A City Council committee has ordered staff to develop new proposals for rerouting traffic between North Oak Cliff and Downtown after neighbors warned the changes could isolate their community from the urban core.
The preferred plan would convert the Jefferson Street viaduct to two-way traffic but shift its Downtown endpoint from Young Street to Hotel Street, beneath the expanded Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center. Earlier designs had called for closing Houston Street — the current southbound route from Downtown into Oak Cliff — to vehicles and making it pedestrian-only.
City officials said rising costs on the more than $3 billion convention center redevelopment forced them to lower the building, eliminating a direct Jefferson connection. Director of Convention and Event Services Rosa Fleming told the committee the adjustment would save about $500 million, though some members questioned that figure.
“I have never seen anything in writing that says that,” Council member Paul Ridley told WFAA.
Residents of North Oak Cliff said the revisions would sever their access to Downtown and accused the city of turning its back on the neighborhood.
“Now they’re going to deprive us of getting to and from Downtown?” asked attorney John Barr, whose office sits just across the Trinity River. “Just because the guys doing the convention center are over budget?”
Barr said he is considering a lawsuit to block the change.
“This is a bad idea and they recognize it as a bad idea,” he said. “That’s like telling North Dallas, ‘We’re going to stop the Dallas North Tollway.’”
At the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee meeting on March 23, members told staff to return with alternative designs.
“You’re going to forever change the traffic, which is going to be a nightmare for people,” Council member Cara Mendelsohn said. “The truth is, if it’s going to take another $500 million to get it right, I’d rather spend that and have it done properly.”
Staff are scheduled to present revised options to the committee in April.