Thursday, April 2, 2026, 1 p.m. (Austin time), Austin City Hall
Committee: Mobility Committee
The Mobility Committee, chaired by Council Member Paige Ellis, met on April 2, 2026 and heard briefings on federal legislative and grant activity, the Urban Transportation Commission, a citywide lighting plan, bond-funded bridge projects (Barton Springs Road, Red Bud Trail, and the completed Wishbone Bridge), the EPA Climate Pollution Reduction Grant, and a Transportation and Public Works director's report. One member of the public, Scott Johnson, spoke on distracted driving awareness during April, which he noted is national distracted driving awareness month. The committee approved minutes from the March 5, 2026 meeting unanimously and discussed potential future agenda topics including Capital Express, the ACT plan, curb management, and the street impact fee.
0:02 Afternoon, everyone. Welcome to the mobility committee.
0:05 I am the chair, Paige Ellis, and I am joined by vice chair zoe cadry, Mayor Pro Tem
0:10 Vela and Council Member lane, who are all on the daes in person with me.
0:14 I it is 1:03 pm and it is April 2nd, 2026.
0:22 And we are operating in Austin City Hall today.
0:25 So welcome to bike month.
0:27 We are now shifting bike month to April instead of May to take advantage of the great temperatures.
0:32 And I believe we have one public speaker.
0:35 Is that still accurate?
0:37 That is correct. Okay.
0:39 Just scott johnson. Perfect. Welcome.
0:43 You'll have three minutes.
0:51 Morning, Madam chair and council members.
0:53 My name is scott johnson, here to talk about distracted driving.
0:56 April is national distracted driving awareness month, and what I had done some years ago after the ordinance
1:03 had passed is brought these to the travis county center where people reregister their car, get plates and
1:10 all. And, uh, I'm doing that again in the new location.
1:14 And these are some that are dated that, uh, we, we need to update, but hopefully we'll get
1:20 more and more awareness by working together myself with transportation public works, and that being the vision zero
1:27 program. Next slide, please.
1:30 Austin is a hands free city.
1:33 You can see the flashing information on the capitol metro buses, which is great.
1:38 We are, uh, trying to enforce the ordinance as much as possible, but that's a growing back to
1:44 the numbers that we had in 20, in the 20 teens.
1:47 My main ask today is that for those of you that have a monthly newsletter or twice per
1:52 month, if you can work with me or work with the vision jira program to get the wording
1:58 to put in during April to focus on this very important issue.
2:02 Some of you already know that distracted driving is now more important, more relevant to crashes and injuries
2:10 than drunk driving is.
2:12 All of them are important.
2:13 Sometimes they're interrelated. There's two or three of them including aggressive driving.
2:18 So I'll be happy to contact your staff and see what we can do to get the word
2:23 out. If you don't have a monthly newsletter, please do something to promote distracted driving awareness month, another
2:30 opportunity that I seized on 11 years ago.
2:33 Um, go to the next slide and then go to the last one.
2:36 There's, there's a cute picture of something you might used to wear, wear on your ear.
2:42 Next slide please. This is something, so Austin has its own digital messaging signs that are smaller than
2:49 on lamar and other streets within Austin.
2:54 Txdot, of course, has some that are very large, and, and they agreed in that timeframe 2015 to
3:00 put on information about the Austin ordinance, which is wonderful 'cause they always reject city's requests to put
3:08 city ordinances on there.
3:09 But they cared enough about this issue and they're doing a great job in terms of education on
3:14 cycling and walking, et cetera.
3:17 You see them on the bus and in other places.
3:20 So this is an example of one of the signs and the transportation public works department's reengaging with
3:26 them to do some signage here, uh, during this month, and I just spoke with staff yesterday and
3:33 it's gonna be tried to do something through the rest of the year.
3:36 It won't be every month necessarily, and it won't even be at peak commute times, but we're gonna
3:42 try our best to get the word out.
3:44 'Cause many people that have moved here since 2015 when the ordinance was effective, don't know about the
3:49 ordinance and we need to do better questions.
3:55 Sure. Vice chair cadre.
3:57 Great. Uh, why is it doing that?
