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Electrical Cars Won’t Save Our Environment – Density Can

Electric cars alone will not save us. 

Yes, they are much better than regular, fossil fuel-burning cars, but even if we replaced every single car in the world with an electric car, it wouldn’t save us. We must drastically reduce car usage in our daily lives.

It is hard to get rid of your car when you live in a single-family house in the suburbs, especially when there isn’t much to walk or bike to. It is hard to get rid of your car when you have to commute an hour each way to work in downtown because you can’t afford a single-family home near downtown. It is hard to get rid of your car when you have a family and you have to drop your kids off at daycare or school, go to work, run errands during lunch, pick up the kids, and go home. Especially if your daycare or school are nowhere near your home or your office. 

This is where upzoning and increased density come into play as a solution to help people either reduce their car usage or get rid of their cars entirely. I’m not saying that single-family homes should be banned or that people shouldn’t be allowed to build them. I’m simply saying that we should allow for a variety of uses all across the city – so that you can live, work, and have your kids go to school or daycare, all within a 15 minute walk or bicycle ride in your neighborhood.

Research strongly correlates increased density with decreased carbon emissions. As one example of this research, Paul Hawken created Drawdown, a comprehensive list of specific actions that we can focus on to reduce carbon emissions by 1,034.75 gigatons by 2050.

On that list:

  • Electric vehicles are #26:  “If EV ownership rises to 16 percent of total passenger miles by 2050, 10.8 gigatons of carbon dioxide from fuel combustion could be avoided.” 
  • Walkable cities is #54: “As cities become denser and city planners, commercial enterprises, and residents invest in the “6Ds,” 5 percent of trips currently made by car can be made by foot instead by 2050. That shift could result in 2.9 gigatons of avoided carbon dioxide emissions and reduce costs associated with car ownership by $3.3 trillion.” 
  • If we invest in bike infrastructure (#59) at the same time: “We assume a rise from 5.5 percent to 7.5 percent of urban trips globally by 2050, displacing 2.2 trillion passenger-miles traveled by conventional modes of transportation and avoiding 2.3 gigatons of carbon dioxide emissions. By building bike infrastructure rather than roads, municipal governments, and taxpayers can realize $400 billion in savings over thirty years and $2.1 trillion in lifetime savings.”  
  • Finally, if we also invest in mass transportation at the same time (#37):  “Use of mass transit is projected to decline from 37 percent of urban travel to 21 percent as the low-income world gains wealth. If use grows instead to 40 percent of urban travel by 2050, this solution can save 6.6 gigatons of carbon dioxide emissions from cars.” 

By investing in these three solutions while also investing in electric vehicles, we could save roughly 11.8 gigatons of carbon dioxide emissions – more than the 10.8 gigatons from electric vehicles alone. By investing in all four solutions at the same time, we could save roughly 22.6 gigatons of carbon dioxide emissions. 

How do we go about increasing density within our city? One of the easiest ways to create a more walkable and environmentally friendly city is to legalize fourplex buildings on every single lot- that is, buildings with at least four units. Again, this is not banning single-family homes – just making it possible to build a fourplex anywhere in the city where single-family homes are also allowed. 

In one hypothetical, Michael Anderson had three imaginary homes torn down on one block and rebuilt as three new single-family homes; on another block, those same single-family homes were torn down and replaced with a fourplex, a duplex, and a triplex. He found that “the housing-related carbon emissions per household of the Plex Block will be about 20 percent lower” than the block with the three new single-family homes. This is because the units inside the duplex, triplex, and fourplex are smaller than the single-family home units – so the spaces in the unit are being used more efficiently; there aren’t as many empty rooms being heated and cooled even when no one is using them. Another researcher from the Sightline Institute found that “boosting the number of homes on residential blocks by one third (as on the Plex Block) correlates with a drop of about 1,000 miles driven per year per household.” This is because denser blocks will typically attract local shops within walking distance, frequent bus lines, reliable ride-sharing – but would probably attract protected bicycle infrastructure and micro mobility options as well, simply because there would be more people who could take advantage of these benefits. 

Increasing density has the added benefit of supporting robust and high-quality mass transportation as well. According to Capital Metro, residential densities of 16 persons per acre within a quarter mile of bus lines are a good minimum baseline for transit-supportive dense neighborhoods. For employment, their guidelines call for densities of eight employees per acre. Remember, we have to invest in mass transportation in addition to walkable neighborhoods if we want to save roughly 22.6 gigatons of carbon dioxide emissions (though more is better!) by 2050. 

