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The Texas Department of Transportation says it can't afford to build new roads without more funds, but a Panhandle lawmaker called the move an attempt to hold projects for ransom. TxDOT argues costs have skyrocketed and federal and state lawmakers have diverted millions to other priorities, Amarillo District Engineer Mark Tomlinson said. State legislators moved more than $1.5 billion from the 2008-09 state highway fund for other missions, he said. So TxDOT must cut $1.1 billion from its 2008-09 construction budget and focus on maintenance of the state's 79,000 miles of existing roadways, Tomlinson said. Next week, Tomlinson will list...

It's not often that an individual makes such a significant and undoubtedly lasting impact on a state as big as Texas, but my long-time friend and Chairman of the Texas Transportation Commission, Ric Williamson, certainly did. As most of you know, Ric died suddenly last month at age 55. It is true that as the state's transportation policymaker, he was a controversial figure. But, it has been my experience that people with visionary instincts and those who prefer to think outside the box are often considered different and unconventional. The world has a long legacy of resisting new ideas, even...

CARTHAGE — James Mason doesn't want a new highway cutting him off from his property. James Boggs wants to keep American jobs here. They were just a sample of about 140 residents who asked, commented and listened during a public forum with state transportation leaders Wednesday night in Carthage. It was the second of several forums scheduled along the Interstate 69/Trans-Texas Corridor, a proposed superhighway that likely will parallel U.S. 59 from Texarkana to the Mexican border. "We haven't done a very good job of (communicating) in the past," said Steve Simmons, deputy executive director of Texas Department of Transportation....

CARTHAGE, Texas — State transportation officials appear to have a tough sales job ahead as they try to pave the way for new highways — mostly toll roads — to deal with the booming Texas population. Texas Department of Transportation executives headed to Carthage on Wednesday for the second stop in a monthlong series of public town hall meetings to discuss the Trans Texas Corridor, a proposed network of superhighway toll roads, and other transportation issues. The unprecedented sessions, which began Tuesday night in Texarkana, are intended to answer questions and improve communication between the agency and people who use...

More and higher tolls won't be enough to pay for the nation's highway needs, a bipartisan study panel chaired by the U.S. Secretary of Transportation said today in a long-awaited report. Instead, Congress will need to raise the federal gas tax by 25 to 40 cents a gallon over five years, according to the National Surface Transportation Policy and Revenue Study Commission. The 12-member commission is a bipartisan panel formed by Congress in 2005 to rethink the way the nation builds and pays for its highways and transit systems. "There is no free lunch," Jack Schenendorf, vice chairman of the...

2007 ended on a sad note for the family and friends of Ric Williamson, the chairman of the Texas Transportation Commission who died Sunday after a heart attack. Given his aggressive and often controversial role in reshaping Texas highway construction, his death leaves the state and Gov. Rick Perry with an important question about how to move forward after Williamson’s memorial service today. Williamson, 55, a successful business owner and former state representative from Weatherford, was appointed to the transportation commission in 2001 by his good friend Perry and was named chairman in 2004. He became a passionate advocate of...

Push for higher gas tax could follow chief's death The death of Ric Williamson, the fiery, whip-smart chairman of the state transportation commission, could upend the still-roiling debate over toll roads in Texas in the new year. Mr. Williamson died Saturday of a heart attack at age 55, sending shock waves through the nearly 15,000-employee department he led as well as the political and policy circles where his combative style and pro-toll-road agenda had engendered enormous change – and criticism. Always careful to credit Gov. Rick Perry, a close friend and former roommate, Mr. Williamson emerged as a lightning rod...

From the Texas Contractor Austin Bureau January 7, 2008 Texas Contractor Interview with Amadeo Saenz on TxDOT construction and maintenance spending in 2008 and beyond. Amadeo Saenz, P.E., a transportation engineer with 29 years' state experience, took over as the executive director of the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) at the end of September — and began working to find ways to allow the agency to meet the state's highway needs despite increasing demand,rising costs and decreasing resources. Saenz, 51, was named to Texas' top transportation position by the Texas Transportation Commission in late September to replace Michael Behrens, who...