4:00 Don't touch the mic.
4:00 There you go. Uh, no, I just wanna thank, uh, mr. Johnson for, for his work on this.
4:05 Uh, we were chatting yesterday at the north loop, uh, neighborhood association meeting, uh, in 20, uh, 11.
4:10 When I was a student at ut I was walking in west campus.
4:14 Uh, there was a student who had been on his phone who drove through a stop sign.
4:19 Uh, and I ended up in his front, uh, front window.
4:23 And when he put on his brakes, I went flying out.
4:25 Long story short, I, I have to have my semester drop dropped and I still have scars in
4:29 my arm. Uh, but he was a distracted driver.
4:32 Uh, and thankfully I was able to come out of it relatively unharmed.
4:35 Um, but that's on the case with everyone.
4:37 So I appreciate the work that, that you do.
4:39 You're welcome. Thank you for sharing that story lot you for your comments.
4:43 A lot of people watching and watching on the video loop.
4:48 Thank you for your comments mr. Johnson.
4:50 We will now move to item number one, approval of the minutes for the March 5th, 2026 mobility committee meeting.
4:56 Do I have a motion made by the vice chair?
4:58 Seconded by Mayor pro tela.
5:00 All in favor? Looks like we are unanimous for everyone on the dais.
5:05 We are now gonna take up item seven.
5:08 So this is the only one that we're gonna take up out of order, but we had a
5:11 request, uh, due to some time constraints to listen to our intergovernmental relations office.
5:17 And so item seven is the briefing by memorandum, and we have kerry rogers here to present to
5:22 us. Thank you so much, chairwoman.
5:25 Uh, again, as you said, I'm kerry rogers, the legislative director for the city of I am on
5:31 mute. Does anybody else turn off their alerts today?
5:33 I got two alerts earlier today, so happy test alert system day to all who are celebrating one
5:38 saw, uh, the news alerts, uh, this week about the testing.
5:42 Um, I am the legislative director for the city of Austin, and I have with me today erica
5:47 zagare, who is our grants officer here for the city.
5:50 Uh, to answer any, uh, hard questions about our community project funding request.
5:56 Um, the, uh, office of government relations sends a a legislative update each month, as you know, to
6:02 our Mayor and City Council with information related to our goings on.
6:07 And so our our topic today is just to hit a few highlights related to that particular memorandum,
6:13 specifically in mobility. I think I've told, uh, most of you that I spent the first 20 years
6:19 of my career as a, as a transportation professional, and so have great affection for this space.
6:25 Um, over the last, um, you know, 15 months or so in the time that I've been here,
6:30 and not unlike other local governments across the country, we've spent a lot of time focusing on transportation,
6:37 funding, affordable housing, and other topics.
6:40 Um, the last big transportation bill that, that we all saw and familiar with are of course, the
6:45 infrastructure investment and jobs act.
6:48 Um, and the bipartisan infrastructure law that, that, um, were put into place back in 2021.
6:55 Those programs are starting to expire, um, meeting, meeting their conclusion date.
7:01 And so there's been a lot of chatter around the next surface transportation reauthorization legislation, um, as a
7:09 mouthful. And, um, in the last few months, the basics bill has been file filed.
7:16 That's hr 74 37. For those who are listening and wanna know the acronym, bridges and safety infrastructure for
7:24 community success act, that's basics.
7:27 Um, the, the good thing about this legislation and what the city of Austin and and I imagine
7:32 many across the country have been advocating for is greater local control over those dollars.
7:39 Uh, most lane miles within any community belong to local government.
7:44 And, and, um, often with many issues, we are best positioned in understanding what the needs are of
7:50 our community. And so, um, as this particular bill moves forward, I think that, um, um, we are
7:58 well positioned. I think we've done a, um, a very robust job of expressing the city's position on
8:04 this particular bill. And so we're watching and waiting.
8:08 Uh, we've received questions about timing.
8:10 Um, I, you know, I think if you're, uh, reading the tea leaves you, uh, um, um, would
8:19 expect that this legislation would hopefully come up before the conclusion of this, uh, fiscal year.
