Proposals to overhaul U.S. Highway 59, a major Houston evacuation route, may not sufficiently address its predisposition for flooding, the Texas Department of Transportation says.
U.S. Highway 59, a major evacuation route from Houston, has been a problem for East Texas for decades. And as flooding rivaling that of Hurricane Harvey inundated the region in April, the highway closed in several places, cutting off a major evacuation route for countless people seeking shelter from the floods. Plans to upgrade the highway, which stretches more than 600 miles through Texas from Laredo to Texarkana, to interstate standards have been on the books for decades.
Texas has poured millions of dollars over the past 30 years into upgrading parts of the highway to interstate standards — an effort known as the I-69 project — with the goal of relieving traffic congestion, supporting economic development, improving safety for travelers and upgrading a major evacuation route for the state’s most populous city. Thus far, only the part of U.S.
At present, there is no dedicated federal funding for the entire conversion of U.S. 59 to a future I-69 route through Texas,' the Federal Highway Administration said in an email statement. 'It is up to the State , to move projects forward.'
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