2018 NEED: $300 MILLION IN NEW AFFORDABLE HOUSING BOND FUNDS
AURA advocates for an Austin for Everyone. That means an Austin where everyone can afford housing that works for their families. While we believe that market rate construction is a key component of ensuring people can have a place to live that does not leave them cost-burdened, we are realistic. We know that no matter how much private development we allow, not everyone can afford market rate for their home, and “capital A” Affordable housing is critical to providing a city that welcomes all. With the 2018 bond, we have the opportunity to live our values as a city. To truly be an inclusive city, we need to make sure we build enough housing so that longtime residents and newcomers alike have a place to live. The market won’t build enough on its own; we need public investment to ensure homes for people from all income levels.
AUSTIN’S STRATEGIC HOUSING BLUEPRINT
The Austin Strategic Housing Blueprint (ASHB), adopted by city council in 2017, identifies the following needs to be paid for in part by local funds:
45,000 new homes affordable to people making below 60% of median income—20,000 for those making up to 30% median income and 25,000 for those between 30 and 60% median income. In 2017, that covered the range of people making effectively no income up to a family of four making $48,850.
The ASHB found that there was a gap of 48,000 homes affordable to those making below $25,000 per year.
Over $6 billion in need for affordable housing funding was identified. Not all of this amount can or should come from bonds, but the demand for affordable housing funds is enormous, and will likely grow as Austin grows.
PAST BOND PERFORMANCE
Austin voters approved a $65 Million affordable housing bond in 2013. It is expected to be entirely spent before the end of 2019.
Midway through the bond cycle, each unit of affordable housing developed with the help of local bond funds cost an average of $38,000. These funds were matched 7:1 by a mix of federal and other funds.
Housing was provided for a wide range of populations—from people transitioning out of homelessness with very little income, to families of four making closer to 60% of median income.
FUTURE NEED
The recent US tax “reform” efforts are expected to cause a 14% decline in funds for the Low Income Housing Tax Credit, which helps finance 90% of affordable housing developments nationwide.
Proposed budgets from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development gut other affordable housing programs.
Over the next 4 years, prospects for continued federal funding of affordable housing are dim. Austinites must be willing to help make up the difference if we want to continue ensuring that low-income people can stay in the city.
Austin should “go big” and ensure that the 2018 City of Austin bond program this year has a sizeable component for Affordable Housing to ensure that we remain a welcoming place for people of all income levels. We call on City Council to present a bond to voters including $300 million in new affordable housing funds.
We call on Austin City Council to amend the Draft Corridor Construction Plan to dedicate transit priority lanes along the Guadalupe Corridor.
Guadalupe Street by The University of Texas, also known as “The Drag,” is Austin’s primary transit spine. AURA first recommended extending the downtown transit priority lanes on Guadalupe north of MLK through the Drag in 2015, when we released our Guadalupe Corridor Study, based on AURA members’ on-the-ground research. We further elaborated on this call in our 2016 Transit City report, which called for the extension of transit priority lanes on Guadalupe from MLK to 38th Street.
This past November, we were pleased to see that the City’s Guadalupe Corridor Plan seconded that recommendation to prioritize transit through our most productive transit spine. What’s more, in November, Project Connect, our current high capacity transit planning process, released a case study for a transit line on Lamar-Guadalupe-South Congress; all of the possible scenarios along the Drag include designating right-of-way for transit. We are expecting to see the debut of Project Connect’s system recommendations later this month and fully expect to see transit priority along the Drag as a central part of that plan. Also this year, a new city transportation plan, the Austin Strategic Mobility Plan, will go before Council, and is expected to provide performance metrics to determine when a street should begin to offer transit priority lanes.
With so much data and so many plans calling for extended transit priority on Guadalupe, AURA was deeply disappointed to see that the Draft Corridor Construction Plan, which which will determine how the funds from the 2016 Mobility Bond are spent, does not include transit priority lanes through the Drag, other than a small contraflow section between 18th Street and MLK. At a meeting on February 6, AURA’s representative on the Corridor Mobility Focus Group was told that the transit priority lanes did not score high enough for inclusion, but that if other planning processes called for them or provided funding, the plans could be re-aligned.