8:25 Uh, we're not expecting that.
8:27 Um, we are in an election year, uh, adjacent to this.
8:31 They're of course, working on the appropriations bill that if everything went well and we had our magic
8:36 wand, that would be, um, completed by October one, which is when their fiscal year concludes.
8:41 But we're not anticipating that.
8:44 So the abbreviated version is basics bill.
8:47 We love it. It's more about local authority, but we don't see it, uh, getting signed or taken
8:53 up. This particular year.
8:55 I mentioned appropriations, so we're in the process right now.
8:59 Uh, appropriations actually in washington is in the process of doing bill markups for the ve the 12
9:06 appropriations committees. Um, we work met with our City Council members and our, uh, departments about projects that
9:14 we May wanted, want to have submitted to our congressional delegation for consideration as part of community project
9:20 funding. Erica and our grants division and government relations led that effort.
9:26 And, and so what I would like to do is just ask her to hit on a couple
9:29 of those mobility projects.
9:30 And of course, chairwoman and council members we're pleased to take any questions as well, erica.
9:38 Thank you, carrie. Good afternoon.
9:41 Erica zangre, uh, grants officer Austin government relations.
9:45 And, uh, we submitted the powerpoint presentation, um, that includes the full list of the community funding project
9:53 requests that we submitted, uh, to our congressmen.
9:57 And so, um, the memo, um, lacks a few of those projects, and so wanted to submit this
10:04 to you all so that you can have the full list of projects.
10:08 We presented this to the directors of all of the projects that we submitted.
10:12 Um, and just wanted to, uh, call your attention to slides five through nine.
10:17 That's where the, you will see the full list of projects and it increased, um, the, uh, submitted
10:23 total from 78 million to 79 million.
10:27 Um, just, uh, just a, a hair over, but, uh, just wanted to make sure that you have
10:32 the complete list, which is different from, uh, what we'll share in the memo.
10:36 Um, at the last minute, one of our, um, congressmen requested for us to submit an additional projects.
10:43 And so that's why there was that increase.
10:46 Um, and so this number, the 79 million includes projects, as carrie mentioned, um, that focus on transportation and
10:54 trails and even, um, some that was submitted by, um, or for on behalf of our, uh, partners
11:02 in the community, the trail conservancy, for example.
11:05 Um, and so I can take any questions you have regarding, uh, the full list of projects, if
11:13 you have any. I have one to lead us off, I had noticed that both of our local
11:21 congressmen had listed $4 million for the east avenue trail, which is the one that runs along, will run
11:27 along I 35. Um, is that half and half or is that the total dollar amount for the
11:32 betterments that we're hoping to see the city add the total dollar amount?
11:37 So we submitted two projects to both of our, uh, congressmen, um, east avenue betterment trail, and also,
11:47 let me see the, the second one best, yes, the emergency vest mm-hmm <affirmative>.
11:57 And so, um, both of those are the full amounts that we submitted to both of the congressmen.
12:02 Okay, sounds good. So they're on both of the lists and it just May be one gets carried
12:06 forward or the other, but not both.
12:09 Uh, it's a possibility that both could be carried forward.
12:12 Yeah, it's, um, it underscores the importance I think, of the project if both members are choosing to
12:18 advance it, even if it's the same project.
12:21 Okay. Yeah. See, that's great to hear.
12:23 Are there other questions from committee members on this particular item?
12:27 How about Council Member lane?
12:30 Um, it's not a question, but more thank you.
12:32 I wanted to thank you for ensuring the inclusion of the red line trail segment that connects the
12:37 lakeline station to the higher density housing that went in and the surrounding area, um, after it opened.
12:46 So thank you so much for ensuring that, that, that made it in there with the information needed.
12:52 Um, thank you very much, Council Member.
12:53 And one thing I wanted to flag, this has come up in a couple of other conversations because
12:58 we have this, um, centralized structure, if you will, for funding pursuits, projects that May not have been
13:06 advanced under this particular, uh, process for community project funding.
13:11 We still have that information for other grant opportunities that May come up, um, throughout the year.
13:17 And so I say that for you all, but of course, anyone else who May be listening that