Keep Austin Beautiful

30 projects in 30 days: How you can help keep Austin beautiful this month

view of downtown Austin from Boardwalk Trail on Lady Bird Lake

You can do your part to clean up Lady Bird Lake by volunteering with Keep Austin Beautiful.

Photo courtesy of The Trail Foundation/Facebook

Doesn't Austin just look gorgeous in the fall? You can help keep it that way this month by volunteering with Keep Austin Beautiful during its new campaign.

Keep Austin Beautiful is dedicated to cleaning and beautifying the city. For its 30th anniversary, the service organization is launching a series of events in October — 30 projects in 30 days.

"It's all of our responsibilities to ensure that [Austin] is clean and that it's beautiful, and we really want to encourage Austinites, especially all of the new Austinites moving into the city every day, and instill that sense of pride of place and inspire people to volunteer and give back," explains Executive Director Rodney Ahart. "We hope that this month can be the introduction and people can continue to be involved."

One of the most popular — and necessary — volunteer efforts that Keep Austin Beautiful organizes is Clean Lady Bird Lake, a bimonthly clean up that focuses on a 10-mile stretch along the shoreline and in the water. This month's event is scheduled for Saturday, October 17. Keep Austin Beautiful provides all of the supplies, including kayaks, paddle boards, and canoes; all you need to bring is sunscreen.

To demonstrate the organization's year-round dedication to volunteers, Keep Austin Beautiful is hosting a Resource Giveaway Day on October 31. "We provide resources throughout the year, but that's one day where we really focus on and highlight the resources we have available for the community for free," says Ahart. Everything from mulch to plants will be available — anything that can assist with a beautifying project in town.

Ausinites looking to get involved can visit the Keep Austin Beautiful website for more information on the October campaign and how to help throughout the year. "We have a calendar filled with opportunities," says Ahart.

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Self-driving Roller Coaster

More self-driving cars expected to roll out in Austin for 2025

Photo courtesy of Waymo via KVUE

Various brands offering self-driving cars are on-and-off in Austin.

Expect to see more self-driving rideshare vehicles, also known as robotaxis, on Austin roads next year.

Robotaxi company Waymo, which you may have already seen on Austin's roads, is partnering with Uber. At some point next year, customers will be able to use the Uber app to call a self-driving ride.

Austin-based company Avride is in the testing phase and plans to roll out its robotaxis next year.

Currently, Volkswagen ADMT and Amazon's Zoox are in the testing phase in Austin, while Hyundai's Motional is in the mapping phase.

Last year, robotaxi company Cruise paused operations in Austin after the California Department of Motor Vehicles revoked the company's permits to operate driverless vehicles in the state. And last week, General Motors said it would no longer fund the company because of the time and resources needed.

This way of getting around has come with its safety concerns and issues. The city is tracking those concerns. According to the Transportation Department, the problems span from blocking the roads and parking in front of people's homes for weeks with lights beaming through their windows, to actual wrecks.

Since July 2023, robotaxis have been involved in 75 incidents. Only 21 of those incidents happened in 2024. It's important to note that Cruise has not been operating in Austin this year.

Since July 2023, driverless rideshare vehicles have been involved in 22 near collisions, eight collisions and seven instances where driverless taxis ignored directions from the Austin Police Department (APD).

According to the data, at least four of those Austin police incidents happened in recent months. The issues varied from driving through police checkpoints, to malfunctioning and getting stuck at an APD road closure near pedestrians, causing safety concerns.

A Waymo spokesperson said their vehicles have gesture recognition capabilities, which they've been training APD officers on using.

As the report shows, sometimes it does not work and Waymo said it is working to improve that. The spokesperson said that as of just last week, Waymo's First Responder Program has been independently verified by TÜV SÜD, making Waymo the first autonomous vehicle (AV) company to receive third-party validation for our emergency response protocols. They also said the data to date indicates the Waymo Driver is already reducing traffic injuries and fatalities in the places where the company currently operates.

Read the full story and watch the video at KVUE.com.

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