The exclusion of transit priority lanes on Guadalupe in the Corridor Construction Plan is inexplicable. Transit riders represent about half the people traveling through the Drag during rush hour, but take up only 10% of the space that cars do. Transit lanes would speed up tens of thousands of transit trips each day without adding delay for cars. We understand that pending the recommendations of Project Connect, it may be premature to say what configuration of transit lanes is appropriate on the Drag. Capital Metro and Project Connect should help determine the location and design of the priority lanes. Yet, it seems clear that regardless of the mode of transit recommended for Guadalupe, the need for dedicated right-of-way for transit is crystal clear.215 SIGNATURES500 SIGNATURES
WILL YOU SIGN?
First NameLast NameEmail Send me email updatesAddress (Street, City, State, Postal code)CountryAfghanistanAlbaniaAlgeriaAmerican SamoaAndorraAngolaAnguillaAntarcticaAntigua and BarbudaArgentinaArmeniaArubaAustraliaAustriaAzerbaijanBahamasBahrainBangladeshBarbadosBelarusBelgiumBelizeBeninBermudaBhutanBoliviaBonaire, Sint Eustatius and SabaBosnia and HerzegovinaBotswanaBouvet IslandBrazilBritish Indian Ocean TerritoryBrunei DarussalamBulgariaBurkina FasoBurundiCambodiaCameroonCanadaCape VerdeCayman IslandsCentral African RepublicChadChileChinaChristmas IslandCocos (Keeling) IslandsColombiaComorosCongoCongo, the Democratic Republic of theCook IslandsCosta RicaCroatiaCubaCuraçaoCyprusCzech RepublicCôte d’IvoireDenmarkDjiboutiDominicaDominican RepublicEcuadorEgyptEl SalvadorEquatorial GuineaEritreaEstoniaEthiopiaFalkland Islands (Malvinas)Faroe IslandsFijiFinlandFranceFrench GuianaFrench PolynesiaFrench Southern TerritoriesGabonGambiaGeorgiaGermanyGhanaGibraltarGreeceGreenlandGrenadaGuadeloupeGuamGuatemalaGuernseyGuineaGuinea-BissauGuyanaHaitiHeard Island and McDonald IslandsHoly See (Vatican City State)HondurasHong KongHungaryIcelandIndiaIndonesiaIran, Islamic Republic ofIraqIrelandIsle of ManIsraelItalyJamaicaJapanJerseyJordanKazakhstanKenyaKiribatiKuwaitKyrgyzstanLao People’s Democratic RepublicLatviaLebanonLesothoLiberiaLibyaLiechtensteinLithuaniaLuxembourgMacaoMacedoniaMadagascarMalawiMalaysiaMaldivesMaliMaltaMarshall IslandsMartiniqueMauritaniaMauritiusMayotteMexicoMicronesia, Federated States ofMoldova, Republic ofMonacoMongoliaMontenegroMontserratMoroccoMozambiqueMyanmarNamibiaNauruNepalNetherlandsNew CaledoniaNew ZealandNicaraguaNigerNigeriaNiueNorfolk IslandNorth KoreaNorthern Mariana IslandsNorwayOmanPakistanPalauPalestine, State ofPanamaPapua New GuineaParaguayPeruPhilippinesPitcairnPolandPortugalPuerto RicoQatarRomaniaRussian FederationRwandaRéunionSaint BarthélemySaint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da CunhaSaint Kitts and NevisSaint LuciaSaint Martin (French part)Saint Pierre and MiquelonSaint Vincent and the GrenadinesSamoaSan MarinoSao Tome and PrincipeSaudi ArabiaSenegalSerbiaSeychellesSierra LeoneSingaporeSint Maarten (Dutch part)SlovakiaSloveniaSolomon IslandsSomaliaSouth AfricaSouth Georgia and the South Sandwich IslandsSouth KoreaSouth SudanSpainSri LankaSudanSurinameSvalbard and Jan MayenSwazilandSwedenSwitzerlandSyrian Arab RepublicTaiwanTajikistanTanzania, United Republic ofThailandTimor-LesteTogoTokelauTongaTrinidad and TobagoTunisiaTurkeyTurkmenistanTurks and Caicos IslandsTuvaluUgandaUkraineUnited Arab EmiratesUnited KingdomUnited StatesUnited States Minor Outlying IslandsUruguayUzbekistanVanuatuVenezuela, Bolivarian Republic ofViet NamVirgin Islands, BritishVirgin Islands, U.S.Wallis and FutunaWestern SaharaYemenZambiaZimbabweÅland IslandsComments (optional) Don’t publish this on the website
AURA—an all-volunteer, member-driven grassroots organization—responded to the fundraising report for the pro-Proposition 1 PAC ‘Let’s Go Austin’.