I imagine a world in which I can choose to live near my office – because the neighborhoods have an abundance of fourplexes or apartment buildings nearby – within a 15 minute walk. I can walk to and from work in 15 minutes every day, which saves me two car trips every day. Because my home and my office are located near a grocery store, I can also choose to shop more often, buying less groceries, and walk to and from the grocery store, saving two car trips. My home and office are also located near a bus line, which I can use to get downtown or to other places to see friends, run errands, or go out on the town, saving me car trips. Even better, because I live on such a dense block, I know several people in my neighborhood who have become my friends and I can walk to their homes to visit them or baby-sit their kids if needed. My neighborhood also has doctors’ offices, shopping, gyms, parks, activities, and other important facets of life – or easy access to those things, whether through robust public transportation or protected bicycle infrastructure. 

Electric vehicles are a solution, but cannot be the ONLY solution. We must allow more people to live on smaller areas of land. We need to allow people to reduce their carbon footprint by living in smaller homes and living in walkable and transit-rich neighborhoods. Not everyone wants to live in a single-family home and have a yard they have to maintain; have empty rooms that are being wastefully heated and cooled; or have a car that needs to be maintained in order to commute because there is a lack of high-quality pedestrian, bicycle, and transit infrastructure. We should be doing everything we can to reduce our carbon emissions and slow the effects of climate change. We need to change for a future that will impact us all. Continuing our current culture of sprawling land use, which enables car dominance and carbon emissions, will only accelerate our headlong rush into our terrifying future. 

For additional research on why density is so important for fighting climate change, check out this comprehensive report by Environment Texas.

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How many affordable old houses are there in Central Austin?

As of June 20th, 2019, the Austin Board of Realtors (ABoR) reports that the median price for single-family homes in Austin has hit an all time high of $400,000.

We often hear from City Council  that we need to save the “affordable” old housing stock in the urban core from demolition and redevelopment. Typically, they are referring to single family homes. Given this perspective, it’s worth asking how many affordable single homes are there in Central Austin?

For the purposes of this analysis, we will define the urban core as the area bound by MoPac to the West, 290 to the south, and 183 to the north and east. The year defining “old” housing is homes which were built in or prior to 1970. Affordability is based on the 2018 Austin median income for a family of four of $86k per year. Data is compiled using the Austin Board of Realtors Multiple Listing Service.

For starters, below is a broad overview showing the median and average prices for homes in the urban core built before 1970 as of May 1, 2019.

120 homes in urban coreMinimumMaximumAverageMedian
Current home prices$229,900$8,500,000$825,318$546,500

Using the rule of thumb that no more than 30% of gross monthly income should be used on housing, a family of four earning the median family income can afford to buy a $360K house (according to the mortgage affordability calculator) or rent one at $2150/month.

Let’s take a look at homeownership first.

As of May 1st, 2019, there were a total of 35 single-family homes built before 1970 available for sale for $360K or less and only two of those were west of I-35. The map below shows the distribution of available single-family homes at this price point. Notably, none of these homes have been updated for today’s energy efficiency and the status of the wiring, plumbing, and foundation is unknown. See Fig. 1

Fig. 1

If we consider that a family of four would likely need at least three bedrooms, the number of available homes drops to 22, all of which are concentrated on the fringes of the urban core mostly east of I-35.

Fig. 2

Of these houses, only 13 are outside the identified FEMA flood zone…

Fig. 3

and only 15 have Central A/C.

Fig. 4

The situation for single-family house rentals is very similar. Given a family of four earning the median income, the maximum suggested monthly rent should be no more than $2150/month. As of May 1st, 2019, there are 36 single family homes with at least two bedrooms available for rent in Austin’s urban core.

Fig. 5

However, there are only 14 three-bedroom houses available at the rent level affordable for the median family income.

Fig. 6

Finally, the multi-family affordable housing is becoming less and less available to families of 4 at the median income level. As of May 1st, 2019 45 apartments with at least two bedrooms are available across the urban core of Austin.

Fig. 7

And only four of these have a minimum of 3 bedrooms.

Fig. 8


Given that the Austin metro area is adding 105 people a day, preserving older single-family homes will not meet our housing needs in a way that is accessible or affordable for even the median income Austin family. A far more sustainable strategy for enhancing affordability in the urban core would be to add new homes with more units, like fourplexes, townhomes, and other missing middle housing types.

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How Multiple Business Districts Can Hurt Dual-income Families

Activity Centers as described in Imagine Austin are akin to the Multiple Nuclei Model for a city layout created by Chauncy Harris and Edward Ullman in the 1945 article The Nature of Cities.  Harris and Ullman argued that cities do not grow a single nucleus but several separate nuclei. Each nucleus acts as a growth point.  Because of increased car ownership, people can live in less-dense single-family style neighborhoods near the nuclei containing their job and thus avoid unreasonably long commute time.

