Map shows proposed oil pipeline’s route across Hill Country West of San Antonio

September 30, 2019
News

A planned crude oil and condensate pipeline across the Texas Hill Country would cross over the Edwards Aquifer Recharge Zone on its route from West Texas to south of San Antonio, according to a map obtained by the Rivard Report. A set of slides from Houston-based pipeline company Enterprise Products Partners dated September 2019 includes a route map that shows the pipeline extending from Midland County to Wilson County, crossing Upton, Reagan, Crockett, Schleicher, Sutton, Edwards, Real, Kerr, Bandera, Uvalde,…

TxDOT unveils plan to widen Loop 1604

September 30, 2019
News

Colleen Waguespack, president of Northside Neighborhoods for Organized Development, is among thousands of Northsiders familiar with the challenges that come with driving Loop 1604. Waguespack and more than 100 others gathered at Resurrection Baptist Church on Redland Road on Tuesday to review schematics and drawings that outline a State plan to widen 23 miles of the freeway. The Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) proposed to expand Loop 1604 to a 10-lane roadway between Bandera Road (Texas Highway 16) and Interstate…

One Water in action: Travis County Courthouse

September 30, 2019
Groundwater Resources

This summer, Travis County broke ground on the new Civil and Family Court Building. The 435,000 square foot facility is located at 1700 Guadalupe Street and sits on 1.46-acres. It is located in the northern part of downtown which is rapidly being re-developed. Travis County leadership realized early that construction of this new facility was a unique opportunity to deploy One Water strategies for the good of the community. Commissioner Brigid Shea worked closely with the City of Austin’s Water…

Houston company proposes crude oil pipeline across Edwards Aquifer

September 30, 2019
Land Conservation and Stewardship

A Houston pipeline company is planning to build a new crude oil pipeline across the Hill Country that would almost certainly pass over the recharge zone of the Edwards Aquifer, the main drinking water supply for the San Antonio region. Landowners in Bandera County earlier this month began receiving notices from Enterprise Products Partners, a publicly traded company that specializes in transporting oil and natural gas, about a new pipeline that would extend from Midland County in West Texas to…

Voters should confirm groundwater district in November

September 25, 2019
Groundwater Resources

I’ve been saying for a long time that we need a groundwater conservation district in western Travis County, and now we can confirm our very own this November. Southwestern Travis County Groundwater Conservation District covers 200 square miles of southwest Travis County south of the Colorado River and west of MoPac Boulevard (Loop 1), including Oak Hill, Bee Cave, Lakeway and parts of West Lake Hills. After years in the making, it was created during the 2017 legislative session with…

Ensuring One Water delivers for healthy waterways

September 24, 2019
Drought

Texas Living Waters is an active advocate for the One Water approach because it offers tremendous opportunities for improving how water is managed. Even so, we are concerned that the available One Water implementation frameworks are not providing adequate guidance or methodologies for ensuring that implementation of One Water principles will result in actual on-the-ground benefits in achieving “healthy waterways,” which is a key component of the One Water approach. There often seems to be an assumption that implementing a One Water…

Reflections on Texas, the outdoors and 40 years of writing and photography

September 23, 2019
Habitat Conservation Plans

Shannon Tompkins, who retires as September arrives and hunting seasons begin, has covered outdoor recreation and natural resources issues for four decades. September’s arrival marks a time of transition for Texas’ natural world and those whose hearts and actions are tied to the rhythms of land, water, sky and the life in, on and over it. This makes the month special for all Texans, but especially those of us who fish, hunt or otherwise spend time engaged with the natural…

A world rocked: Communities clamor for regulation as Texas mining industry explodes

September 23, 2019
Groundwater Resources

Kevin Baum gazes out from his second-floor porch across his 12-acre slice of Texas Hill Country heaven. On a cloudy day, he points past live oak trees and a kaleidoscope of wildflowers to Horseshoe Bay 20 miles to the south. When it’s clear, he says, he sees 30 miles farther, past rolling hills in the distance to the edges of Johnson City. Baum retired in 2005 after more than two decades with the Austin Fire Department, rising from entry-level firefighter…

Splash Into Science Snorkel Program launches at Spring Lake

September 23, 2019
Children in Nature

Spring Lake is renowned for being one of the most biologically diverse aquatic ecosystems in the country. While many visitors view Spring Lake’s artesian springs and teeming aquatic life on a glass-bottom boat, one can now get a closer look by enrolling in a new Splash into Science Snorkel Program from The Meadows Center for Water and the Environment at Texas State University. “Splash into Science is an immersive snorkeling program that provides low-impact educational fun,” said Dr. Rob Dussler,…

Kyle amends pipeline-related ordinance, files motion to dismiss Kinder Morgan’s lawsuit

September 23, 2019
News

Lawyers for the city of Kyle filed a motion Sept. 11 to dismiss Kinder Morgan’s lawsuit against the city, based in part on the City Council’s adoption, two days earlier, of an amended version of the pipeline development ordinance on which the suit was based. “Because plaintiffs’ challenge in this lawsuit is premised on the entirety of the ordinance as it stood prior to the amendments, its challenge in this case has been rendered moot,” the motion reads. According to…