Recent Streetsblog NYC posts about Houston

The Bayou Greenways Plan: A Game-Changer for Houston?

By Angie Schmitt | Jul 25, 2014 | No Comments

Houston’s Bayou Greenways plan is perhaps the largest active transportation project in the country right now — if residents can actually use it for transportation when it’s completed. Jen Powis of the Houston Parks Board has described the greenway project as a cross between the Atlanta Beltline and the Portland Bike Master Plan, which “re-envisions transportation” […]

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More Mayoral Results: Minneapolis, Houston, Boston

By Angie Schmitt | Nov 7, 2013 | No Comments

This week’s mayoral elections yielded good news for transit and safe streets in both Houston and Minneapolis. In Boston, meanwhile, the results are less straightforward. Transportation reformers in Minneapolis are generally pleased about the election of City Council member Betsy Hodges (runoff votes are still being counted, but the second-place contender has conceded). Hodges is […]

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Desperate to Keep Highway Money Flowing, Texas Foists Costs Onto Cities

By Angie Schmitt | Aug 21, 2013 | No Comments

Faced with an impending budget crisis, the Texas Department of Transportation has decided not to rethink its $5.2 billion plan for a third outerbelt through undeveloped grasslands around Houston. Instead, the agency has developed a proposal to basically shift a big part of its costs to the state’s major cities. The Houston Business Journal reports that […]

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Meet the Rick Perry Donor Who Runs Texas DOT

By Angie Schmitt | Nov 11, 2011 | No Comments

Last week Streetsblog looked into the suburban real estate moguls who used their public offices to advance the country’s largest sprawl project — Houston’s third outerbelt, also known as the Grand Parkway. But even with all the cronyism and self-deal propelling this project forward, just a few months ago it looked like the Grand Parkway […]

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Third Houston Outerbelt Would Turn Prairies Into Texas Toast

By Angie Schmitt | Apr 28, 2011 | No Comments

There’s a place just outside Houston where the vinyl siding and attached garages thin out and recede into grasslands. The Katy Prairie, one of the country's last remaining natural grasslands and an important bird habitat, may be replaced with a highway and sprawl. Image: Houston Tomorrow In this place — one of the country’s few […]

Stim Cash Gone Bad: Feds Fund Houston’s Highway to Nowhere

By Ben Fried | May 8, 2009 | 3 Comments

Robin Holzer. Photo: New York Times. Reuters just wrapped up a two-day "Infrastructure Summit" and published a great collection of stories about the state of transportation policy in the U.S. I especially like this piece, featuring Robin Holzer of the Houston-based Citizens’ Transportation Coalition, who does a great job illustrating some of the major deficiencies […]

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