A Google self-driving car drove itself around Austin and across Texas over the last week. State laws don’t yet appear to address the futuristic technology.
Transportation
Reporting on roads, transit, infrastructure, and policy shaping travel and mobility across the state, from The Texas Tribune.
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Transportation
Group Launches PR Effort for Transportation Needs
A new advocacy group is hoping to get lawmakers and the public as worked up about transportation funding this session as they are about water.
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Public Education
Straus on Priorities; More Campaign Woes for Dewhurst
The speaker of the House dampens expectations for vouchers, tax breaks and transportation without ruling any of those things out. And the lieutenant governor unpeels another layer of problems he says arose from a campaign manager’s embezzling.
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Transportation
DPS Centers Aim to Keep Customer Traffic Flowing
Texas Department of Public Safety driver’s license offices have a reputation for long lines and exhausting wait times for customers. But new mega centers are drastically cutting the wait time for license renewals and replacements.
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Economy
Perry Calls for More Funds for I-69 Project
A planned interstate highway stretching from South Texas to Michigan remains decades away, but Gov. Rick Perry said Wednesday that lawmakers should find more money for the project and ones like it.
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State Government
TxDOT Tells Lawmakers Funding Crisis Around the Corner
The Texas Department of Transportation is two years away from a severe drop in funding unless lawmakers find more cash, agency officials said at a budget hearing Monday.
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Transportation
TxDOT Considers Outsourcing IT
The Texas Department of Transportation is taking proposals for privatizing its information technology system, part of a larger movement by the agency toward outsourcing many of its functions.
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Public Education
Pitts and Williams Say School Funding Debate Can Wait
Ongoing school finance litigation will likely prevent the Legislature from discussing education funding issues this session, two Republican budget leaders said at a TribLive event Thursday.
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Energy
Lawmakers Seek Cash to Fix Roads Hit by Drilling
As lawmakers look for a way to fix infrastructure crumbling under the weight of a drilling boom, talk of reducing the tax money that feeds the state’s Rainy Day Fund is drawing attention.
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Criminal Justice
Lawmakers Renew Push to Ban Texting While Driving
At a briefing Tuesday, lawmakers and relatives of people killed while texting and driving renewed a push to make the practice illegal. A proposal passed during the last session but was vetoed by Gov. Rick Perry.