AUSTIN — Toll road critics were turned down in their request for wide-ranging transportation department documents, but a judge gave them more time to narrow their request as part of a lawsuit against the state. Texans Uniting for Reform and Freedom, led by San Antonio resident Terri Hall, sued the Texas Department of Transportation in September to fight the department's toll road efforts. The group claims the "Keep Texas Moving" promotional campaign violates a ban on state officials using their authority for political purposes. It also wants to stop agency officials from lobbying Congress to allow more tolling. On Thursday,...

Local toll authority likely to carry more of the burden for designing, building second wave of Austin-area toll roads The Texas Department of Transportation after February will cease awarding contracts for new or expanded roads, a belt-tightening that probably will indefinitely delay a number of Central Texas highway projects. Work on some local projects, such as widening FM 1460 between Round Rock and Georgetown, RM 2338 in Williamson County, and Texas 195, which runs from Interstate 35 in Williamson County to Killeen, will be shelved for now. In addition, the edict will force Central Texas' local toll authority to carry...

Anyone whose feet are set in concrete against toll roads is going to get run over. Toll roads are here. They are coming. The need is undeniable, as is the rationale in many cases. But you can’t defend toll roads in every instance, and the proposed I-35 toll lanes through Waco sound indefensible. Two concerns present themselves immediately — one about Waco’s self-interest and one about fairness to motorists. First, the provincial concern: The proposed self-contained toll lanes would deliver a lot of travelers through Waco without access and egress to take advantage of what the city offers, even if...

Williamson County Republican reshaped Austin area's transportation system State Rep. Mike Krusee, a Williamson County Republican who reshaped the Austin area's transportation system and, with Gov. Rick Perry, turned Texas toward a toll-centric approach to highway building, will not seek re-election next year. Krusee, 48, is not leaving the public stage right away. He will serve out his term, which runs through January 2009; will continue serving on national panels on transportation and urban planning; and could return to a statewide post after he retires from the Legislature. Talk around the Capitol is that Krusee, who has served in the...

Deficit may top $1.8 billion by fiscal 2012 with current slate of road projects AUSTIN — The Texas Department of Transportation, working to fend off a funding shortfall, intends to cut hundreds of millions of dollars budgeted for everything from consulting engineers to right-of-way purchases. The plan wouldn't affect existing road projects, and it's "difficult to say" what future projects would be delayed as a result, agency spokesman Randall Dillard said Friday. Projections show that if existing plans on awarding contracts and expenditures were to go forward, the department would have at least a $1.8 billion deficit by fiscal year...

STAPLES — Dennis Elam knew he wasn’t cut out to be a city dweller during the one month he lived in San Marcos with his new wife, Brenda, after they were married in 1963. “I’ve got to have my horse. They won’t let me keep him in an apartment,” Elam said. The problem for Elam and his family is that the State Highway 130 construction contractor and the property acquisition firm has tapped the 57 acres they live and work cattle on and it is smack in the middle of the path of the highway where it will connect with...

Coin trays in Texas cars may actually get to see the faces of dead presidents. The much-discussed and controversial Trans-Texas Corridor, or TTC, has breathed life into the debate of toll roads in Texas. Plans for the Trans-Texas Corridor include TTC-Instate 35, which starts in Laredo and extends north to Gainesville, running along the eastern part of Texas; and Interstate 69/TCC, which has three openings in Laredo, McAllen and Brownsville and follows the coast to Texarkana. Much of the TTC will be privately operated toll roads, run by the Spanish firm Cintra. The TTC will not run through San Antonio,...

Prop 12: Beware of the Hungry Tax Wolf in Sheep's Clothing. VOTE NO on Prop 12! The revenue hungry "Tax Wolf" is rearing its ugly head again with Proposition 12, which is carefully crafted to trick Texans to vote for debt, future tax increases and toll roads paid for with our tax dollars (an unaccountable double tax). In recent years, TxDOT has claimed they’ve run out of money, while they spend billions of our tax dollars to shift our public highways to toll roads and push the equally unpopular Trans Texas Corridor (TTC). Also to blame are Texas legislators, who...

Toll road contract in Texas allows state to lower speed limits on nearby interstate freeway to avoid paying penalties to a private company. The Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) has agreed to consider lowering the maximum speed limit on a stretch of interstate highway that competes with a planned toll road. Cintra-Zachary, a joint Spanish-US venture, paid TxDOT $1.3 billion for the right to collect tolls on 40-miles of State Highway 130 set for construction beginning in 2009. Although TxDOT suggested that free market competition was part of the goal of using a public-private partnerships to construct and operate roads,...