Many cities have intentionally or unintentionally developed according to the nuclei model, Houston, in particular, comes to mind. However, while these cities do indeed have multiple growth points and relatively low-density housing, these features have not resulted in the expected reasonable commute times for several reasons.

Most important, typical households today consist of two earners, often in different fields, ie both spouses have different jobs in different locations but live in the same house. Because the two partners will have different jobs in different fields they will likely have to commute to different business centers from the same house. This couple will have to choose which job will be closer to home and likely require the other to have a much longer commute, with all the impacts to quality of life and the environment that follow.

It’s not surprising that Harris and Ullman missed this now obvious fact while writing in 1945 when the idealized and typical household was a single-earner family, ie the husband had a job and the wife stayed home. But that fact should give us pause if we intend to rely on separate job centers to solve our housing shortage and transportation issues. These separate job centers will be unlikely to provide both earners the opportunity to work and live one area and enjoy the access to jobs and amenities like daycare within the short commutes that are necessary for cultivating a successful career and raising a family today. Unfortunately, today that is still most likely to disproportionately impact working mothers.

The activity centers described in Imagine Austin are an important part of our growth plan, but cannot serve as the only or even the essential part of housing and transportation solutions we create in our new land development code. If we really do want to open up opportunities for everyone to grow both a career and a family, we have to ditch the multiple nuclei theory of cities and instead encourage and allow dense concentric development, especially missing middle housing and transitive supportive density close to downtown as the most efficient and environmentally sustainable way for a city to grow.

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Homes not Handcuffs

AURA continues to call for the decriminalization of homelessness and supports the efforts of the Homes not Handcuffs coalition. In light of the newly released 2019 Point in Time count, it’s more important than ever that Austin provide housing for people experiencing homelessness – not a date with a judge. Eric Goff, an AURA board member, says “The people’s strong endorsement of a historic $250 million housing bond speaks to the community’s strong desire to aid people experiencing homelessness, not put them in handcuffs for merely resting on a sidewalk or in a public place.”

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Rewriting The Land Development Code

As we write a new land development code we are not merely choosing which buildings we’re allowed to build and where we’re allowed to build them. We are making a choice about what kind of city we want Austin to be. Do we want to be a city that looks backward to an imagined golden past, while becoming increasingly more expensive, environmentally destructive, and exclusionary? Or do we want to be a city that looks forward to a better future? One that’s affordable, environmentally sustainable, and full of opportunities for everyone?

In this past year’s election, Austin’s voters firmly resolved on the latter. Therefore, to create an affordable and sustainable Austin with opportunities for everyone, this council must pass a land development code that supports our values by allowing and actively encouraging abundant, transit-oriented housing with walkable access to community needs everywhere in the city and especially in the urban core.

First, for housing costs to go down, we must build enough housing not only to meet current demand but also to meet any future demand.  Over the next ten years, 635,000 new people will move to the Austin Metro region, while 128,000 new Austinites will be born here. To make sure all of these people have somewhere to live, we will need to build over 300,000 additional homes. And if we want housing costs to go down, we’ll need to build even more.

Next, unless we want to force all of these people to constantly drive on I-35 or Mopac, we must build the majority of this new housing compactly in the urban core. Today an average metro-resident travels over 180 miles in their car every week, which is why transportation causes 36% of Austin’s 13.5 metric tons of CO2 emissions. To reduce these numbers and prevent paving over the Hill Country and the consequent flooding and water quality concerns, we must create new public transit options. However, for any new mobility plan to work, we must build far more new housing in core neighborhoods and along major transit corridors.

Finally, to build integrated, diverse, complete and accessible communities with opportunities that are open to everyone, we must build a variety of housing, amenities, and businesses for everyone in every neighborhood in Austin. Today Austinites have to travel all over the city to drop off their children at daycare centers and schools, to shop for groceries, and to take care of elderly parents, all on top of driving just to get to work. To lessen these burdens we must build essential services within neighborhoods where people can easily walk to them.

To support these values and achieve these ends, AURA proposes that the three policies set out below must be adopted in our new land development code.

First, we must allow missing middle housing such as six-plexes, row homes, townhomes, and accessory dwelling units by-right everywhere in Austin. As we allow more missing middle housing, we divide the cost of land between more people. That, in turn, lets more people, and especially families, live in Central Austin and enjoy the walkable access to transit, small businesses, jobs, opportunities, and communities that come with that.

