Austin council pushes back on plan to turn Parmer Lane into a highway with frontage roads

Parmer Lane carries traffic across far North and Northwest Austin, past apartments, offices, child care centers, McNeil High School and Jollyville Elementary. Regional planners have floated turning a stretch of it into a limited-access highway with frontage roads. On Thursday the Austin City Council said it wants something else.

The council adopted item 44, record 26-2942, on its consent agenda. The consent agenda passed without objection, with Council Member Natasha Harper-Madison absent. The resolution tells the city manager to work with the Capital Area Metropolitan Planning Organization (CAMPO), the Texas Department of Transportation and other partners. The goal is to put safety, walking, biking and transit first in any Parmer Lane (FM 734) project, and to push for a full environmental review of any proposal for the corridor.

The proposal on the table

CAMPO and TxDOT are studying Parmer west of MoPac, Community Impact reported. At a Sept. 14 CAMPO meeting, planners presented a concept for the stretch between RM 1431 and MoPac:

• north of SH 45, four highway lanes plus four frontage road lanes;
• south of SH 45, two highway lanes plus six frontage road lanes.

Community Impact also reported that Connected Central Texas, an advocacy group, estimates the conversion would add 40 million to 75 million vehicle miles of driving a year. According to Community Impact, the resolution says the plan does not fit the city's goal of keeping solo car trips to no more than 50% of all trips by 2039. CAMPO's recommendations are not final, and no public timeline has been set.

What the sponsor said

Council Member Krista Laine, who represents District 6, is the primary sponsor. Council Members Mike Siegel, Paige Ellis, Vanessa Fuentes and Zohaib "Zo" Qadri are co-sponsors.

Laine laid out her case from the dais, saying decisions on Parmer "will shape north and northwest Austin for the next 50 years." She said her office regularly hears concerns about students crossing the corridor, especially near McNeil Drive, which is on the city's high-injury road network.

She said her office's questions to CAMPO showed the current recommendation was reached without modeling traffic counts, travel time or safety effects for several different options. She added that the extra driving new lanes tend to attract was not counted. She cited a preliminary look at local crash records suggesting frontage roads have roughly twice the rate of fatal and serious-injury crashes per mile driven compared with state-managed arterials like Parmer. "I'm not confident that sufficient analysis has been completed," she said.

Laine also pointed to large undeveloped tracts along the Williamson County portion of the corridor. Some, near rail stations such as Lakeline, already have entitlements for transit-oriented and high-density development, and she argued that road decisions there should support the city's broader goals. The resolution, she said, asks CAMPO and TxDOT to meet standards the council has already adopted: safe crossings, no increase in vehicle miles traveled, and fewer deaths and serious injuries.

Two people spoke in favor during public comment, beginning here. One was a parent who described Parmer as a barrier between children and nearby parks. The other spoke for Connected Central Texas.

What's next

The Austin Current noted that the resolution directs city staff to work with CAMPO and TxDOT on plans that add trails, bike lanes and other safety features. Parmer is a state farm-to-market road, so the city cannot set the design on its own. The resolution makes the council's position the city's stance in its talks with CAMPO and TxDOT. The resolution's full text and three letters of support are attached to our record of the item.