All aboard!

New $24 million light-rail station speeds into Austin’s ‘second downtown’

A new MetroRail station is on track for an enormous mixed-use project being developed across from the Domain complex in North Austin.

The Capital Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which runs Austin’s public transit system, approved a deal on August 24 to evenly split the cost of a $24 million MetroRail station with commercial real estate owner and developer Brandywine Realty Trust.

Construction on the new commuter rail station, adjacent to the Brandywine-owned IBM corporate campus, is set to begin in September and be completed in the summer of 2022. The new MetroRail station will replace a station on Kramer Lane near Burnet Road, just south of the IBM campus.

Cap Metro says the new station will provide a link to Austin’s “second downtown” and a connection to a “high-density, mixed-use development with a safe and walkable street grid.”

The rail station will serve a planned 6 million-square-foot development previously known as Broadmoor but now dubbed Uptown ATX. The initial phase of the Brandywine project will feature a 360,000-square-foot office tower and 340 apartments. Construction is scheduled to start later this year.

Philadelphia-based Brandywine envisions that its 66-acre site along Burnet Road near MoPac ultimately will encompass 3.2 million square feet of offices, 2.9 million square feet of apartments, 382,000 square feet of retail space, and 248,000 square feet of hotel space.

IBM is the main tenant of Brandywine’s existing seven-building, 1.1 million-square-foot office park on Burnet. The property is just north of the stadium under construction at Braker Lane and Burnet for Austin’s first major-league sports team, Major League Soccer’s Austin FC.

“Brandywine is creating a true, urban, prototypical live-work-play environment … with fantastic connectivity and vibrancy, a tremendous draw for Austin’s deep and growing talent pool,” Barry Haydon, senior vice president of commercial real estate services company JLL, said in a 2019 release.

The new station should be operational by 2022.

Rendering courtesy of Brandywine Realty Trust

The new station should be operational by 2022.

transportation

Take A Bike

City of Austin gears up to make permanent changes to Congress Avenue

Photo courtesy of AustinTexas.gov

Congress Avenue's undergoing a transformation.

Driving down Congress Avenue has looked a lot different this summer. Not only are the throngs of traffic gone and buildings empty of workers, but a series of temporary bike lanes have been installed along the corridor.

In May, more than a 1,000 residents signed a petition asking to install the bike lanes along "the Main Street of Texas." The following month, the Austin City Council passed the measure and announced the creation of temporary bike lanes along Congress, between Riverside Drive and 11th Street.

With Austin battling COVID-19, the bike lanes were a way "to improve safety and to address COVID-19 risk-based guidelines to ensure enough physical distance for all people using [Congress] Avenue and the Ann Richards Bridge," the city said at the time.

Earlier this week, the City of Austin announced the bike lanes will become permanent. The traffic cones and plastic markers installed to designate the lanes will be replaced with flexible delineator posts and parking stops to create a physical barrier between cyclists and vehicles. Driveways and on-street parking will remain accessible to cars, notes a news release.

Congress Avenue's new bike lanes promote access to alternative modes of transportation while easing traffic on downtown sidewalks. With cyclists and scooter riders using dedicate lanes, pedestrians and nearby businesses are better able to take advantage of the sidewalk and maintain social distancing guidelines, the city notes in its announcement.

Along with the bike lanes, the city also announced the creation of dedicated left and right turn signals at high-traffic intersections, a move that will hopefully stop the soul-crushing feeling of cruising down Congress only to get stopped behind someone attempting to make a left-hand turn across three lanes of traffic. In addition, improved pedestrian crossings and signage will also be installed.

These improvements are part of the Congress Avenue Urban Design Initiative, a project funded in 2012 and launched in 2017 with the goal of improving the downtown corridor.

Construction on the permanent bike lanes is already underway, and the city has projected a four-to-six week timeline for completion.

downtown transportation