Furthermore, development under the current code has restricted the potential for truly affordable units in the urban core and has pushed new market-rate housing into areas the city has traditionally neglected, putting disproportionate pressure on Austin’s poorest residents and communities of color in particular. To combat the displacement resulting from our current code, we need to open up the urban core, and west Austin in particular, to far more market-rate and Affordable housing. Missing middle housing provides the best way to do that.

Second, we must design transition zones that allow for dense, mixed-use, and transit-supportive housing within a ten-minute walk of major corridors. The only way to reduce traffic and CO2 emissions is to get people out of their cars and onto bikes, scooters, buses, and trains or walking – whether that’s for getting to work, taking care of children and elderly parents, or running errands. But people cannot bike, scoot, or walk from Round Rock to downtown Austin. Nor can buses or trains develop the ridership necessary to grow and sustain a public transit system without more people living within walking distance of transit routes.

To achieve this transit-supportive density, we must eliminate minimum parking requirements along corridors to ensure valuable corridor space is not taken up by unnecessary parking. We also either need to relax compatibility standards to allow maximum-density apartment complexes along major corridors or we need to eliminate separate compatibility standards altogether and “zone for compatibility” by mapping high-density, mixed-use zoning on corridors, moderate density within a third of a mile of corridors, and lower missing middle density for residential cores.

Third, we need to relax residential-only restrictions so essential services such as daycares, grocery stores, pharmacies, and doctors can develop within walking distance of where people live. People need convenient access to these services without having to get in a car. Relaxing residential-only zoning restrictions will also give members of different communities the opportunity to start small businesses that help their neighbors live, work, and play in their neighborhood.

Today, Austin is the most segregated city in America by both income and race. It is also one of the most car-dependent and fast becoming one of the most expensive. Our antiquated, woefully inadequate, land development code exacerbates all of these challenges.

We all love Austin despite these problems. To solve them we need a new land development code. We need a code that allows missing middle housing everywhere in Austin. We need a code that creates transit-friendly corridors in every part of Austin. And we need a code that provides complete, walkable communities with essential services in every neighborhood in Austin.

In short, we need a land development code that reflects our values of affordability, environmental sustainability, and opportunity. Only then, can we create an Austin that is truly for Everyone.

AURA Land Use Working Group
Kevin McLaughlin – Chair
Caroline Bailey
Josiah Stevenson
Liza Wimberley
Jordan McGee
Timothy Bray

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AURA Board Elections

AURA will be holding board elections at the end of February to fill five of our eleven board seats. Board members are elected by a membership vote, and any member of AURA may run for the board. To be considered for a board seat, please fill out this form by February 20, 2019.  Voting will take place from Feb 21-Feb 28, 2019. If you have any questions about what serving as a board member entails please feel free to email the current board at board@lists.aura-atx.org

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What is Mobility Justice?

“How can cities, including Austin, use mobility justice to guide future investment in transportation systems? What is Austin doing right now to offer more affordable mobility options for vulnerable populations and communities?”  These important questions were discussed at an Imagine Austin Speaker Series on Mobility Justice on Saturday, January 12th at the Asian American Resource Center Ballroom.  Dr. Adonia E. Lugo presented “Mobility Justice: People Power and the Future of Transportation” and shared her work on “mobility justice, the practice of accounting for the diverse vulnerabilities that individuals carry with them as they travel through shared public spaces.”  

Dr. Adonia E. Lugo PhD. (Affiliate Faculty in Urban Sustainability, Antioch University Los Angeles) is an urban anthropologist, bicyclist, activist, and college professor living in Los Angeles. She’s spent the last decade researching racial inclusion in active transportation. Her book, Bicycle/Race: Transportation, Culture, & Resistance, was published in 2018. Dr. Lugo serves as an advisory board co-chair for Los Angeles-based community-based organization People for Mobility Justice and is a core organizer of The Untokening, a national collective.

AURA had the opportunity to ask Dr. Lugo a few questions on Principles of Mobility Justice and how it pertains to Austin.

1.  How would you briefly describe Principles of Mobility Justice in a nutshell for folks who are not familiar with this practice?

The Untokening 1.0 Principles of Mobility Justice was a collective effort to distill some shared values around the concept. In a nutshell, “mobility justice” refers to the efforts to shed light on the vulnerabilities that different individuals face as they travel. Keeping our communities safe takes more than good design; we also have to grapple with racial discrimination in policing, the persecution of immigrants, sexual harassment, and many other ways that folks might experience un-safety in our streets and public spaces.