“I’m not surprised they think it’s a good idea to spend half a million dollars on mailers that are going straight to the trash can. After all, they are supporting an inefficient plan that will waste limited transportation dollars and reduce system ridership”, said Brad Absalom, chair of AURA’s transit working group.
“It’s simple: light rail should save money, not waste it. By following a route through low-density areas, the Proposition 1 rail line will siphon money away from Capital Metro’s bread-and-butter bus service. This will reduce ridership and make congestion worse,” argued AURA member Kevin Miller.
Miller is the author and maintainer of WorseThanNothing.org, a website that details the pro-transit argument against the road and rail package on this November’s ballot.
Members of AURA — just named ”Best Grassroots Group” for 2014 by Austin Chronicle readers— were highly involved in promoting a better transit system for the past two years as part of the Project Connect process. Due to the proposed project’s harmful effects on transit, AURA members are overwhelmingly opposed to the urban rail proposal.
AURA is a grassroots urbanist organization focused on building an Austin for everyone by improving land use and transportation through policy analysis, public involvement, and political engagement.
Contacts:
Brad Absalom, AURA Project Connect Central Corridor Working Group Chair: bradabsalom@gmail.com, 214-236-3293
Kevin Miller, AURA Project Connect Central Corridor Working Group: aura@happywaffle.com, 512-560-5208
AURA will host a press conference Tuesday, November 17 at 8:30 am at City Hall
November 17, 2015
Austin, Texas
AURA, an urbanist grassroots non-profit that works toward an Austin for Everyone, along with a diverse coalition of organizations strongly urge Austin City Council to adopt the draft ordinance on Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs)—known colloquially as granny flats, garage apartments, or backyard cottages.
This draft ordinance is the result of a lengthy, thorough process with numerous opportunities for public input from a wide variety of Austin citizens. Since June 6, 2014, when City Council passed the resolution directing the City Manager to produce a draft ordinance, the public input process has included:
Three public hearings before the Planning and Neighborhoods Committee, on June 9, 2015; August 17, 2015; and September 21, 2015.
Public hearing before Planning Commission, on April 28, 2014.
Two public hearings before the Codes and Ordinances Subcommittee of the Planning Commission on February 5, 2015 and March 17, 2015.
“The data shows that backyard cottages are affordable, so we should build more of them,” says Eric Goff, an AURA Board member. “Austin’s Fair Housing Action Plan identifies limits on ADUs as a barrier to affirmatively furthering Fair Housing.”
In addition to the substantial public comment in favor of the changes, more than 1,000 Austinites have signed AURA’s petition urging Austin’s City Council to allow granny flats and other small houses everywhere in Austin.
“All eleven council members campaigned heavily on alleviating rapidly rising housing costs in Austin,” says Cory Brown, AURA member. “The proposed changes to allow more backyard cottages is a win across the board: renters and people with modest incomes get more housing options, while homeowners get another tool to offset their tax burden.”
Join us at City Hall on Tuesday, November 17 at 8:30 am as we show Austinites the broad coalition of support for backyard cottages as a tool to provide more housing options that benefit renters and homeowners citywide.
AURA is a grassroots urbanist organization focused on building an Austin for everyone by improving land use and transportation through policy analysis, public involvement, and political engagement.
Should you and I, as residents of Austin, have a say on CodeNext, the first major rewrite of Austin’s Land Development Code in 30 years?
Yes.
Should you and I, as registered voters of Austin, get to vote on CodeNext, the most important policy question facing our city in at least 5 years?
No.
Despite what the political groups Community not Commodity and IndyAustin say, you and I should not vote on CodeNext in a referendum. These groups claim that such a referendum would be more democratic and would lead to a more robust debate. But, as Austin’s own dark history with the Fair Housing ordinance of 1968 shows, a CodeNext referendum, far from guaranteeing democracy or debate, will subvert our representative democracy and disenfranchise the most of vulnerable of our citizens.
