Recent Streetsblog USA posts about Highway Expansion

The Mythology of HOT Lanes

By Kevin Posey | Sep 27, 2016 | 14 Comments

In July Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe stood on the platform of a train station in Alexandria to announce that the U.S. Department of Transportation had granted $165 million for the Atlantic Gateway project. While this is a multimodal project featuring rail, bus, and highway improvements, it was clearly the latter that most enthused the governor. At one […]

Toledo Neighbors Fight Back Against City’s Plan to Widen Their Road

By Angie Schmitt | Aug 15, 2016 | 5 Comments

Roseanne Martinez has lived at the corner of Secor and Bancroft Roads, just over the border from Toledo, for almost 30 years. She and her husband were married in the backyard. They raised four kids there. Every Sunday, they walk right across the street to attend church at Hope Lutheran. But Martinez found out recently she […]

Houston’s Big Chance to Turn Back the Tide of Car Traffic

By Angie Schmitt | Jun 29, 2016 | 3 Comments

There’s a lot riding on Texas DOT’s $7 billion plan for downtown Houston freeways. TxDOT has been working for more than a decade on a plan for the three highways that roughly form a circle around the city — I-45, I-10, and U.S. 59. Last April, the agency revealed a draft version of the plan, and another revision […]

4 Ways Road Builders Game the Numbers to Justify Highways

By Angie Schmitt | Jun 23, 2016 | 15 Comments

The people who make the case for highways often present themselves as unbiased technicians, simply providing evidence to an audience subject to irrational bias. But traffic forecasting is not a neutral, dispassionate exercise. It is subject to all sorts of incentives, beliefs, and assumptions that can skew the results in a particular direction. Intentionally or not, forecasters frequently exaggerate predicted […]

Texas DOT Seems Open to a Downtown Dallas Highway Removal

By Angie Schmitt | Jun 13, 2016 | No Comments

Will Texas embrace a model of mobility that works well for cities, instead of tearing them up with wider highways? A new report from the Texas Department of Transportation indicates that at least in some circumstances, the answer may be “Yes.” TxDOT last week released its “CityMAP” plan for urban highways in central Dallas [PDF]. Normally, you […]

Clinton Pledges to Make a Big Infrastructure Push in Her First 100 Days

By Angie Schmitt | May 25, 2016 | 1 Comment

The industry groups behind last week’s “Infrastructure Week” campaign got exciting news today when presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton announced she’s going to make a big $275 billion “infrastructure” push in her first 100 days. An anonymous Clinton aide told the Washington Post: This proposal would represent the most significant increase in infrastructure investment since President […]

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