Get ready, Austin: I-35's upper decks are coming down. The highway is widening. Dozens of homes and businesses will be forced to leave.
TxDOT will buy the properties and pay moving expenses. But TxDOT won't pay for everything. Definitely not the lost sleep. TxDOT has an idea to lighten the blow of losing 22 lower-cost apartment units. The state could require any future owner of the property to build affordable housing. The land, the agency estimates, could support at least 100 units. But that wouldn't happen for years.This TxDOT map shows the new highway in green, yellow, orange and blue. The shaded magenta area will be part of a construction staging zone.
But TxDOT won't pay to cover the highway. The state estimates the city's cost to be at least $542 million. UT would have to pay at least $394 million. The latest numbers are included in a TxDOT schematicThe construction timeline for the entire CapEx Central project stretches out a decade. A baby born today would be in fifth grade by the time the highway is done.Growing the highway's footprint will require expropriating more than 54 acres of Austin into the state's right-of-way.