Let’s start with the claim that the proposed CodeNext referendum is “about democracy” as Fred Lewis, from Community not Commodity stated in a recent Austin Monitor article.
In 1968, the Austin City Council courageously passed Austin’s own Fair Housing ordinance to prohibit all forms of discrimination in housing. But a certain group of Austin property owners, who said they wanted to “give democracy a chance”, petitioned to put the ordinance to a vote. The referendum that followed rejected Fair Housing with 57% voting against and 43% voting in favor. Only 27% of registered voters and 10% of the total population voted in the election. That’s hardly representative of the will of the people. Worse still, as the map below attests, the overwhelming 59% of east Austinites that voted for Fair Housing were crushed by the 61% of West and South Austin that voted against.
1968 Austin Fair Housing Referendum Results by Precinct
Some things have changed since 1968. Austin no longer has legal segregation and is now seen as a progressive haven in an otherwise conservative state. But some things have not changed. We still face the same turnout challenges: less than 17% of registered voters cast a ballot in the last referendum. Worse still, while 30% of Austinites live east of I35, they only make up 24% of the registered voters. In fact, the map below showing registration percentage from 2017 looks strikingly similar to the map above showing percentage AGAINST the referendum from 1968.
2017 Voter Registration by Precinct
Under the 10-1 council system, East Austinites have a fair say in CodeNext through the representatives they elected. In a referendum, they do not.
After the 1968 referendum, then-mayor Harry Akin said, “if there had been half as much interest in the election as there has been in the football game, we would have had a fairer measure of the will of the people”. A CodeNext referendum risks the same. That doesn’t sound like democracy to me.
Next, let us consider the claim from Indy Austin‘s Linda Curtis that “if you put it on the ballot it will cause a big debate such that you might have a chance of informing a lot more people”.
We should not expect a more informative debate on CodeNext. The fact is most people don’t have the time to brush up on Land Use Regulation in their spare time. As Curtis herself said “find a regular Austinite who is just trying to pay their mortgage or rent, they’ll go: ‘Code what?’”
When the people voted for their representatives to sit on the city council dais under the 10-1 system, they placed their faith in those representatives. We should not lose our faith in those representatives or the 10-1 system that Curtis herself campaigned for.
This proposed referendum is not about democracy or debate. It is about delay. Because of the property owner’s referendum in 1968, minorities of Austin had to wait decades for another fair housing ordinance. Half a century later, we cannot afford to make the same mistake. We cannot afford the same decades of delay with our land development code.
We absolutely should have a say on CodeNext. And we do – by talking to our council members, who we elected, and encouraging them to develop the best CodeNext they can. We count on our representatives to pass a code that helps erase the vestiges of our city’s dark past and create an Austin for Everyone. If they don’t, it is our duty to hold them accountable at the ballot box.
I am President of the Board of Directors of AURA and write to you today to support Connections 2025 in the strongest possible terms. I know you have been hearing many different things about the Connections 2025 service changes. I urge you to approve these changes tomorrow and implement them in summer 2018, as planned.
I’m not afraid to criticize CapMetro when I think they make mistakes, but Connections 2025 is not one of those mistakes. It is an important first step toward getting bus ridership growing again and making Austin a transit-friendly city. In our Transit City report, AURA called for a high frequency bus network and with Connections 2025, CapMetro has delivered on that in a big way. AURA recently gave CapMetro a grade of A- on our Transit City report card, due in large part to the promise of Connections 2025.
It is necessary that to remake Austin for transit, we must make some tough decisions. Some of those decisions may involve sharing neighborhoods with more neighbors, or making it slightly more difficult to use your car, so that more people can benefit from transit. Another tough decision is cutting a few—a very few—bus routes, so that literally thousands more riders can use transit effectively. For some, this may allow them to perhaps make the decision to live car-free or car-light lifestyles. For others, it may be the cost savings that allows them to access their jobs and continue to afford rent in the city by reducing their transportation costs. High frequency networks unlock the city by allowing people the confidence to ride without the fear of missing the next bus.
I was highly encouraged by ADAPT’s endorsement of the new service plan as well.
