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• CAMPO Moves Forward

CAMPO Moves Forward with $2.2B Toll Plan

Tuesday, October 9, 2007 - 2:32 PM CDT

In a lively meeting at Anderson High School in Northwest Austin Monday evening, the Capital Area Metropolitan Planning Organization gave the green light to build five toll roads.

The new toll plan, which replaces a 2004 toll road plan that was approved but later scrapped, includes tolls on four existing roads and the proposed State Highway 45 Southwest. The following roads will be expanded via toll roads: U.S. 290 East from U.S. Highway 183 to State Highway 130, U.S. 183 from Springdale Drive to Patton Ave., SH 71 East from Riverside Drive to U.S. 183, and the convergence of U.S. 290 West and SH 71 in Oak Hill.

SH 45 from MoPac Expressway South to FM 1626, which doesn't yet exist, will be four-lane tollways with a free frontage lane on each side. The total estimated cost of the five projects CAMPO approved is $2.2 billion.

A majority of the CAMPO board voted for the proposed toll plans, with four board members - Austin City Council Member Jennifer Kim, Hays County Judge Liz Sumter, Jeff Mills, State Rep. Eddie Rodriguez and Sunset Valley Council Member Jeff Mills - voting "no" on all five items. Travis County Commissioner Sarah Eckhardt voted against the SH 45 SW plan and Sen. Kirk Watson, also the CAMPO chair, recused himself from the vote on U.S. 290 East because he is the director of a bank that has land along that road.