So, you've no doubt decided already how you're going to vote on Prop. 12. Me, neither. In fact, until I started working on this column, I couldn't have told you that there are 16 amendments to our ever-ballooning Texas Constitution awaiting you on the Nov. 6 ballot, including one involving county inspectors "of hides and animals." Or that Proposition 12 would allow the Texas Department of Transportation for the first time to use general state revenue — sales taxes, oil taxes, etc. — to pay back money borrowed for roads. Up to $5 billion of borrowed money. Actually, it would...

TexDOT: No Money to Build New Hghways Agency blames diversion of state gas tax money, curbs on privately funded toll roads By Jim Forsyth Friday, September 28, 2007 At a time the Texas Department of Transportation is defending spending thousands of dollars on a public relations campaign designed to convince you to support toll roads, the department says it has no money to pay for highway construction, 1200 WOAI's Robert Wood reports. "The bottom line is, we're running out of money very quickly," TexDOT's Chris Lippincott says. Lippincott blames decisions by state lawmakers to spend more than $1.5 billion in...

Monitoring the court fight between activist Terri Hall and the Texas Department of Transportation is a lot like staring at a buffet line full of warmed over hospital cafeteria food. On the one hand, you're hungry and interested in eating. But on the other, you really can't get excited about the choices before you. It's tempting but unpalatable to root for Hall, who has adopted the noble cause of trying to stop TxDOT from spending millions of dollars on a PR blitz to build support for toll roads. Despite Hall's impressive gifts of organizing, public speaking and rabble-rousing, she is...

The Blackland Coalition is the largest of the grassroots coalitions fighting against the Trans-Texas 35 & 69 Corridors. It has been our priviledge to become acquainted with the Blackland Coalition leaders and members in the TTC “trenches� that we share. Some of them and members of CorridorWatch. org & IndyTexans will be joining together with citizens of our counties in attending the schedule of TTC-69 DEIS Hearings which will likely be in February 2008. Word of the February timeframe comes to us from the TTC-69 office of Jack Heiss (Texas Turnpike Authority TTC-69). As soon as an official hearings schedule...

After conducting business as though it were a private entity rather than a public trust, the Texas Department of Transportation is now trying to turn the tide of public opinion in its favor. The Keep Texas Moving campaign is a $7 million to $9 million effort designed to promote various transportation projects in the state. According to the campaign site, www.keeptexasmoving.com, Texans can learn more about such projects as the vast Trans-Texas Corridor and "its promise for Texas." Unfortunately, TxDOT has a history of not being entirely forthcoming about transportation plans. Last year, agency officials and the road-building consortium Cintra-Zachry...

With all the madness in the world, I meditated Tuesday on two matters of great gratitude. One is that through vigilance and good fortune we have, so far, gone six years without another major attack on U.S. soil. The other is that I wasn't one of the Texas officials who was forced to attend a workshop in Austin in which PR flacks would try (under a $20,000 contract) to teach me techniques for selling Gov. Perry's massive toll road boondoggle. It was a small part of a $7 million to $9 million campaign that will include feel-good ads pushing Perry's...

The Texas Department of Transportation is pushing Congress to pass a federal law allowing the state to "buy back" parts of existing interstate highways and turn them into toll roads. The 24-page plan, outlined in a "Forward Momentum" report that escaped widespread attention when published in February, drew prompt objections Thursday from state lawmakers and activists fighting the spread of privately run toll roads. "I think it's a dreadful recommendation on the part of the transportation commissioners here in Texas," said Senate Transportation and Homeland Security Committee Chairman John Carona, R-Dallas. "I feel confident that legislators in Austin would overwhelmingly...

The Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) says it needs to spend $9 million in taxpayer money to sell its vision of transportation policy to the public. Maybe if TxDOT pursued rational transportation policies, the public support would follow, and it could spend that $9 million building and maintaining roads. Here’s why Texans ought to be concerned. Borrowing carries a price tag. The Texas Constitution has traditionally eschewed deficit spending and required existing revenue to pay for existing spending. Now, the state wants to build most of its roads by borrowing, either publicly or by getting a private firm to agree...

