrified, let's bulldoze it for a freeway. Okay, how about west of Mopac? SOS'll eat you alive.

The sad truth is that Austin and its leaders had a long time to fix I-35 before it became the disaster it is now. They sat on their hands. And now I fear there isn't a solution left to them.

[AC]

Belated replies:

Snowed In: I've seen those photos before. Frankly, I'm glad that some of those projects were never built. But there's no question that this city systematically underinvests in infrastructure. The important point is that there is no other solution now. Either traffic will grind to hopeless gridlock, or we do something this. Also, bear in mind that congestion pricing actually increases road capacity, and variable pricing means the road could be quite cheap in off-peak hours.

Grits for Breakfeast: The tolls on an I-35 parkway would generate hundreds of thousands of dollars per day, enough to service billions in bonds. They'd pay for a lot of construction. I'll gladly volunteer the "Highway in the Sky" TxDot has planned for Oak Hill for de-funding, though. Fix290's plan is better -- although it needs to be tolled.

M1EK, I mean "parkways." Frontage roads would destroy a lot of the advantages here. Plus, a city grid would have more carrying capacity than a frontage road.

[M1EK]

AC, turning a highway that currently has frontage roads into one that does not is probably illegal and definitely impossible, politically speaking. You know I hate frontage roads as much as the next ten guys, but it ain't gonna happen - sorry.