As everyone knows by now, Austin is likely to be declared in “non-attainment” of the federal Clean Air Act next summer. Many people seem to believe that this automatically freezes federal highway funds and would kill off SH 130, but that’s not quite true.
What non-attainment would do first, according to Capital Area Metropolitan Planning Organization (CAMPO) director Mike Aulick, is require that the Austin metro area do a “less-than-baseline analysis.” This requires estimating what our level of emissions of the two major precursors to ozone &– nitrogen oxide (NOx) and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) &– were in 1990, and then establishing that our current level of emissions will, under the transportation and management plans in place, be brought under that level. This is a gross simplification of a process you’ll be hearing plenty more about in the next six months.
If Austin passes its baseline test, then the area is assumed to be conforming to federal requirements pending the development of a state implementation plan (SIP) for long-term air quality management, which would be done under the auspices of the Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission and which could take years. (Austin Mayor Kirk Watson, who was chair of the TNRCC predecessor Texas Air Control Board, will likely be guiding this effort.) Any projects that are already part of a local transportation improvement program (TIP) covering the next three years — ours is overseen by CAMPO — would be cleared to build.
Right now, SH 130 is not included in the local TIP, but CAMPO is scheduled to vote in March on whether to include it and thus, in all likelihood, immunize it from Clean Air Act maladies. This vote was supposed to happen back in December, but local protest and policy misgivings convinced CAMPO to postpone it at least until after the EIS was released and digested. The CAMPO board does not officially have to “accept” the EIS, but it has a 45-day window — basically through the middle of February — to make formal comments to TTA and the Federal Highway Administration about it. So CAMPO could express its pleasure with the EIS and still not put SH 130 in the TIP before non-attainment kicks in — which would leave the fate of the highway in question.
This article appears in January 21 • 2000.