Let the fracas continue over Texas transportation policy. It's important to keep people alert to the Legislature's failure to address the state's glaring highway needs, and a new dustup is one way to accomplish that. The latest is over the Department of Transportation's developing "outreach" campaign to advocate for the controversial Trans-Texas Corridor and other proposed toll projects. The price tag could reach $9 million, and some lawmakers have badmouthed the idea. Good. Along with their complaints, maybe we'll see a rare thing come out of the Capitol – realistic solutions for meeting demand for new roadways in the face...

The plan to convert the 311-mile-long Interstate-80 into a toll road is part of Act 44 in Pennsylvania. Overall, the legislation generates a huge amount of money to accomplish a wide range of bridge and road improvements, including those on Pennsylvania's interstates, the turnpike and secondary highways. Those projects will be funded with borrowed money that will be repaid by tolls on I-80 and the turnpike. Tolls on the 530-mile long turnpike will be increased by 25 percent in 2009 and 3 percent each successive year. The same tolls charged on the turnpike will be charged on I-80. Specifically, Act...

Even if it's just for a moment, let us give credit where credit is due. The Texas Department of Transportation has realized — finally — that it has an image problem when it comes to convincing Texans of the need for a vast network of toll roads and the Trans-Texas Corridor. The realization, however, comes with a price tag of $7 million to $9 million that, rather than going to build highways, will fuel an advertising campaign centered around a memo titled, "Keep Texas Moving: Tolling and Trans-Texas Corridor Outreach." This is where I get off the track. Outreach? The...

Texas drivers are tired of traffic gridlock. We want new roads built sooner rather than later, but we do not want a Trans-Texas Corridor that would surely invite more illegal drugs and more illegal aliens. Legislators have gotten our message but since both highway funds, the State Highway Fund (a gasoline tax) and the Texas Mobility Fund (bond money), have been pilfered for other uses, there is no money for road building. Members of the Texas Senate Transportation & Homeland Security Committee met on August 7 to discuss this funding dilemma. Committee Chairman John Carona suggested a new constitutional amendment...

AUSTIN — The Texas Department of Transportation, which complains about chronic underfunding, has launched a multimillion-dollar campaign that promotes the divisive Trans-Texas Corridor plan and toll roads. The campaign is anticipated to cost $7 million to $9 million, according to a memo titled "Keep Texas Moving: Tolling and Trans-Texas Corridor Outreach" sent to transportation officials by Coby Chase, director of the agency's government and public affairs division. Such use of state highway-fund dollars is drawing questions, but the department says it's an important effort to educate and engage Texans. "It's a waste of money," said Rep. Warren Chisum, chairman of...

Toll roads will not solve Texas' roadway woes, state Sen. Kevin Eltife, R-Tyler, told the Tyler Area Chamber of Commerce board of directors on Tuesday. The state must take care of its infrastructure needs, and Eltife said he has always supported indexing the gasoline tax to inflation to ensure funding to handle those needs. "I think we need to get back to the basics in this state and pay for road and bridge improvements," he said. "We ought to index the gas tax to inflation, we should build our own roads," Eltife said. "The toll roads are a piece of...

Democratic calls for raising the federal gas tax to pay for national bridge repairs are wrongheaded, U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison said Thursday at a transportation forum in Irving. "We cannot adopt every bridge in America," said Ms. Hutchison, R-Texas. "We have to be very, very careful that the federal government not become the genesis [of the funding] for all of the nation's bridges and for all of its highways." Transportation officials in Austin and Washington have warned that the gas tax revenues supporting the Federal Highway Trust Fund will have a $4 billion deficit by 2009 unless new sources...

IRVING — Just two months after the state's transportation department got its latest marching orders from the Legislature, a leading state senator said Tuesday the agency is as arrogant as ever. At a hearing of the Senate Transportation and Homeland Security Committee, Chairman John Carona, R-Dallas, accused Texas Department of Transportation officials of circumventing legislative intent and even refusing to explain what they're up to. "What does it take to get TxDOT to listen to the will of the legislators?" he said. "It is a core attitude of arrogance that I believe still exists." Carona made the same complaint last...

