More on this tomorrow, but first the short-and-dirty version: At the urging of officials from various localities and ignoring the pleas of environmentalists and anti-tollers – and in some cases, berating them – the Texas Department of Transportation approved another $1.2 billion in highway projects to be funded with federal stimulus money. TxDOT added some projects in “economically distressed areas” to address concerns that a previous failure to prioritize such areas would run afoul of the stimulus legislation.
This article appears in February 27 • 2009.