It has become commonplace in the planning profession to equate congestion with affluence. Recently, that argument has been tailored for policymakers to imply causation. Project Connect has taken the “Think beyond congestion.” mantra to new depths with their Highland Mall rail proposal. We’re not buying it and neither should your readers.
If built, Highland will be a symbolic rail alignment. From Hancock Shopping Center inbound, it is an identical twin to the earlier Mueller rail proposal. The Highland-Mueller alignment will send near-empty trains running up and down Red River Street. Both serve the stadium that holds 7 games a year, the medical school with a projected enrollment of 175, an aspirational “innovation district” in a Capitol Complex that a new state law put off limits, past blocks of parking garages to the convention center where the plans turn one of downtown’s few parks, the historic Brush Square, into a transit station.
Empty trains will be visible to the thousands of drivers in stalled traffic on the IH-35 upper deck. This high-subsidy line will be a daily reminder to the region of Project Connect’s wasted opportunity, and a lasting legacy of today’s leadership. Instead of a successful, expandable high-ridership line that connects people where they live to where they work, it may be the first and last light rail alignment built in of our lifetimes.
That’s why we established Our Rail, a political action committee promoting a fair and effective first light rail investment. We SUPPORT a ballot measure that designates the Guadalupe-North Lamar as a top priority for building the city’s first LIGHT RAIL alignment. We will OPPOSE any ballot measure that contains light rail service to the speculative and duplicative Highland sub-corridor. We SUPPORT concurrent construction of any extension such as EAST RIVERSIDE which connects to Guadalupe-North Lamar alignment via A BRIDGE. We will OPPOSE a Project Connect ballot measure containing any investment such as the proposed $500 million MetroRapid busway that threatens the development of light rail on Guadalupe-North Lamar.
We can put tracks within a ten minute walk of a third of all the jobs in this city, or we can choose to be symbolic. Many have already made that choice. UT Student Government, environmental groups, non-profits, planning bodies, and neighborhood organizations serving nearly 100,000 Austinites have formally endorsed a light rail alignment in the Guadalupe-North Lamar corridor.
Policymakers refused to listen, and the people have taken this back.
Scott Morris, treasurer OurRail.org
