Few people in Dallas ride bikes for transportation. Dallas is a car city, and it will probably still be a car city when future archaeologists comb through the ruins of human civilization and pull our desiccated husks from fossilized car frames. Everyone knows that, but Dallas is far from the…
Dallas City Councilman Scott Griggs wasn’t pleased with the status update on the downtown-to-Oak Cliff streetcar line city staff delivered Monday. He wasn’t happy that planners had settled on a final color scheme (parallel bands of DART’s yellow, blue and white; picture here) without informing him. The Oak Cliff end…
The Dallas City Council may soon decide that requiring adults to wear bike helmets is a stupid idea — and if the city is indeed serious about starting a bike-share program, it probably is. But the helmet law is at least aimed at achieving a legitimate public policy goal (i.e…
There was an odd little dance on Friday between the city of Dallas and Virgin America after the carrier announced that it had struck a deal with American Airlines and would begin flying out of Love Field on October 13. Company executives predicted city approval would come swiftly and was…
Three airlines — Delta, Southwest, and Virgin America — have been battling for the final two gates at Dallas Love Field since American Airlines was forced to give them up to settle an antitrust suit brought by the federal government last August. Virgin is declaring victory. At a Friday morning…
Eight months after nearly regulating Uber out of existence to protect Yellow Cab’s near-monopoly in the city, Dallas is set to propose new taxi rules that sorta kinda resemble a free market. A draft of proposed “transportation for hire” regulations, crafted over several months by a committee led by City…
The Dallas Morning News’ Brandon Formby spent days, maybe weeks, trying to chase down Councilwoman Vonciel Jones Hill to get her views on tearing down I-345, the short nub of freeway dividing Deep Ellum from downtown. She wouldn’t talk, twice begging off because she was too busy, then just not…
Of late, the North Texas Tollway Authority has been testing out a host of new methods to encourage drivers to pay their tolls. The agency will block your vehicle registration and impound your car. It will publicly shame you. It will sue you. Sometimes, though, nothing works as well as…
The Texas Department of Transportation and its transportation-planning surrogates have unsheathed their latest weapon against the proposal to tear down I-345, and that weapon is poor people. The argument was first voiced by Dallas Morning News editorial writer Rodger Jones, who wondered a few days ago why the urban types…
In case you missed it, NPR ran a piece yesterday about Texas’ moderately surprising move toward bike-friendliness. The state, especially its cities, have been adding trails, bike lanes and pro-cycling policies at a respectable, if not quite Portland-esque, clip. Just look at Dallas’ ambitious bike plan, with its plans to…
When intrepid Observerer Amy Silverstein recently took DART to DFW International Airport, she missed her hypothetical flight and narrowly avoided being devoured by coyotes. She ultimately discovered that there was a bus that took her to the terminal, but the trip was long, arduous and complicated. That problem will be…
Don’t have a car but the bus isn’t your style? As part of our look at car-free Dallas living, Amy Silverstein weighs the pros and cons of other ways to get there from here. Taxi Pro: Even if you’re partying in a sketchy part of town, calling Yellow Cab guarantees…
As part of our look this week at what it means to live in Dallas without a car, Amy Silverstein put DART to the test to see how well it could get her from our offices at Oak Lawn and Maple avenues to D/FW International. There’s a United Airlines flight…
Critics of Uber say that without the heavy hand of city regulation, the app-based limo dispatching company won’t serve residents in poor neighborhoods. Critics of Yellow Cab complain that’s pretty much how things often work now. For our look at living car-free in Big D, Amy Silverstein pitted Yellow Cab…
For all the complaints about taxi service in Dallas — drivers often refuse to take credit cards, they dislike short hauls and sometimes they’re slow to arrive — making a living driving a cab in Dallas can be an iffy proposition. For our look at living car-free in Dallas, Amy…
The revelation last year that Dallas City Hall, in an effort to help its benefactors at Yellow Cab, was quietly working to put Uber out of business sparked a massive public outcry. Transportation hearings have turned into a referendum on the taxi industry. Uber has been called racist. And it’s…
Here’s an idea. What if, instead of maxing out its credit card on a road-building spree, Texas took care of the roads it already has? Crazy talk, right? If the past decade has proved anything, it’s that the state’s fiscal conservatism ends as soon as the asphalt begins. So who,…
When Lyft rolled into Dallas last fall, it was a popular cab alternative for city-dwellers who couldn’t afford Uber’s “surge pricing” and who also didn’t need to travel very far. But that’s about to change. Starting tomorrow afternoon, Lyft’s service area in Dallas will expand to a much bigger grid…
When DART updated nearly half of its bus fleet in 2012 and 2013, it opted for vehicles fueled by compressed natural gas. But fossil fuels are so 20th century, hence the transit agency’s just-announced plans to add all-electric buses. DART isn’t about to electrify its entire fleet. The plan right…
In news that should surprise no one, the Texas Department of Transportation will not tear down Interstate 345, the 1.7-mile stretch of highway separating Deep Ellum from downtown. The Dallas Morning News reported over the weekend that the agency will instead repair the aging span, citing the same concern voiced…
The Wright Amendment, the baldly anti-competitive 1979 law designed to protect DFW International Airport, dies for good on October 13, when the ban expires on direct flights from Love Field to anywhere that isn’t in Texas or the four states that border it. And what exciting new destinations might be…
We’ve all seen those desperate emails that Yellow Cab sent to Dallas City Hall last summer, using its influence there to demand that officials crack down on Uber, the digital-savvy car service. Poor Uber, the narrative went, just a little start-up under assault by the entrenched taxi industry. But when…