2.  What inspired you to incorporate Principles of Mobility Justice into your practice?

I had been active in defining equity in the bike movement since 2013, and within a few years it was clear that we needed to go further; looking at one mode of transportation wasn’t sufficient to address the root causes of street un-safety. I also felt constrained by bike advocacy’s emphasis on using public funding for infrastructure projects, when that kind of funding doesn’t necessarily lead to benefits for folks in disadvantaged communities. With the broader focus on mobility justice, the groups I’m part of now are working to innovate alternative ways of investing in local community safety.

3.  Austin passed a Mobility Bond in 2014 and has several transportation efforts on the ground, such as our newly released, city-wide Austin Strategic Mobility Plan (ASMP) and CapMetro’s Project Connect – a regional high-capacity transit plan, including light rail and buses in various corridors around Austin. How do you think Austin could benefit from implementing principles of Mobility Justice as we move forward with our transportation plans?

In the transportation sector, there tends to be a big emphasis on spending public dollars on brick and mortar projects and rolling stock. The mobility justice approach puts the focus on people: what are their customer service needs, what jobs can they access, what cultures are cultivated in transit spaces? In order to keep our cities equitable and diverse, we need to put people and community at the heart of the work.

4.  What are some of the challenges practitioners may face while implementing Principles of Mobility Justice?

It can be pretty difficult to get transportation folks on board with the idea that “street safety” includes other kinds of vulnerability besides avoiding vehicular violence. In LA, we’ve been developing partnerships with groups that work on other aspects of community safety in order to create an authentic intersectional approach.

5.  What top recommendations do you have for Austin for holding space for mobility justice in the face of new pressures in the transportation industry?

– Consider that “shared use” will only be equitable if it’s a step toward shared ownership. What is the city doing to support worker-owned cooperatives that serve mobility needs?

– Undertake historical research to highlight the parallel tracks of transportation development as a market-driven project versus mobility systems funded by public dollars as a public good. I think we have a long way to go before we can see that the idea of transportation spending going toward disadvantaged community needs is relatively new, given how long we’ve been building those systems in this country. Transportation is big business, which means it’s not going to shift toward social justice overnight.

~

Interested in learning more?  Check out Dr. Adonia Lugo talk about Mobility Justice: People, Power & the Future of Urban Transportation at the Imagine Austin Speaker Series.  Feel free to contribute to the discussion with comments below.

IASS_flyer_MobilityJustice_Jan2018.jpg
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Austin Strategic Mobility Plan Response

AURA sent the letter below to the Austin Transportation Department and members of Austin City Council on January 13, 2019. 

AURA, a grassroots organization that believes in an Austin for Everyone, began its existence as a transit advocacy organization. Since then, we have released multiple reports and engaged in continual advocacy around transportation and transit issues. The Austin Strategic Mobility Plan (ASMP) will be a key document in shaping the future of Austin. As it stands, our current mobility policies have largely led to unaffordable, disconnected, unhealthy, unsafe, and environmentally destructive sprawl.  With the ASMP, especially in combination with land use reforms, we can begin charting a new course—one that includes environmental justice and greenhouse gas reductions, economic vitality, effective transit, and safer, more walkable communities everywhere.

The draft ASMP needs significant work to get to that point. There are nods to many good, if vague, policies throughout the written document, but it nowhere lays out the overarching vision and clear policy priorities that we need to get to a brighter future.  There are tradeoffs in many of the decisions that must be made about mobility: “prioritizing multimodal solutions” and a “culture of safety” are not necessarily compatible with “increasing highway person-carrying capacity,” since highways are the locus of a large percentage of our automotive-related deaths and serious injuries.  

Policies that do not aim to set clear, measurable goals, with baselines and projected improvements, are incredibly hard to evaluate. Without that guidance, and a clear hierarchy of priorities, and when there are too many general policy pronouncements, virtually any decision can point to whichever policy best justifies it. These policies will guide technical documents including new Street Design Guide and the Transportation Criteria Manual. These are critical documents that will determine street safety, development patterns, and Austin’s environmental footprint, potentially for decades. But these manuals get very little concrete direction from the policies enumerated. By contrast the Strategic Housing Blueprint identified clear goals for the production of different types of housing, and the Watershed Master Plan shows specifics of the types of watershed projects that need to occur and where. The ASMP needs to follow a similar track and provide much more clarity.