I am unable to come speak to you in person tomorrow, but I urge you to please, please approve Connections 2025.
AURA supports Proposition B: Parks and Conservation Easements.
As seen in the bond project list, too much funding in Proposition A goes to expand sprawl-serving roads and travel infrastructure. Despite the inclusion of some bicycle projects, Proposition A mostly subsidizes sprawl. In contrast, Proposition B includes parkland dedication and conservation easements outside the city limits as a way to preserve green space and make sprawl that much more difficult.
More information on the bonds is available at the Travis County bond website.
AURA is a grassroots urbanist organization focused on building an Austin for everyone by improving land use and transportation through policy analysis, public involvement, and political engagement.
Over the last two years, AURA members have advocated a bold, visionary overhaul of Austin’s land use rules that would create a more environmentally friendly, livable, and affordable city.
The release of the CodeNEXT Draft 2 last weekend made clear that consultants and staff are unwilling to rise to the task of making meaningful strides toward AURA’s goals. Both drafts leave in place most of the barriers to abundant housing that have been driving up rents and accelerating displacement. Continuing this broken status quo is not acceptable.
AURA demands a CodeNEXT that provides the following measurable improvements in affordability, alternative transportation use, and environmental quality:
We need a code that makes Austin more affordable by encouraging the construction of new housing stock in the central city where people want to live. In particular, we need a code that will create the conditions to actually add at least 150,000 new homes on the ground in Austin’s city council District 9 within ten years, in addition to new housing elsewhere in the city. Actual construction is different from “zoning capacity”—building 150,000 new units will require entitlements for half a million.
We need a code that makes Austin more affordable by adding a significant amount of “missing middle” housing—triplexes, fourplexes, sixplexes, and row homes—the cheapest housing to build: at least 40% of the new units added under the new code must be missing middle housing, not counting ADUs.
We need a code that makes Austin more affordable by affirmatively furthering Fair Housing: at least 75% of the land area in every urban core neighborhood must be eligible for a realistic affordable housing density bonus, as called for in the 2016 fair housing resolution.
We need a code that gets people out of their cars and into alternative modes of transportation that alleviate Austin’s gridlock and reduce carbon emissions: the number of Austinites getting to work some other way than driving alone mustdouble from 25% to 50% within ten years as a result of land use reform under the new code according to realistic, credible forecasts. We need zoning that takes the share of solo trips by car below 50%.
We need a code that minimizes impervious cover at the metro area level: CodeNEXT should minimize our geographic footprint by encouraging housing in places and forms that use less impervious cover per person in order to mitigate flood risk and improve water quality.
CodeNEXT Draft 2.0 makes some incremental progress toward these goals:
It allows construction of ADUs in more places
It allows residential uses in commercial zones
Despite these improvements, the draft still falls short on the AURA goals enumerated above. To wit:
By City consultant firm Fregonese’s own admission, the new drafts adds only 19,481 new housing units in District 9— and that’s capacity, not a true forecast.
That District 9 number is far less than the 32,231 projected net new units in District 1. This allocation of housing capacity continues pushing development out of Central Austin into the East Side.
Only 18% of the projected new units under Draft 2—again by Fregonese’s own admission—are in missing middle housing. For the most part, missing middle will still be missing if nothing changes from here. That’s a small improvement over the status quo, but it is not the bold reform we need.
From the Affordable Housing Bonus Program maps we’ve seen, it appears essentially zero neighborhoods will be even 50% density bonus eligible. Even with improvements that extend the density bonus program to more places, eligible land is still a tiny portion of most neighborhoods and completely unavailable in our most common zones.
We have not seen numbers on mode shift, but it strains credulity to believe that the draft’s mere tinkering around the edges of the status quo will produce the car-independence we need.
The broken system of lot-level impervious cover percentages, which has resulted in the paving of tens of thousands of acres of hill country, forest, and prairie in and around Austin, remains in place. This approach has long been recognized as counterproductive by the EPA. We need smarter, more holistic approaches.
Cities are growing, dynamic entities. If we do it right, CodeNEXT can give Austin the tools it desperately needs to allow our neighborhoods to provide enough homes for the next generation. Providing enough homes will require change—a meaningful departure from the broken status quo that has created the housing shortage that is devastating our community with high rents and rapid displacement all over Austin. AURA calls on our City staff, consultants, and leaders at the Planning Commission and City Council to show courageous leadership and use CodeNEXT to create an Austin for Everyone.
