With the completion of the runoffs, Austin's next City Council is set. Although it falls short of the densificatron the Austin Chronicle mused about, it is being widely hailed as the most urbanist-friendly council in recent memory. How did we get here? Well, I'd like to believe it's because the world is coming to understand that building awesome, compact cities is the only ...
Three versions of Austin’s next transit map
This blog cut its teeth analyzing Project Connect's light rail vision in 2014 but I've stayed relatively silent on the current iteration of Project Connect. Largely, this was because Project Connect did pretty extensive but not super sexy analysis in their preliminary reports and I didn't have much to object to in it or add to it. The one time I chimed in was to encourage ...
How splitting transit can hurt everyone
This is a companion piece to our post on Austin's next transit map explaining in more detail how running two parallel lines can hurt both. In our example, you live at 46th and Avenue F in Hyde Park and need to go downtown on a Sunday night. Today, you have two good options: I would walk to the #7. Wifi isn't a big deal to me, especially on a random short trip. ...
What makes for awesome public transportation
I don't drive. When I arrived in Austin, I learned this was a hard city to get around in without driving but I didn't know exactly why. This search to understand what makes Austin so hard to get around without a car is what got me all mixed up in this world of blogging and advocacy. I still don't have all the answers today but I'd like to share some of what I've learned on one ...
Three-month returns for CapRemap look very positive and what is happening to the UT shuttle?
A few months ago, Austin revamped its bus system, making a sweep of changes to routes known as CapRemap. The new system made a number of bus routes run more often, at the expense of longer walks to some bus stops, more transfers required, and some infrequently used routes being rerouted altogether. How has it been going? CapMetro employees say that a thorough analysis will ...
