{"id":455033,"date":"2026-10-03T06:36:16","date_gmt":"2026-10-03T06:36:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/455033\/"},"modified":"2026-10-03T06:36:16","modified_gmt":"2026-10-03T06:36:16","slug":"city-staff-reveals-latest-proposed-plan-for-the-jefferson-and-houston-viaducts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/455033\/","title":{"rendered":"City staff reveals latest proposed plan for the Jefferson and Houston viaducts"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Photo by Victoria Hernandez.<\/p>\n

Residents gathered at the Methodist Dallas Medical Center\u2019s Hitt Auditorium Thursday night for the latest updates regarding the Jefferson and Houston viaducts.<\/a><\/p>\n

City staff presented a new proposed rerouting of the viaducts\u2019 Downtown access following the feedback received from the community and the Dallas City Council decision to keep the lowered redesign<\/a> of the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center,<\/a> which requires the removal of the elevated portion of Market Street.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Rosa Fleming, director of convention and event services,<\/a> said that this proposed design is a response to what was heard from the community over the summer, and that staff took July and August to come up with this new design before bringing an update back to residents.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo this is more for the community and responding to the questions; we heard you, in short, and we understood what you were asking, and we accommodated that,\u201d Fleming said.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

A conceptual roadway plan for the Houston and Jefferson viaducts on display at a community meeting held Thursday, Oct. 1. Photo by Victoria Hernandez.<\/p>\n

Rather than rerouting the Jefferson Boulevard Viaduct around the lowered convention center with two-way traffic as previously presented, this proposal reroutes traffic heading north from the Jefferson Viaduct to run under the convention center and end at Lamar Street. The Houston Street Viaduct would no longer be reserved as pedestrian- and public transit-focused, which aligns with the Oak Farms Transportation Corridor Study,<\/a> but instead would include lanes of southbound traffic in addition to the streetcar and pedestrian\/bike lane.<\/p>\n

The Oak Farms study has not received funding by city officials, but Transportation and Public Works Director Gus Khankarli<\/a> added that this proposed concept \u201callows for a future conversion\u201d of a car-free Houston Street Viaduct if the council decided to fund that plan.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat we\u2019re saying here is we\u2019re building something that, if that study is ever implemented, whatever that time frame is, it can be done,\u201d Khankarli said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

During the construction phase, traffic from Jefferson would be rerouted via a north connector which runs by the Reunion parking garage, bringing northbound traffic to the Houston Street viaduct heading toward Young Street. The pedestrian and bicycle traffic would be detoured to the northern entrance of the garage to Hotel Street.<\/p>\n

This change during construction would reduce traffic to one lane northbound and one lane southbound. Khankarli said the temporary configuration is expected to last approximately four years, with a projection to start construction toward the end of 2026.<\/p>\n

Meeting attendees raised concerns about the impact that these changes will have on traffic. Khankarli said that an earlier traffic study estimated about a five-minute delay during the construction phase for vehicular traffic.<\/p>\n

He said that traffic studies will also be done for current and future conditions.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo all the traffic models will be updated \u2026 because this is the initial concept, and we will be developing the traffic study model,\u201d Khankarli said.<\/p>\n

There were also concerns raised about the lack of communication to the community. One resident suggested a video that shows the path traffic would take and the need for information available for the Latino community, such as Spanish translation.<\/p>\n

Fleming said that Thursday evening was just the first community meeting.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s going to be several,\u201d she said. \u201cThere\u2019s going to be bilingual meetings as well.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Photo by Victoria Hernandez. Residents gathered at the Methodist Dallas Medical Center\u2019s Hitt Auditorium Thursday night for the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":455034,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[102,104,103,153148,156230,152178,152179,9728,156231,156232,90279],"class_list":["post-455033","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-dallas","tag-dallas","tag-dallas-headlines","tag-dallas-news","tag-department-of-transportation-and-public-works","tag-gus-khankarli","tag-houston-viaduct","tag-jefferson-viaduct","tag-kay-bailey-hutchison-convention-center","tag-oak-farms-study","tag-oak-farms-tranportation-corridor-study","tag-rosa-fleming"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455033","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=455033"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455033\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/455034"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=455033"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=455033"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=455033"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}