The core group of volunteers at the Festival Beach Food Forest, Austin’s only food and indigenous medicinal plant grove that is always open for the public to forage, have long known that the future expansion of I-35 would impact what they’ve built. But the group didn’t anticipate the construction to branch into the forest itself.
The Texas Department of Transportation’s Capital Express Central Project will expand I-35 through Central Austin, and the freeway basically borders the food forest. The construction is scheduled to take about six to eight years, sending dust and noise pollution into the food forest and neighboring community garden.
So in October 2024, the group began to plant a berm along that side of the forest to protect it from the future I-35 CapEx project. Mexican plum and silk tassel trees would grow tall into a shield wall, filtering out polluting particles. Mulberry bushes, roughleaf dogwood, and yaupon holly would create a lower thicket, while still providing edible plants for humans and birds.
On Jan. 6, a TxDOT representative emailed the Festival Beach Food Forest leadership to notify them that, beginning within weeks, the very area where the berm is planted would be excavated to relocate an Austin Water wastewater pipeline. Utilities along the freeway are being rerouted around the future CapEx project, Austin Water’s Charles Celauro told the Chronicle in January.
Construction was planned to start on Feb. 16. “We do not consent to this extremely tight timeline we’ve been given,” FBFF volunteer Natalie Evans said during the Feb. 2 Austin Parks and Recreation Board meeting.
“We’re supposed to get 30 days’ notice, but it wasn’t given to us in this case, and there isn’t a repercussion for that.”
Angelina Alanis, FBFF’s communications coordinator
TxDOT agreed to delay until Wednesday, Feb. 18, at the city of Austin’s request, giving the group more time to save the plants along the berm. Over 2,400 people signed FBFF’s petition to allow time for a better solution. Last week, FBFF core volunteer Aly Tharp sent out emails to city of Austin departments in a Hail Mary effort to pause the project, suggesting alternative locations for the pipeline.
With excavation growing near, the group raced to move at-risk plants out of the ground. On Thursday and Saturday, Feb. 5 and 7, volunteers unearthed still-young trees and bushes to pot them. As of Monday, volunteers had saved over 90 trees and shrubs, and a 40-year-old mountain laurel is being moved by the city with heavier machinery. “People will try to keep them alive, try to prevent stunting and damage. It’s inevitably damaging, what we’ve done,” Tharp said.
FBFF has gotten only verbal commitment from an Austin Water representative that they may be able to eventually replant those trees and bushes on top of the pipeline, once the months-long trenching and relocation process is done, but it would require specific soil and materials to be placed over the pipe. “If they keep their word … we’ll be able to replant most of these plants. That’s the goal,” Tharp said.
In November 2024, when TxDOT’s construction firm first took the pipeline project to Austin’s Parks and Recreation Board, they reassured the board it would not impact the food forest, according to FBFF. The pipe relocation was then approved by the city of Austin in January 2025, but the organization was never notified to be able to contest the decision within the given 30-day window.
Moreover, the FBFF meets quarterly with TxDOT representatives as required by the CapEx Environmental Impact Statement, which identifies the food forest as being affected by future construction, but the group claims that the pipeline relocation was never mentioned.
TxDOT’s project approval also came after the city of Austin’s 2022 approval of Phase 2 of FBFF’s expansion to 3 acres, ultimately creating conflicting commitments over the same land. The group reports their work thus far on the berm and impacted area to be worth $550,000.
FBFF argues that this oversight is a violation of Texas’ parks and wildlife code, which requires that projects approved by the city must use “all reasonable planning to minimize harm” to parkland, and provide a public hearing with 30 days’ notice for projects that require them.
“Our agreement with the city lays out parameters for how the city should be treating community groups. There’s no teeth to it,” said Angelina Alanis, FBFF’s communications coordinator. “We’re supposed to get 30 days’ notice, but it wasn’t given to us in this case, and there isn’t a repercussion for that.”
After attempts to bring TxDOT and the city of Austin to acknowledge those former agreements and interdepartmental communication errors ultimately failed to pause the project, FBFF volunteers say they hope the city will use the situation as a lesson to honor their standing agreements, and better protect Austin parkland from major state-led infrastructure projects moving forward.
“It’s really a huge hit to the wind in our sails to have to start over in this way,” Alanis said. “It also leads to distrust. It’s hard to imagine going forward … when we’re looking over our shoulder and are never quite sure of whether or not our agreements with the city are going to be honored.”
Tharp, who has volunteered in the food forest for 10 years, also hopes that city leadership is “committed to seeing land restoration and climate solutions that are grounded in place.” After the rush to save plants against the construction clock, the volunteers plan to continue the conversation at the Feb. 23 PARB meeting.
“We’re trying to create universal access to healthy ecosystems, nutritional and medicinal plants, a public commons that’s free for anyone to come learn, to come forage, to get their hands in the dirt,” Tharp said. “I’ve seen it bring a lot of meaning and a lot of healing to people’s lives.”
“To me, this is the heart of Austin,” they continued. “It just takes vision and intention to have a city that’s in balance with nature.”
This article appears in February 20 • 2026.