Free Republic

HILLSBORO, Texas — Leroy Walters has survived many a threat on the farm that has been in his family for 120 years — droughts, hailstorms, tornadoes, grasshopper attacks. But now he sees a manmade danger on the horizon: a colossal, 600-mile superhighway that will plow clear across Texas, perhaps cutting through Walters' milo and corn fields, obliterating family houses and robbing his grandchildren of their land. "I don't think they're going to want to pay a toll to go across this land," he said. "They want to enjoy it free, as Texans should enjoy it." That kind of fear and...

Monday, March 06, 2006 The Blackland Coalition Ads & Endorsements The Blackland Coalition put two ads out over the weekend. Here are the links to them: Texas Our Texas and Cornfield National Security. The first thing I noticed is there are no incumbents on the list. Excerpts from the Texas Our Texas ad are below. TEXAS TEXAS OUR OUR TEXAS TEXAS Preserving the heritage our forefathers fought for The BLACKLAND COALITION would like to say THANK YOU to these various entities for standing up and fighting WITH US against the catastrophic Trans-Texas Corridor 35 plan to grab TEXAS land....

Get ready. TTC-35 is coming. Though Michael Behrens wouldn't use those words, not exactly, and he'd probably cringe to realize it, that's the impression he left at the end of an hour and a half of questioning Thursday. "Something is going to have to be built somewhere," the executive director of the Texas Department of Transportation said after meeting in Cameron with a group of reporters from several rural newspapers. There was touch of resignation in his voice when he said it. The Trans Texas Corridor is a proposed multi-lane transportation network designed to carry passenger, freight, rail and utilities....

Supporters say the Trans-Texas Corridor will relieve congestion on I-35 and spur new business. But the people who live along its path say the highway will devastate their communities. “I like the serenity and the peacefulness of it," says Chris Hammel. He bought his slice of heaven 15 years ago in the form of a rolling farm outside Holland. It's a place where man and nature co-exist beautifully. "Love to work with the cattle. We have a big lake. I love to fish… It's a lovely place to be." Holland is a town where "skyline" takes on a different meaning...

The Texas Department of Transportation went on the offensive Friday to quash rumors that it was surveying land in Central Texas for the Trans-Texas Corridor or preparing to acquire property for the proposed tollway project. “We have taken this unusual means of releasing a special statement to assure the people of Bell and McLennan counties that this rumor is untrue,” the department said in a statement. Some local officials and corridor critics said they had encountered similar rumors, which they attributed to uneasy landowners who fear the state's plan to build a 1,200-foot-wide network of roads, railway and utility infrastructure...