Free Republic

Several key Central Texas highway projects — including expansions of U.S. 183 in North Austin, U.S. 290 in Southwest Austin and Interstate 35 through the heart of the area — are once again in limbo after Gov. Greg Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick last week staked out firm anti-toll positions. “Right now there’s a billion dollars worth of projects on hold, between 183 and Oak Hill,” said Mike Heiligenstein, executive director of the Central Texas Regional Mobility Authority. The I-35 project, estimated to cost $8 billion to add toll lanes and other improvements from Round Rock to Buda, was...

The southern, privately built section of Texas 130, which has been an obstacle course of bumps and cracks since shortly after its October 2012 opening, will see $60 million of pavement repairs over the next year in 35 spots between Mustang Ridge and Seguin. Crews in many cases will be removing five feet or more of the road’s “sub-base,” the treated and compacted soil layers that underlie the highway’s asphalt driving surface, replacing it with soil with different, stronger properties, and then repaving those rehabilitated sections. Some repairs will also include installation of impermeable layers of soil alongside the road...

It's been almost 3 1/2 years since Austin club owner Paresh Patel was last seen. He was leaving one of his clubs on Sixth Street on a late September afternoon with thousands of dollars in cash. Patel told a relative in a subsequent cell phone call that he was heading to another of his clubs in the Warehouse District. But he never arrived. He failed to pick up his children that evening. No one has heard from him since. During a federal court trial that ended last week, Patel's story re-emerged. Three members of the Texas Syndicate prison gang were...