The new transportation funding formula approved by voters in Texas will bring new funding to the Texas Department of Transportation.
"State Comptroller Glenn Hegar on Wednesday offered transportation planners a mixed bag of projections about the highway funding enhancements that voters have approved in recent years," reports Tom Benning.
On the good side of the mixed bag, general sales tax revenue will be sufficient to trigger $2.5 billion a year in road funding by 2018. From the middle of the mixed bag, vehicle sales tax will also send more money to roads in 2020, but less than originally thought. Finally, from the bad side of the mixed bag: "The estimates continue to shrink — thanks to the low price of oil — for the yearly boosts the Texas Department of Transportation receives from the state’s energy production tax revenues."
All of this funding is necessary to meet the $5 billion in annual funding established by the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) as necessary "to keep congestion from getting worse and to maintain the state’s roads." Proposition 7, approved by voters in November, enabled these new funding mechanisms.
Read the full story: State comptroller, though optimistic, offers mixed projections on roads funding boosts
Federal Carbon Reduction Funds Could Finance Highway Projects in Texas
Transit advocates say the state’s carbon reduction strategy reveals a continued preference for car-oriented infrastructure.
Why Don't State DOTs Believe in Induced Demand?
Despite evidence that widening roadways is only a temporary solution to congestion, a decades-long inertia leads states to continue pushing expansion projects against local opposition.
Follow Planetizen’s analysis of surface transportation reauthorization
Follow along as we explore the upcoming surface transportation reauthorization bill and its potential impacts on US transportation infrastructure in the coming years.
Planetizen Federal Action Tracker
A weekly monitor of how Trump’s orders and actions are impacting planners and planning in America.
Amtrak, CN end decades-long dispute with eight-year agreement
The new operating agreement establishes an updated framework for the companies to work together, including processes to resolve disputes.
Northwest rail fans eager for Sept. 30 debut of Amtrak’s Airo fleet
Get ready for that new train smell and more seats. But they won’t go faster or run more frequently on the Cascades route in Washington and Oregon.
St. Louis Metro to test if single-car trains can reduce operating costs, maintain rider satisfaction
The pilot program will run from October to spring 2027, and begin with one single-car train operating on Metrolink’s Red and Blue lines.
Pennsylvania is building data centers in abandoned mines
Housing data centers in mines provides an alternative to destroying local forests and may spare residents from data centers’ noise and air pollution.
If Corpus Christi can’t revive desalination plant project, it may owe Texas $235 million
Earlier this month, city officials declined to pursue developing the plant for the second time in a year.
FREE Course: Walkable City 1: Why Walkability?
After describing his path towards focusing on walkability as the essence of good planning, Jeff Speck marches through his five principal reasons for making more walkable places.
Reinventing Malls: Planning Alchemy—Turning Gray Fields Into Gold
The course focuses on the opportunities and imperatives that shape reinvention of mall sites.
City of Thousand Oaks
City of Wisconsin Rapids
Harvard University Graduate School of Design
The Architects Foundation
University of Cincinnati Online
The Pocatello Development Authority
The Urban Renewal Agency of the City of Pocatello