Austin seems to have a pretty nice grid of wide streets especially downtown with a decent network of arterial streets outside of downtown with most streets still following a grid pattern for the most part. I just don't see how that is so different from other similar sized cities. The highway network isn't that high capacity compared to some other cities of similar size, but the local street network does not seem under capacity compared to other cities. Boston has a worse local street network than Austin manages to have a good transit system. I bring up Boston because it is known for having a poorly designed under-capacity local street network and I just don't see how Austin with a regular grid of 3-6 lane streets downtown and large arterial streets connecting the rest of the metro can be considered to not have plentiful streets for transit. There are plenty of wide streets downtown that could easily have a transit reservation and room for cars with the same being true of the arterial streets that extend out from downtown.
TLDR: Austin's road network doesn't seem subpar unless it is only compared to other cities in the southwest, but when compared to many northeastern and midwestern cities of similar size it seems pretty comparable and has plenty of space for transit.
Last edited by Citylover94; Mar 9, 2020 at 12:42 PM.
|