Nearly a fifth of America's roads are now considered in poor shape and about one-in-four bridges is rated "structurally deficient." The U.S. Department of Transportation estimates that the cost to fix these problems is a staggering $460 billion. The tab grows far larger when you add in the hundreds of billions to build the new transportation infrastructure that's needed to handle the country's growth. Part of the problem is that big increases in state and local spending for politically popular programs, especially Medicaid and education, as well costly public employee pensions and benefits, have crowded out infrastructure -- even as...

Ric Williamson and his fellow transportation commissioners will find themselves in a tight corner today as they meet in Austin to decide who will build the State Highway 121 toll road. On one level, the commission is simply fulfilling its duty as the Texas Department of Transportation's governing board by deciding whether to award a multibillion-dollar contract to Spanish construction firm Cintra or give it to the North Texas Tollway Authority. But a whole lot more is going on at another level. The Highway 121 decision also pits Mr. Williamson's desire to support Gov. Rick Perry's ambitious highway-building agenda against...

AUSTIN – State Transportation Commission Chairman Ric Williamson is proud that he can still work a bulldozer, a skill he learned early on the ranch and in the gas fields. Others would say he still drives it at meetings, committee hearings and town hall gatherings. Mr. Williamson, 55, is one of the most influential men in Texas. He has the ear of the governor, with whom he speaks almost daily. He is the architect behind the state's road plan for the next 25 years. He is smart, studious, self-made. And critics, who seem as endless as a West Texas highway,...

AUSTIN – A property rights bill that went awry and a mandate for the Trans-Texas Corridor to follow the state's existing highway system were among the 49 bills that fell victim to Gov. Rick Perry's veto pen on Friday. Mr. Perry targeted at least two bills that he believed would open the courthouse doors to more litigation, including a bill that would have provided a greater balance in eminent domain proceedings. The bill spelled out what public land uses were acceptable in order to take private land and provided more recourse for land owners. But a provision tacked onto the...

AUSTIN — Transportation officials on Thursday approved more than 80 toll road projects across the state, many of which probably would use some private financing. State lawmakers recently passed a two-year moratorium on some private toll road contracts. The law still allows local and state planners to move on the new toll projects — with a price range of more than $50 billion — although the rules have changed. Under these projects, local officials would get the first crack at development before the state steps in. And even if privately financed, the government would own and operate the roads and...

A bill that places a two-year moratorium on private toll road agreements in Texas was signed by Gov. Rick Perry on Monday. The bill, Senate Bill 792, was pushed by opponents of the Trans Texas Corridor, which is a proposed set of privately-funded toll roads throughout Texas. The final version of the bill represents a compromise between opponents of the TTC and Perry, its main backer. Specifically, the bill prevents the Texas Department of Transportation from entering what are called comprehensive development agreements, or CDAs, which are contracts for private companies to build and profit from toll roads in Texas....

But compromise doesn't affect six projects slated for Harris County AUSTIN — Gov. Rick Perry on Monday signed legislation that slows down his ambitious plans for building toll roads but does not halt them completely. Perry and the Legislature got into a stare-down last month when lawmakers sent him a bill that put serious restrictions on building toll roads in Texas and constrained policy set by the Texas Transportation Commission, which is run by the governor's appointees. Perry said he would veto the bill and threatened to call a special legislative session if lawmakers did not send him compromise legislation....

Hank Gilbert was not impressed with the 80th meeting of the Texas Legislature. Gilbert, a former candidate for agriculture commissioner and Democratic anti-toll road lobbyist, offered his opinions and reported on his efforts, specifically on bills concerning the toll roads, at the Texas Democratic Women of Gregg County's monthly meeting Thursday. "The 80th session probably had some high points," he said of the Democrats' progress. "But I didn't see them; except the raising of the minimum wage to $7.25, which won't go into effect for another two years." Gilbert spoke in detail about Texas House Bill 1892, a piece of...

Now that legislators have gone home and trumpeted how they passed a bill to freeze private financing of toll roads, the governor's office has some bubble-busting news. There isn't much of a moratorium in Senate Bill 792. "Of any kind, that we can tell," said Robert Black, spokesman for Gov. Rick Perry. "Unless there was something screwy that happened." Actually, there were plenty of screwy machinations in the Legislature as lawmakers hammered out bills to rein in tolling powers of the Texas Department of Transportation. Slapping a two-year moratorium on privatization contracts started out simple. But skittish lawmakers carved out...

