Transportation
Real estate
BY KATY MCAFEE
How did Austin get so many toll roads?
What’s next
78610 Number of homes sold
October 2022
October 2023
Residential market data
Year-over-year home sales in the San Marcos-Buda-Kyle market increased in October, according to data from the Austin Board of Realtors. As more homes were sold, median home prices across the market dipped. The average number of days homes spent on the market also increased year over year.
The CTRMA has a ve-year plan for potential roads it plans to bring to the Austin metro using surplus funding. Bass said the group is looking into adding one or two tolled lanes on MoPac, south of Lady Bird Lake. The CTRMA could also use its surplus funding for nontolled transportation projects, such as shared-use paths.
49
+12.24%
Without adequate nancial support from gas tax revenue, transportation leaders turned to toll roads as a solution. “In the early 2000s the commission said, ‘There’s got to be a better way to do this,’” Bass said. “One way we [did] that is by having our regional mobility authority go to the bond market [to] issue bonds, borrow money, and then collect the tolls and pay back that borrowed money over time.” The CTRMA has worked with the Capital Area Metropolitan Planning Organization to build six toll roads through this process. The Texas Department of Transportation built the other four. Langmore said adding toll roads has gone “amazingly well,” as they’ve given drivers a faster option and generated enough surplus to build more roads in the past two decades.
As Austin’s population started to boom about 20 years ago, local transportation leaders recognized the need for more roadways connecting the region. Many roads were in a “lousy state of repair,” and the state did not have the money to x them or build new ones, said John Langmore, former board member of the Central Texas Regional Mobility Authority. At the time, state road projects were funded solely through the gas tax—a $0.20 per gallon tax Texans pay every time they’re at the pump. By the early 2000s, the gas tax wasn’t bringing in enough revenue to build all the needed infrastructure projects in Austin. Texas’ gas tax has not gone up since 1991, and it has lost nearly half its purchasing power due to in ation, according to CTRMA documents. The growing number of electric vehicles and fuel- e cient cars have also limited gas tax revenue, CTRMA Executive Director James Bass said.
55
78640
78610
98
+36.73%
78640
134
78666
21
35
78666
66
+13.64%
75
80
Median home sales price
2022
2023
N
78610
-16.4%
$359,500
$430,000
The Central Texas Regional Mobility Authority operates six toll roads in Austin.
MARKET DATA PROVIDED BY AUSTIN BOARD OF REALTORS 512 454 7636 WWW.ABOR.COM
78640
-3.11%
$349,950
$361,200
COURTESY CTRMA
78666
-5.9%
$340,000
$361,308
SAN MARCOS 510 Barnes Dr (512) 392-0366
CREEKSIDE TOWN CENTER 263 Creekside Crossing (830) 608-1969
SOUTHPARK MEADOWS 9900 IH-35 Service Rd S (512) 280-7400
NEW BRAUNFELS 1671 IH-35 S (830) 629-0434
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