This post is part of a series on Imagine Austin’s priority programs, in light of Austin’s current CodeNEXT rewrite process. View the entire series here.
This program is focused on conserving water resources and improving watershed health. This includes issues such as public health, recreation, conservation, and water supply. Austin’s Water Utility is municipally owned, which allows Austin Water to work more closely with all departments that have an impact on water supply and watershed health.
In the past four years, we have gone through significant drought, highlighting the need for careful conservation of our water resources. We have also had some significant floods which have damaged many homes, particularly in the Onion Creek area. These events have highlighted the need for watershed protection to ensure creeks and streams are healthy and can handle heavy rains. Because of Austin’s location in “flash flood alley” this concern was built into Imagine Austin with this priority program.
Key updates in the past four years include:
PRESERVATION OF LAND
1,700 acres of land over the critical Edwards Aquifer recharge zone has been preserved from development. Preservation is a key step in ensuring that our water supply as well as that of San Antonio’s is protected from pollutants.
City council approved buyouts of homeowners living in the floodplain of Onion Creek. This action was taken after devastating floods in which many families lost their homes. Much like Boggy Creek and its floodplain, the homes purchased will be demolished and the creek will undergo restoration and protection as natural wetland to ensure safety for residents as well as proper runoff in storm events.
WATERSHED PROTECTION ORDINANCE
This ordinance was adopted by city council and Travis County Commissioners Court in 2013. It’s a huge document and you can read all of it here if you want to. The most important part is this—a large community of stakeholders worked together to balance the needs of the environment with desire for development (all the new residents to Austin have to live somewhere). Stream buffers keep development far enough away from streams and creeks to remain safe from floods as well as to prevent erosion. With the increased setbacks, the city plans to restore creek beds as well as provide trails for people to walk and cycle, serving to connect communities and provide options for healthy transportation.
REDUCED WATER CONSUMPTION
Through water restrictions as well as rebates for rain harvesting and newer homes built with more water-saving features, Austin has decreased water consumption significantly city-wide.
Austin is well on its way to better protection of our water resources now and in the future. Although we have had heavy rain this year and lakes are now full, the programs which have been put into place will help with conservation and protection no matter what, as our area is prone to flood as well as drought. Because of the progress we’ve made we are more resilient in the face of any changes in our climate.
One year ago this week, AURA released its Transit Vision for the city of Austin. It recommended a set of small, incremental improvements that collectively would have a greater effect than a multibillion rail line or set of rail lines. For transit, we recommended frequent bus routes and transit priority rather than a single magic bullet. We recommended disincentivizing parking and driving to work by reducing parking minimums across the city, enacting parking maximums in downtown, and creating cash-out programs at major employers instead of free parking. Other steps like finishing the sidewalk and bike network, increasing connectivity, and allowing more housing near transit corridors set up an urban space where walking, biking, and using transit is encouraged rather than discouraged. AURA still believes that these steps are critical to enabling a more multimodal transportation system. The rest of this post steps back from the day-to-day grind of transportation planning in Austin to evaluate how the major transportation agents have achieved or not achieved these goals.
CAPMETRO: GRADE: A-
Capital Metro, for all its problems, has been the most successful at implementing the transit vision.
STEP: IMPLEMENT A FREQUENT NETWORK:
Most critically, In March 2017, the CapMetro board approved the framework for Connections 2025, a long-range plan that will create a network of frequent routes across the city. This is a very encouraging step that will go a long way to providing improved bus service for CapMetro’s customers. Although there were concerns that some riders would lose access to their current jobs, a joint analysis by AURA and Farm & City showed that the new network would provide frequent access to transit and, with it, greater economic opportunity to 10,000 low-income households. AURA urges CapMetro to implement Connections 2025 as quickly as possible.
STEP: FARE PARITY BETWEEN METRORAPID AND LOCAL ROUTES:
In January, Capital Metro eliminated the fare differential between the MetroRapid routes and its local routes. The higher fare for MetroRapid had long created a two-tier system where wealthier riders could choose a better service. This step has already caused ridership to increase on the MetroRapid corridors. Some riders are switching from the locals to the MetroRapid, but the change has likely attracted new bus riders as well.