To deliver the kind of city that is mandated in Imagine Austin and countless resolutions since, the goals of the ASMP should include:

  • Clear mandates on reducing Vehicle Miles Travelled (VMT) and greenhouse gases
  • Policies that prioritize safety, including clear targets of when and how Austin will accomplish its VisionZero goals.  
  • Prioritizing transit, cycling, and other low-environmental impact mobility solutions over single occupancy vehicles, including targets on improving modeshare for those alternatives.  
  • Efficiently managing parking in line with current best practices.
  • Remove all ‘crash gates’. The city must reject a handful of vocal residents to disconnect a neighborhood.
  • Initiate a Streets Master plan to identify and reconnect the traditional streets grid in addition to mapping street grids for future subdivisions.
  • Disallow subdivision approval without full connectivity.
  • The city should plan major protected bike/scooter highways that connect Downtown/UT to other parts of the city.
  • Moratorium on new traffic signals, explore small scale roundabouts instead.
  • Specific direction to reduce/eliminate parking minimums, and ideally enact parking maximums
  • Identify more east-west streets for 4->3 road diets and protected bike lanes.
  • Remove road widenings in the Barton Springs Zone. In particular, the Oak Hill parkway must be carefully planned to minimize environment impacts in this sensitive area.

With clear, ambitious, but achievable goals, the ASMP can help us on the path to a much brighter future for Austin, but that vision is currently lacking in the draft.  We hope that future drafts will begin to address these issues.

Contact:

  • Brennan Griffin, brennan.griffin@gmail.com.
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Project Connect Vision Plan Response

AURA, a grassroots organization that believes in an Austin for Everyone, got our start doing transit advocacy. In 2014, we worked to improve the previous Project Connect plan. Unfortunately, our data-driven input wasn’t accepted, which led us to oppose the overall 2014 bond because it would unsustainably increase the per-rider cost and would lead to an overall reduction in ridership. We’ve hoped that this round of Project Connect goes better, and so far it is. We appreciate the data and analysis that went into the corridor selection, that there has been more transparency in general, and particularly that the Orange Line seems like it could be a transformative high-capacity transit line.

Our approach to Project Connect this go-around is to call for strong corridor selection, careful selection of mode, and a focus on more sustainable future for Capital Metro by limiting unproductive and inequitable expenses while increasing the transit agency’s income. A key way to do this is by focusing on reducing the per-rider cost for new investments, which frees up funds to accommodate more riders. A focus on a high-quality transit network for Capital Metro will increase equity, focus the fight on climate change, and improve the daily lives of hundreds of thousands of people.

PROJECT CONNECT CORRIDORS

In general, we support the draft corridor map released as a part of Project Connect. We’re particularly pleased at the inclusion of the Pleasant Valley corridor and that the Orange Line goes from Tech Ridge to Slaughter. A true BRT on Pleasant Valley would serve parts of Austin that are not well-served today and contribute to the overall equity of the system. The extensive Orange Line under study would provide a clear benefit to most of Austin — and we hope to see significant investment to have an Orange Line spine that serves as much of Austin as possible. If studies suggest that extending the Orange Line north of 183 would be beneficial to transit, we hope to work with Capital Metro and others to secure right-of-way from TxDOT to build such an extension as early as possible.

The major concern with the corridor map that continues to worry us as transit activists is the Green Line. We believe the Green Line has very poor performance in any fair scoring — primarily because the potential ridership is very low, making the cost per rider very high — in the range of $40+ per ride when annualized capital costs and operating costs are considered. For comparison, the cost per rider for our poorly performing Red Line is “only” $24. By contrast, the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor was estimated to cost on the order of $4-5 per rider. Because one of the most important metrics in transit planning is cost per rider, the proposed Green Line’s combination of low ridership and high operating costs is simply unsustainable. Perhaps it can be included in a future, built out system, where walkable urban communities have been developed along the proposed route, but that would require further study. Alternately, if sources of funds outside of Capital Metro’s limited revenue sources were available, it might be possible to develop a Green Line along this corridor in a way that would benefit transit riders. But any such alternative source of funds would have to include ongoing operating costs, since the Green Line has among the highest operating costs of any of the investments under consideration.

We also are concerned about the seemingly-last minute addition of several new lines, particularly Parmer and Cameron/Dessau. Added less than two weeks before the CapMetro board will vote on the plan, transit advocates have been scrambling to process this new information. A few of the lines are simply restorations of corridors that were highlighted on the early draft map and seem to be positive additions. The reconnection of Pleasant Valley is a particularly exciting prospect. However, Parmer and Cameron/Dessau are areas of great concern. Although these roads are heavily trafficked, the land use is fragmented and low-density. The roads themselves are high-speed and wide, and will be a hazard to transit users. Their highway-like nature makes them a poor choice for a major mass transit investment. Furthermore, they do not not seem to have been subjected to the same data-oriented analysis that the other corridors were. We hope that data will be provided to justify a final decision on building these lines. If there is a need for a northern east-west corridor, and it is not too late to add new corridors, we strongly suggest CapMetro consider Rundberg and/or Braker as a BRT Light corridor instead of Parmer.