The nation's transportation experts have identified their top three priorities: a national freight network, urban congestion and connecting new urban centers with the interstate system. The American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, meeting in national conference last month, heard futurists predict that the cost of meeting the transportation needs would be $3.1 trillion over the next 25 years. State and local governments are turning to "public-private partnerships," or PPPs, to produce the funding. The city of Chicago was happy to partner with a Spanish-Australian group that paid $1.83 billion for a 99-year lease to operate the Chicago Skyway....

For years, Fort Bend County officials enthusiastically supported the proposed I-69 highway, which would replace what is now U.S. 59. A promise of added lanes to the highway - and international trade - has been the driving force behind this initiative. Growing discontent over the direction of the project, however, led the county last year to decide against renewing membership with the non-profit, intergovernmental group that is pushing Interstate 69. And recently that same group was dealt a major blow with Harris County's decision to withdraw. County Judge Bob Hebert said the county pulled out not because of disagreement over...

AUSTIN – Lawmakers broke camp Monday, taking it on faith that Gov. Rick Perry won't slam the brakes on a compromise toll road bill. Monday's session finale came and went without Mr. Perry signing the bill, which imposes a partial two-year freeze on private toll road deals. Lawmakers did not try to override his veto on their initial bill to overhaul the state's toll policies. Many involved in the contentious toll road debate were expecting Mr. Perry to approve the bill by now because his office was closely involved in hammering out the compromise. Perry spokeswoman Krista Moody said the...

If anything has approximated unanimity in the 80th Texas Legislature, it is the desire to slow down on toll roads. This has left the state’s biggest proponent of toll roads, Gov. Rick Perry, the odd man out. But he’s still the man with the veto pen. The House and Senate last week overwhelmingly approved a two-year moratorium on most toll roads, including the Trans-Texas Corridor. Lawmakers earlier sent a bill to Perry with toll-road restrictions. He vetoed it, and threatened a special session if he didn’t get a bill he could sign. The bill that emerged reportedly meets his terms....

Those persuasion skills were key to Ms. Kolkhorst marshaling support for a partial two-year moratorium on private toll roads. The bill could get lawmakers' final blessing today. The Brenham Republican has emerged as a central figure in the Legislature's efforts to slow down the privatization of Texas roads. She has persuaded nearly all of her 149 House colleagues to back the moratorium, which excludes most North Texas toll projects. Ms. Kolkhorst, 42, has parlayed a blend of persistence, fearlessness, smarts and country charm into a more visible role in Austin. In addition to leading the toll road freeze, she has...

House, Senate passage seem likely The careening vehicle that has been this legislative session's toll road overhaul appeared to pull into the garage about 4:35 p.m. Thursday. At that moment, Republican state Sen. Robert Nichols of Jacksonville, after spending several moments huddling on the floor with Sen. Tommy Williams, sponsor of Senate Bill 792, affixed his signature to a compromise version of the bill, and the two shook hands. "We've got a deal now," Williams, R-The Woodlands, said about an hour later. "This is really going to move transportation issues forward, particularly in large metropolitan areas." The deal was among...

AUSTIN -- Key negotiators were still working Wednesday night to hammer out a compromise version of a toll-road moratorium bill that Gov. Rick Perry won't veto. Earlier Wednesday, Sen. John Carona, R-Dallas, said a compromise between the House and Senate versions of a transportation bill had been negotiated, but key House members quickly insisted that a deal had not been reached. The compromise version would require both chambers' approval. Perry vetoed a toll-road moratorium bill last week, citing concerns that it would cost the state federal funding of transportation projects. Different versions of a second moratorium passed both chambers last...

Paul Burka’s blog has a nice update on the legislative efforts to de-rail Gov. Perry’s Trans Texas Corridor project. It hasn’t been stopped yet (reference to bills are bills to halt the TTC): So here’s where we are. HB 1892, the original bill, has been vetoed. SB 792, Carona’s bill, is in conference committee. The governor’s office, through former senator Ken Armbrister, is trying to round up enough votes in the Senate (11) to block an override of the veto. If he is successful, then the governor holds all the cards. He can veto 792 as well, with the calendar...