STEP: IMPROVE BUS SHELTERS
Currently, far too many bus shelters in Austin are totally bare bones with no shade or even no bench. This makes them practically unusable in the hot summer months, as well as unwelcoming to those with mobility challenges who cannot stand for long periods of time. Capital Metro has a new, cheaper design for bus shelters, which will enable the agency to deploy them at many more stops. Unfortunately, these new shelters still do not consistently provide shade or protection for the elements. AURA calls for CapMetro to find a shelter design that can be widely implemented and actually provide basic shelter.
FOR 2017-2018
Going forward, Capital Metro’s major initiative right now is Project Connect 2.0, which is concluding its first phase in June. The first phase recommended 16 different corridors for future study, including 3 commuter routes, 10 “connectors” on major arteries through the city, and 2 downtown circulators. AURA is concerned that the process may end up committing too many limited transit dollars to low-value suburban commuter projects, but we are also encouraged by the inclusion and high scores of many high ridership bus corridors, especially the strong result for the Lamar-Guadalupe connector corridor.
CITY OF AUSTIN: GRADE C-
The city of Austin has made halting steps towards a more multimodal city, but they let themselves be hamstrung by forces that would maintain a suburban status quo.
STEP: FULLY FUND THE BICYCLE MASTER PLAN AND HIGH PRIORITY SIDEWALKS
The city of Austin half-accomplished this step with the Go Big Mobility Bond, passed by voters in November 2016. That bond commits $137 of its $720 million to local mobility projects, mostly sidewalks, urban trails and bike lanes. It is true, as the mayor says, that this is the largest investment the city has ever made in active transportation. Unfortunately, it is still woefully inadequate, since it allocates only a quarter of the estimated $400 million to implement the bike plan and high priority sidewalks. It is also peanuts compared to regional highway funding: the US 183-A expansion will cost $650 million; the cost overrun alone on the MoPAC express lanes was $200 million.
The largest part of the mobility bond is reserved for the corridor plans: seven existing plans for major roads in the Austin area. The city is still determining which projects identified in the corridor plans it will fund, and those decisions will determine whether this effort is a success for transit or not. Projects range from excellent—like the transit priority lanes on Guadalupe, to the misguided—like bus pullouts on major corridors, to the disastrous—like the $110 million plan to widen and speed up FM 969 east of 183, creating yet another sprawl accelerator to the periphery of the city. The ultimate success of the mobility bond will depend on the city choosing projects wisely.
STEP: ALLOW AND PROMOTE ABUNDANT HOUSING NEAR EXISTING TRANSIT.
The major driver here is Austin’s land development code, currently being rewritten as CodeNEXT. The goal of CodeNEXT was to enact the Imagine Austin plan and “promote a more compact and connected city” by enabling more missing middle housing in the urban core and upzoning the corridors identified for future density. At these tasks, it has thus far failed completely. The new code is more complex than the current code, does not enable abundant housing, and may in fact make it more difficult to build small-scale infill housing. Inexplicably, the new zoning map largely replicates our existing housing map rather than supporting Imagine Austin’s mandate and goals.
Absent substantial changes between the current draft and the final product, the timidity of the CodeNEXT result ensures that Austin’s most desirable, most transit-friendly neighborhoods will fail to provide housing sufficient to meet demand and will persist as low density enclaves for the wealthy. Scarce and unaffordable housing in the central city will also continue to drive young families to the suburbs, where transit options are limited and driving is required for almost every trip.
STEP: TRANSIT PRIORITY
Transit priority is arguably the single most important thing Austin can do to help Capital Metro provide effective bus service. The city has made some strides here, with some signals getting transit priority treatments, but there are many lost opportunities and very little political will to enact change.
Center for Transportation Research study table showing Scenario 1 – with a transit lane in each direction on Guadalupe – reducing travel times
The Guadalupe corridor is illustrative. The city started a study of the Guadalupe Corridor, i.e. the Drag, in 2014. Almost all of Austin’s major bus routes use this corridor, where they get caught in significant traffic going past the University. An AURA study showed that at rush hour there are nearly as many travellers riding buses as in cars, despite the buses taking up a tenth of the space. In Spring 2015, modeling from the Center for Transportation Research at the University of Texas showed that implementing transit priority lanes on Guadalupe would accelerate buses and cars (see table above). In 2016, the City’s draft corridor report recommended transit lanes.
