Case study offers early praise for the structure and organization of Project Connect

A new report from an advocacy group in support of mass transit projects across the country has praised Austin’s Project Connect initiative, which is still roughly a decade away from realizing its goal of providing light-rail service through the city.

On Tuesday, the Los Angeles-based group Accelerator for America Action released a “living case study” that examines several components of how Project Connect was organized. The document, which will be updated every six to 12 months, focuses in particular on the creation of the Austin Transit Partnership entity to handle the planning and construction of the light-rail line, expansions of bus service, and a variety of land use and development goals.

The creation of ATP after voters approved the transit plan in 2020 to handle governance, staffing, financing and other pieces of the project was highlighted as a new best practice that other cities around the country could emulate.

Mary Ellen Wiederwohl, president and CEO of Accelerator for America Action, said using a new centralized project delivery entity can prevent existing transit authorities or municipal transportation departments from becoming stretched too thin trying to handle the design, procurement and construction phases of large-scale projects.

“When you look at how transit agencies are built and operate, building a new transit system is very different than operating a transit system every day. Asking an already burdened transit agency in any community to then say, ‘Oh, now you’re going to be an expert at construction also’ is just a bit too much,” she said. “Having an agency like ATP that can focus on the build-out and focus on the many important and detailed tasks related to the construction of the system, while the transit agency Cap Metro can continue to focus on excellence in operations every day … that is the best practice that we are highlighting.”

The case study also praised the community engagement and land use considerations that the city and ATP have put into action in recent years, with the city’s moves to promote density and affordability near transit corridors standing out. On permitting, it was noted that the city retaining final authority on needed approvals could create issues on scheduling and overall efficiency. And while ATP’s procurement strategies are still in the very early phase, the case study praised the organization’s stated preference for smaller contracts with a variety of suppliers and vendors rather than large “megacontracts” that can be difficult to manage.

Wiederwohl said the land use practices will be especially important as ATP and related parties move forward with preparing applications for the billions of dollars in federal transportation dollars that will be essential to delivering the system at the scale promised to voters.

“Austin has been very careful throughout the process, specifically ATP, to ensure that what they’re doing and how they’re doing it is following what (Federal Transit Administration) is going to be looking for, specifically on land use,” she said.

“It may not be the first thing that you think about, but that’s something that goes into the decision-making process and the point scoring for how much money you get from the federal government. Because they want to make sure that when you build out these new lines – specifically the rail lines – that you’re encouraging denser transit-oriented development around the lines,” she said.

With portions of Project Connect coming online – including the opening of McKalla Station and the forthcoming bus service expansions into East Austin – local transit advocates hope residents will increase their usage while the implementation of land use changes are expected to increase housing near new transportation corridors.

Bill McCamley, executive director of the Transit Forward education and engagement group, said the case study can serve as early encouragement for those working in transit that the city is seen nationally as taking the right approach to an ambitious, long-range infrastructure project.

“If you’re a staffer and you know that there’s this research out there and you know that your management has made a commitment to hold themselves accountable with this data, I do think that can have a real positive effect on your day-to-day operations,” he said. “It can be really easy just to do things the same way they’ve always been done because it’s simple and easy to grasp. One of the great things about this process is it keeps in the back of their minds: ‘We need to make sure we try to keep doing things the right way here.’”

Read the full article on AustinMonitor here.