POSSIBLE MAP AMENDMENTS

It would be helpful to hear detailed public consideration of the “wishbone alignment” proposed by Dan Keshet, where the blue and orange lines intersect and cross the same bridge and haves “six golden miles” of overlap from Crestview to Auditorium Shores between the Orange and rerouted Blue Lines. As discussed on Keshet’s blog (refer to link above), this stretch would have very high frequency and would greatly simplify transfers. In this map, the northern segment of the proposed Blue Line would be the Keshet Gold Line instead and have only a medium priority. We hope that this configuration will get more careful study. However, even without this specific proposal, we need early planning on how connections between the proposed Blue and Orange Lines will happen across downtown. We are glad that the late-breaking “Central Austin V3” map seems to give consideration to these ideas. Transit advocates have been confused by the U-shaped Gold Line on the V3 map and we need clarification about what the V3 map shows. Will we have the option to run a service from East Riverside to North Lamar Transit Center? For now, we need to preserve all our options and make sure that we are able to minimize transfers and create the most flexible services possible. Downtown is such an essential part of Austin — we need to make sure we get transit right.

In regards to the connecting to the airport, It may also be worth considering using airport and/or Hotel Tax revenue to connect from the last eastern stop on the Blue Line to ABIA — many people see themselves as taking the train to the airport, and often look for this feature in the map. While ridership alone may not justify the connection, if revenue outside CapMetro’s core budget were available, it would probably increase the public support for the level of transit investments being considered.

TRADEOFFS IN TRANSIT MODES

We support a mode-neutral study of the various corridors — but we hope close scrutiny is applied to the newly proposed mode called autonomous rapid transit (ART). ART is an unproven technology deployed in only a few circumstances. It promises to have “robot buses” that can queue behind a lead bus and act like a train without the need for investing in installing rail or a train maintenance facility. ART could be very cheap and effective compared to other modes. It might let us get many more miles of “train like” service than we could with other investments. But we have questions that we’d like to see answered before we go “all in” on a bet on ART. Those questions include data about the cost per mile, operating costs, successful deployments, and any risk analyses that have been performed on the technology. Even information like the length of ART vehicles, which is crucial to a federally-required environmental study, is not yet available. If Capital Metro can’t answer these questions effectively, we will be skeptical of a large deployment of ART. Rail has been an effective investment for hundreds of years. When it comes to big investments that we know can help hundreds of thousands of people, fight climate change, and deliver on past-due changes to help mitigate traffic, we need to be sure it will work.

For corridors where our transit need is the greatest, even gold standard Bus Rapid Transit, (BRT), which dedicates lanes and stations to buses, may not be enough. High capacity transit is a way to accommodate more riders on the most productive and important routes in a city. For these lines, such as the 1/801, even the gold-standard BRT may not be sufficient for ridership. Dwell times for buses will still cause backup and “traffic” in dedicated right-of-way after several years of use, and BRT vehicles generally carry fewer riders than LRT vehicles. This makes the decision around ART or trains especially important. If ART looks high risk or infeasible in the timeframe proposed, then the default for our best transit corridors should be rail, not BRT, and any preliminary design and engineering needs to be able to be quickly repurposed for rail.

A good mix of corridors will inevitably have different preferred modes for different corridors. We hope that this network of corridors will have well-planned transfers and be designed from the beginning with the rider experience in mind. Off board fare collection, well-sheltered stops, and a safe network of dedicated lanes for transit, bike lanes and sidewalks will all be essential to effective transit options. As we called for in our Transit Vision report, amenity-filled stops at Republic Square and West Mall will benefit many riders — today.

The most important transit mode consideration is that regardless of mode, our transit must be in dedicated right-of-way and be generally center-running. Dedicated right-of-way will simplify transit massively and AURA calls for the dedication of the largest-possible amount of right-of-way for buses and trains. We must be a city that fights climate change, so this isn’t a choice — it’s an imperative. Center-running, dedicated right-of-way will also make every transit decision easier for each person in Austin for decades to come.

FUNDING

Besides funding a network that is a mix of high-capacity modes, we also believe it’s essential to work on the experience getting to and from the transit stop. For AURA, that means significant new spending for sidewalks, bicycle lanes, and affordable housing, most of which will have to be City of Austin investments. Sidewalks and bicycle lanes will help thousands of Austinites get to and from the station without a car and affordable housing in transit-rich areas will allow people of all incomes to live a short distance from the station. Fully funding the Bicycle Master Plan and all high priority sidewalks is an imperative. From an equity perspective, it’s important to use the recommendations in the Sidewalk Master Plan, which specifically considers equity. Spending “equally” in each district sounds fair but ignores the reality of equitable investment needs that staff and the council have recognized are important when writing and approving the plan. If Austin wants a “transit future” where a car is a option instead of a necessity, we must make it easy for hundreds of thousands of people to easily access our transit network without one.

