With less than a month until Austin voters will be asked to decide how to regulate vehicle-for-hire companies like Uber and Lyft, advocates on both sides are amping up their campaign efforts.
Transportation
Reporting on roads, transit, infrastructure, and policy shaping travel and mobility across the state, from The Texas Tribune.
Analysis: State Government is Expensive, No Matter How You Pay
Cutting prices can be expensive. The Texas Department of Transportation offered up the most recent example of that, answering the Legislature’s question about the price of making the state’s toll roads free. Spoiler alert: It’s high.
Paying Off Toll Roads Could Top $30 Billion
If Texas decided to pay off construction debt on nearly all of its toll roads tomorrow, the price tag would be somewhere in the neighborhood of $30 billion, according to a preliminary report.
Font on Texas Highway Signs Set for Another Shift
The Federal Highway Administration is no longer permitting states to use an experimental font called Clearview on highway signs. Texas, one of the typeface’s earliest adopters, has used it on its new highway signs since 2004.
Texas Supreme Court Denies Effort to Rewrite Austin Ballot on Uber Ordinance
The Texas Supreme Court denied a request Monday aiming to rewrite the ballot language for an upcoming referendum that will determine how the city of Austin regulates vehicle-for-hire companies like Uber and Lyft.
Texas Supreme Court Asked to Weigh in on Austin’s Battle with Uber
An Austin resident, supported by Uber, has asked the Texas Supreme Court to weigh in on the ballot language for a measure related to vehicle-for-hire companies scheduled to come before voters on May 7.
Uber to Leave Third Texas City Over Background Check Laws
Corpus Christi will be the third city Uber has left this year in response to local laws. In February, the company ceased operations in Galveston and Midland after the cities voted to enact background-check requirements.
North Carolina Sending Top Official to Texas Over Toll Road Bankruptcy
In the wake of a recent bankruptcy filingfrom a private company that operates a Texas toll road, North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory has dispatched his top transportation official to Texas as his state begins work on a similar project.
Bullet Train Opponents Sue TxDOT and Attorney General Ken Paxton
A group opposed to to a private firm’s plans to build a bullet train stretching from Dallas to Houston has filed a lawsuit in order to obtain communications between the firm and state officials.
SH 130 Toll Road Operator Files for Bankruptcy
A private company that operates part of the Texas toll road with the highest speed limit in the country filed for bankruptcy Wednesday, fewer than three years after the section of the road it oversees first opened.


