AURA: Austinites for Urban Rail Action

We want an Austin where we improve our public transit system by building urban rail on our best corridor(s) to support the overall expansion of transit service.

[AURA: Austinites for Urban Rail Action @aura_atx]

Austinites for Urban Rail Action believes honesty when you’re spending this amount of public money is a moral imperative. Other organizations with names that are similar to ours but aren’t an acronym (don’t stand for anything) may feel differently.

[AURA: Austinites for Urban Rail Action @aura_atx]

It’s troubling how many people are repeating the claim that the starter segments of Austin’s light rail network announced today don’t change anything in the eventual plan; just the order in which they are delivered. Whether made through ignorance or malice, it’s not true.

[AURA: Austinites for Urban Rail Action @aura_atx]

Most importantly, Capital Metro and the ATP need to act with a philosophy of honesty. It’s not honest to let people believe nothing is being lost here; and they’ll eventually figure it out. Better you be the one to tell them than to appear to be hiding it from them.

[AURA: Austinites for Urban Rail Action @aura_atx]

Putting things beyond sensible capital investment in one good rail route in the 2020 referendum directly led to the outcome today with the state government. It’s unfortunate that so few people remember that the state we live in is hostile to transit and must be treated carefully.

[AURA: Austinites for Urban Rail Action @aura_atx]

@txbeergoddess @chrisewen Since the other group explicitly dropped the acronym “Austinites for Urban Rail Action”, it logically became available for whomever else wanted to pick it up.

[AURA: Austinites for Urban Rail Action @aura_atx]

A local person has accused us of being fraudulent. For the record: the acronym reflects the facts that we are Austinites, and that we are in favor of urban rail action. Any other "AURA" means something other than that. Ask them what it stands for if you are curious.

[AURA: Austinites for Urban Rail Action @aura_atx]

@txbeergoddess @chrisewen That group doesn’t use AURA as an acronym. Ask them.

[AURA: Austinites for Urban Rail Action @aura_atx]

@chrisewen @CurtRog This account’s name makes it very clear what it is. After the colon. The other AURA account is acting in bad faith by trying to silence a pro-transit voice in Austin.

[AURA: Austinites for Urban Rail Action @aura_atx]

@txbeergoddess AURA actually meant “Austinites for Urban Rail Action” circa 2013-2016. Ask other AURA twitter accounts what acronym they represent if you like!

[AURA: Austinites for Urban Rail Action @aura_atx]

@CurtRog (and very rarely used at that. Only necessary when there’s something timely that I know that most other people do not know, that would be lost in my main. Like today. Before that, many months ago?)

[AURA: Austinites for Urban Rail Action @aura_atx]

@CurtRog I did this a long time ago because my personal account has a bunch of other things in it, and people who honestly are only interested in transit were never going to see the content that way. Completely honest and earnest on this here.

[AURA: Austinites for Urban Rail Action @aura_atx]

The content of that reply would have been: if LSTAR has the same <1 in 1 million chance at being built as last time, on balance it hurts rather than complements Project Connect, as it consumes some scarce political and financial capital.

[AURA: Austinites for Urban Rail Action @aura_atx]

In the time it took to draft the reply to the tweet on the bottom, the anonymous people behind this new effort to enrich consultants and grifters have blocked this account.

[AURA: Austinites for Urban Rail Action @aura_atx]

@RestartLSRD To be clear, lots of money and political will were wasted on the last effort; money and political will that would have been very useful for Project Connect. The local reserves of money and political will are fairly shallow and should not be spent on obvious fools’ errands.

[AURA: Austinites for Urban Rail Action @aura_atx]

The previous effort consumed (wasted) a lot of political and financial capital on a project that was never going to happen, due to the obvious disincentives to moving freight off the existing UP route. What will be different this time around?

[AURA: Austinites for Urban Rail Action @aura_atx]

@RestartLSRD If you expect the public to support another effort at this, you should clearly explain what you think has changed since the last time. More federal funding is not a good enough answer.