The case could not be clearer. And yet, at a recent urban transportation committee (UTC) meeting, Austin Transportation Department’s director for strategic planning refused to commit to transit priority on Guadalupe, awaiting the results of the Austin Strategic Mobility Plan (ASMP). While it is good to have a strategic mobility plan, and AURA has provided feedback on transit priority in the ASMP, transit priority lanes, especially in a corridor where they are as badly needed as they are on Guadalupe, should not have to wait four years and multiple planning cycles for implementation.
OTHER STEPS: CONNECTIVITY, CASH-OUTS, PARKING REQUIREMENTS
AURA recommended several other steps to reduce car dependency and promote alternative modes of transportation, like increasing grid connectivity, giving an option for employees to take cash instead of a free parking spot, and reducing requirements for parking at new developments across the city. The city of Austin has made halting progress in these areas. Connectivity is a part of the Mobility Strategic Plan. The city does not have a cash-out for parking program yet, but it has started offering paid time off for employees who don’t drive every day. Unfortunately, parking minimums have not been reduced. The minimum number of parking spots required has been slightly decreased for some uses in the draft version of CodeNEXT, but they remain untouched or even increased in other areas of the proposed code. In particular, AURA is concerned about the persistent high levels of parking required for bars and cocktail lounges, which is just an invitation for people to drive to alcohol, and then to drive home drunk. The city needs to seriously consider the effect requiring so much parking has on our city, and the behavior of its citizens.
FOR 2017-2018:
In the next year Austin will finish its strategic mobility plan and its new land use development code. These major projects must make serious commitments to transit priority on our streets and more housing in our neighborhoods. It may be unpopular with some, but it is the only step forward to make a multimodal city.
OTHER REGIONAL PARTNERS: GRADE F
TxDOT, CTRMA, and CAMPO continue to pay lip service to alternative modes of transportation while greenlighting and building major highway projects all over the city, spending billions of dollars to swallow more land for cars.
Even these organizations’ meager efforts towards multimodality are undone by the harm their highways do. CTRMA is committing to build park-n-rides connected to the city of Austin by express bus lines. But park-n-rides are not an effective way to get people out of their cars. To move even 100 commuters a day requires a parking lot an acre in size. To make a substantial dent in the percentage of single occupant vehicle commuters, then, would require paving over 10 or 20 square miles, or building expensive multi-story garages, neither of which is cost-effective.
These organizations aren’t even succeeding at providing decent car mobility because of induced demand, the phenomenon by which new highway capacity is rapidly absorbed by new highway drivers, resulting in even more congestion than before the capacity was built. An example in Austin is 183-A, a toll road built to the rapidly growing suburbs of Cedar Park and Leander. 183-A was one of CTRMA’s first highway projects; it opened as an empty, brand new road in 2007. Less than ten years later CTRMA has proposed building two express lanes at a cost of $650 million, equivalent to funding both Austin’s bicycle plan and the high priority sidewalks. CAMPO, the agency in charge of responsible transportation in the Austin area, was not consulted.
183-A also directly competes against CapMetro’s Red Line to Leander, crippling its effectiveness.
FOR 2017-2018:
As they look to the future, these agencies must admit that geometry is against them. They cannot provide enough highway capacity to satisfy the demand their highways will generate, nor can they build enough parking lots to accommodate meaningful transit commuters. Instead of paying lip service to transit, they must make meaningful commitments. For instance, rather than build highways that compete with commuter transit, CTRMA could fund the operating costs of Express Buses or the Red Line.
CONCLUSION
A year after its publication AURA’s transit vision still charts necessary and important steps to creating a city where alternatives to a car dependent lifestyle are more widely accessible. Some of these steps will require hard choices that disrupt Austin’s status quo of a city built for cars. But they are desperately needed as we seek to become a more sustainable city. The region and the planet simply cannot keep up with a vicious cycle of suburban housing leading to highways, feeding even more suburban sprawl, leading to more highways. Some progress has been made in the last year, but the focus for 2017-2018 for the city and its regional partners must be to really commit to a future where transit is viable.
