Opinion: Highway Caps Are Not Austin’s Priority

City Council will make a monumental decision on May 22 that will impact city finances for years to come. We’ll decide whether to commit hundreds of millions of dollars for decks to cover an expanded I-35 highway, or whether to save scarce resources for priorities like housing, flood prevention, and climate resilience.

Austin needs a careful approach. We live in an era of state preemption and DOGE-mandated austerity, and the city has more than $10 billion in unmet capital needs. It’s more important than ever to invest thoughtfully in projects that will make our communities stronger in the face of coming challenges.

At the same time, the city is reaching the limit of its debt capacity. This means that every dollar committed to the “cap and stitch” project is a dollar taken from crucial 2026 bond initiatives.

The most expansive cap proposal under consideration requires $410 million in commitments now and $1.4 billion or more to complete construction. But the city cannot take on new debt exceeding $750 million without triggering a devastating credit downgrade. Thus, any cap commitment comes at the cost of other capital projects under consideration, like building thousands of units of affordable housing, constructing drainage improvements to prevent flooding, expanding solar power generation and battery storage, and adding libraries and pools in underserved areas.

I understand the motivation for the caps. TxDOT forced the I-35 expansion through the heart of our city despite the strong objections of City Council, the Travis County Commissioners Court, and a coalition of grassroots organizations. In doing so, the state is widening a literal and metaphorical scar that has divided our city across racial, economic, and geographic lines.

Unfortunately, the caps will not reconnect our communities. TxDOT is building new and improved connecting bridges across I-35 as part of the expansion, including several new pedestrian bridges. The caps themselves do not create additional connections. Instead, the downtown caps would sit next to the TxDOT crossings, surrounded by up to 22 lanes of highway and frontage roads.

I question how enjoyable the cap experience would be. The renderings portray idyllic scenes of parks and plazas, but I’m concerned about air quality, noise levels, and the challenge of crossing eight lanes of frontage road to reach the caps from the west.

Most importantly, I’m concerned that unlike every other cap project in the country, Austin is the only entity committing funds. Some point to the downtown cap in Dallas as an exemplar project, but the city of Dallas contributed $20 million to Klyde Warren Park, with private funds and state and federal grants covering the rest. By contrast, no philanthropic support has come forward for Austin’s project, the state is refusing to contribute, and the feds took back the only grant we had. We are on our own.

In an alternate timeline, TxDOT would use its multibillion-dollar budget to mitigate the harms of highway expansion by paying for Austin’s caps. Or instead of having an administration that rescinds every grant with the word “equity,” we’d have federal support to heal Austin’s east-west divide. Or maybe one of Austin’s tech billionaires would pay to put their name on new public infrastructure.

But that’s not the context we’re living in. The people of Austin are counting on Council to do what’s right for the people here right now. Instead of covers for the highway, we need to put roofs over people’s heads. Instead of building and maintaining a handful of mini-parks over I-35, we need to build and maintain parks all around town.

Instead of funding a project that might benefit our city decades in the future, let’s invest in addressing our needs today.

Mike Siegel is the City Council representative for Austin’s District 7.

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