Since the defeat of the property tax increase known as Proposition Q, City Council Member Krista Laine has looked with fresh eyes at the expensive infrastructure projects Austin has committed to over the last five years. These include the creation of a new convention center, which the Chronicle examined last week. They include the “cap and stitch” plan to beautify I-35, which we will look at later this month. And they include Project Connect, the decades-in-the-making plan to bring light rail to Austin.
“A lot of things are different from how they were when some of these big infrastructure projects were approved by the voters,” Laine told us in mid-December. “They’re different for the city in all kinds of ways.”
Voters approved Project Connect in November of 2020, as the city’s population, home values, and tax revenue continued a 10-year rise. The vote created a new, permanent property tax increase of about 20%. At the time, the owner of a median family home valued at $325,000 paid close to $300 more per year for the project. Today, with the same home closer to $500,000 in value, that property owner pays over $400 a year.
In return for the increased taxes, the city promised to build a sleek, effective light rail system. A new government corporation, the Austin Transit Partnership, was established to oversee the system’s design and construction. In a 2023 KUT article, ATP CEO Greg Canally said that the rail should be open to the public in the “early 2030s.” There would be 27 miles of track on five rail lines, including one that ran underground through Downtown, emerging on a bridge crossing Lady Bird Lake, before continuing to the airport. The trains would run every five to 10 minutes, easing traffic congestion, reducing carbon emissions, and creating jobs, according to the city. The plan also included new rapid bus routes to be developed by CapMetro and paths for pedestrians and bicyclists.
But in April of 2022, 17 months after Project Connect’s approval, the Austin Transit Partnership announced that a spike in construction costs had pushed the plan’s price from $5.8 billion to more than $10 billion. ATP scaled Project Connect back to 9.8 miles of track the next year, scrapping the tunnel and the connection to the airport. Meanwhile, since 2020, the city’s growth has slowed by about 3%, according to The Daily Texan.
During the Prop Q debate, as Austinites learned they would spend hundreds more in 2026 on increased county taxes, school taxes, and utilities, some voters questioned whether money dedicated to Project Connect could be re-allocated to meet other city needs. The short answer is no. Project Connect is a capital improvement project and the money voters approved for it must go, by law, specifically to build the transit system. However, Laine pointed out that Project Connect is more than trains. It includes the new bus routes, on-demand shuttle services, and new park-and-ride facilities. Given that the plan has already evolved, Laine wants to ensure that the lower-cost, non-rail elements of it are adequately funded.
“I speak as someone whose district has seen transit cuts over the last several years, despite consistent population growth and demographic shifts that increase the need for transit alternatives,” said Laine, who represents District 6 in Northwest Austin. “We hear regularly from residents frustrated by shrinking bus service, even as it expands in other parts of Austin and has been maintained as far out as Leander. Our residents are understandably concerned about taxes and equitable service for District 6. There is an ongoing need to make sure our community isn’t left behind.”
Laine told us that one of the changes to Project Connect was the removal of a MetroRapid bus line that would have served her constituents. CapMetro launched two new MetroRapid lines on the Eastside in February with plans to open another rapid bus line connecting Oak Hill and Westgate in the next five years.
While Laine would like to see these kinds of bus lines in her district, Council Member Chito Vela is wary of any distraction from Project Connect’s central vision: the light rail system. “We can’t be diverting revenues to non-light rail portions of Project Connect, when the light rail portion of the budget is already really tight and has already been reduced substantially,” Vela told us. “I want a larger, more robust rail system. And we’re not going to get that unless we build the spine of the system first. We can’t talk about expanding and improving the system until we’ve actually built it.”
There is, however, one change to the project that Vela and other Council members told us they would like to see: extending the line to the airport. “Our airport is doing gangbusters business right now,” Vela said. “We set a record for passengers in October. We’re building a second concourse and a bunch of new gates. Employment at the airport continues to rise. It makes a lot of sense to connect to the airport, especially since we’re stopping so achingly close to it. The airport would be literally the next stop on the East Riverside line.”
An ATP spokesperson said the decision not to include the airport on the East Riverside line was made for budget purposes, among other factors, and emphasized that “as additional funds are available, the extension to the airport is priority.”
City leaders now estimate that the light rail portion of Project Connect won’t be complete until 2033, so there will be more time to consider such questions. Meanwhile, ATP is pushing forward. In November, the project got a vote of confidence from federal transit officials, who gave it a favorable review, putting it in position to receive a $4 billion grant that would cover close to half of its cost (though final approval is not a given, considering Trump froze infrastructure funds during last year’s government shutdown). Early this year, ATP is expected to name the firm that will design and build the system, including the tracks, stations, bridges, and streetscape. The group hopes to break ground in 2027.
This article appears in January 9 • 2026.