Intentionally allowing growth near existing and future potential high capacity transit areas will make every transit decision easier in the future. More people seeing direct benefits from investments in transit will build support for future transit investments in a virtuous circle. More people using transit will reduce our community’s carbon footprint. A higher tax base inside of Austin instead of in the sprawling suburbs will make bonds for future transit investments much easier. Market rate and affordable housing co-located a short walk from our transit system must be a part of Austin’s plans for transit — the tax base benefits alone will pay dividends for our transit bonds.

The long-term financial viability of Capital Metro is essential in this vision. That’s why all funding options should be on the table for Capital Metro’s financial future. The City and Capital Metro should explore whether Capital Metro has options for additional tax authority and whether operating and maintenance cost could be reduced for Capital Metro if the City owns the lines and equipment instead of the agency. The City could also invest annually in ongoing expenses, or pay for specific projects, like bus stops or placemaking around train stations. There has also been talk of asking the state legislature to authorize a local option tax to fund transit. While AURA would be supportive of a local option, we recognize the inherent challenges with relying on the Texas legislature to support transit. If a local option is not forthcoming, we should be laser-focused with allocating our bonding capacity on transportation options that fight climate change: transit, sidewalks, and bike infrastructure.

The 2020 transit bonds have the opportunity to alter our trajectory as a city, address our traffic problems, fight climate change, and improve the lives of hundreds of thousands of people. Or, the bonds could go down in ignominy or have only mild improvements in transit for just a few more people, stalling future investment while we figure out “what went wrong.” Let’s get this right and resolve the technical details quickly, so we can all unify in our call for the best future for Austin — together.

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Police Oversight, Transit Justice, and Vision Zero

AURA believes in an Austin for Everyone, and one of the main ways our city can do that is by finally desegregating our neighborhoods. That will mean that everyone can afford to live in the neighborhood they want to live in, and that the place is designed so that they can. A big part of a place being “your” neighborhood is that it feels like home. That’s why we’re in favor of implementing an Office of Police Oversight in Austin as quickly as possible. The Office should ensure that information about critical incidents or policy violations be released to the public so that public confidence in the police and police safety can be improved. 

There are many good reasons to support effective police oversight. But AURA, as an organization focused on safer streets and better transit, can speak directly to traffic enforcement. One of the major points of stress in police and community relations is traffic enforcement. Racial bias in police traffic stops has been evident in Austin for years, if not decades. In 2017, 66% of searches resulting from traffic stops were for Hispanic or black drivers, despite making up a relatively smaller proportion of the city overall. AURA also calls for Council to try to reduce the number of traffic stops in Austin by designing our streets to be safe. Narrower lanes, multimodal uses, and streets designed for low speeds means that the police will need to spend less time enforcing traffic violations that can lead to critical incidents.

When streets are designed for safety and for people, rather than automobile convenience, traffic enforcement can be reduced, and police can focus on violent crimes. Stronger police and community relations achieved through a truly independent Office of Police Oversight will allow the city to focus on safety for people, and reduce and eventually eliminate implicit bias in traffic enforcement, among other police issues. Regular, consistent oversight with randomized checks of police activity will build confidence, improve policing, and hopefully be a tool to reduce the impact of implicit bias.

We also support the work of the Untokening, and their Principles of Mobility Justice. In particular, “Mobility Justice demands that ‘safety’ and equitable mobility address not only the construction of our streets but the socioeconomic, cultural, and discriminatory barriers to access and comfort different communities experience within public spaces. We must shift focus from the modes of transit people use to the bodies and identities of the people using those modes by centering the experiences of marginalized individuals and the most vulnerable communities. It acknowledges that safety is different for different people, and should be defined by those most economically and legally vulnerable.” We also particularly agree that “Until many past wrongs and inequities are addressed, pursuit of mobility justice for marginalized communities may involve looking beyond individual choices about transportation modes to deeply related issues like housing instability, job options and over policing.” To tie it all together, “Mobility Justice demands an understanding of the relationship between policing and public space, and rejects law enforcement – increased ticketing, beat cops on bikes, etc – as a solution for street safety.”

Austin must reduce vehicle violence and reduce the number of interactions with police that can potentially lead to escalated incidents with the police. We should plan for and pay for streets designed for safety and equity using tools provided by NACTO and Vision Zero, and the Principles of Mobility Justice. Creating an independent Office of Police Oversight is a critical step in making sure that Austin is for Everyone.