Every road in Texas is a bet on the future: that people will come, that freight will move, and that the underlying economy will continue to outpace yesterday’s infrastructure. And the Texas Department of Transportation’s job is simply to stay one step ahead.
In 2025, the agency argued how aggressively it is trying to do that. More than $60 billion in active construction was underway across the state, the largest portfolio in its history, with more than 11,000 projects in planning, design or construction at any given time. Behind that construction is the state’s financial engine: TxDOT’s 10-year Unified Transportation Program (UTP), the annually updated plan for prioritizing and funding transportation projects, which hit a record $104.2 billion, the second year in a row to top $100 billion.
Aerial view of Cresson Bypass, a TxDOT project designed to improve regional mobility by diverting traffic from local streets.
Photo courtesy of Texas Department of Transportation
Nearly half of that investment came from Proposition 1 (2014) and Proposition 7 (2015), voter-approved amendments that redirect oil and gas production taxes and portions of motor vehicle sales and rental taxes to the State Highway Fund, revenue streams that have become the backbone of Texas’ long-term mobility spending. The Texas A&M Transportation Institute estimates that the UTP generates approximately $29.4 billion in annual economic benefits and supports approximately 71,500 direct and indirect jobs.
On the execution side, a very competitive 2025 construction market helped TxDOT stretch its funding even further, allowing the agency to move forward on additional work. “Significant savings … have allowed us to advance more projects than we originally anticipated,” says Adam Hammons, the agency’s director of media relations, “and we expect to accelerate even more later in the fiscal year.” TxDOT expects to issue 768 construction awards by 2026.
Construction is nearing completion on Corpus Christi’s Harbor Bridge, where TxDOT is replacing the aging crossing with a cable-stayed structure designed to improve safety, increase capacity and accommodate larger vessels.
Photo courtesy of Texas Department of Transportation
State remodeling projects
The 2025 construction starts reflect everything TxDOT handles: urban rebuilding, rural safety improvements, flood-resistant infrastructure and at least one project that rewrote the record books. The year also saw notable awards highlighting innovation, safety and quality construction. Several districts won the Texas Bluebonnet Safety Award for incident-free performance, while the quality of the project was recognized through the TxDOT–Texas Asphalt Pavement Association Quality Pavement Awards. TxDOT projects also received regional recognition through the America’s Transportation Awards.
“We expect to accelerate even further later in the fiscal year.”
—Adam Hammons, director of media relations, TxDOT
In Corpus Christi, TxDOT opened the new Harbor Bridge in June. The $1.3 billion structure is the longest segmented concrete cable-stayed bridge in North America, carrying a six-lane divided roadway over the ship channel with 205 feet of clearance, sufficient for post-Panamax vessels.
In the Bryan/College Station area, the $671 million SH 6 Central BCS expansion, known locally as The Big 6, broke ground on December 1st. Awarded to Fluor Heavy Civil, the project will widen the corridor from four to six main lanes, reconfigure secondary lanes, add collector-distributor lanes, improve vehicle interchanges and incorporate shared vehicle and bike paths.
In Waco, the My35 Waco South project broke ground on February 24, targeting approximately three miles of I-35 between South Loop 340 and 12th Street. The $250 million effort will widen the main lanes from six to eight, rebuild overpasses and frontage roads, realign ramps, add sidewalks and introduce a diverging diamond interchange at Valley Mills Drive. Completion is scheduled for early 2029.
Construction crews work on Interstate 35 near New Braunfels as part of a TxDOT project along the fast-growing corridor between Austin and San Antonio.
Photo courtesy of David Salomon Lara
Houston anchors some of TxDOT’s most complex work. Segment 3 of the North Houston Highway Improvement Project represents a wholesale rethinking of the downtown interchange environment: rerouting I-45, widening I-69 with new express lanes, replacing the Pierce Elevated with downtown connectors, adding structural caps over depressed sections to create potential green space, and advanced drainage engineering to reduce flooding.
“We expect to accelerate even further later in the fiscal year.”
—Adam Hammons, director of media relations, TxDOT
Flood resiliency initiatives are also underway nearby, targeting an area that has flooded 10 times since 1992. The $407 million I-10 White Oak Bayou Reconstruction and Elevation Project includes raising 1.8 miles of the corridor above the 100-year floodplain, rebuilding the main bridge and replacing the main bridge and replacing the avenue HOV in La2nes. detention pond
Rural Texas is also experiencing significant investment. The SH 21/US 190 west widening in Madison County will convert approximately 20 miles of two-lane undivided roadway into a four-lane divided facility, separating oncoming traffic, straightening curves, adding shoulders and installing restricted U-turn intersections.
The geographic reach extends even further. In Austin, construction began on the Capital Express Central I-35 Lady Bird Lake and I-35 Tunnel projects. Dallas began construction on the I-30 Canyon project. San Antonio moved forward with I-35 NEX South Phase 2. In South Texas, the US 77 New Location Freeway moved forward in Kleberg County and US 281 was upgraded to freeway standards in Hidalgo County. “From helping local communities to providing substantial improvements to our major cities, these projects are helping to improve safety and ease congestion across the state,” says Hammons.
A section of I-35 is under construction as part of a long-term TxDOT project to modernize the corridor near Austin.
Photo courtesy of David Salomon Lara
looking ahead
Each region of Texas is straining the system in a different way: urban corridors choking on congestion, suburbs outgrowing their infrastructure, and rural communities seeking connectivity that drives economic growth. The priority that runs through all of this, however, is the same. “Every project has a safety element,” Hammons says, “and the state will continue to implement improvements to reduce accidents and save lives.”
And that emphasis is reflected in the data. By 2025, Texas was on track to record its lowest total for road deaths in more than five years. The progress supports TxDOT’s Road to Zero initiative, which aims to cut traffic deaths in half by 2035 and eliminate them entirely statewide by 2050, supported by $3.8 billion invested in more than 6,900 data-driven safety projects from 2015 to 2024. a 15 percent drop in annual delay hours, saving the average driver about $316 per year on TxDOT maintained roads.
Construction is progressing on I-35 in San Antonio, where TxDOT is rebuilding and widening the freeway to ease congestion on one of the city’s busiest routes.
Photo by Vince Kong/ENR
Technology is also reshaping the way the agency manages its portfolio. TxDOT released its AI Strategic Plan in late 2024 and updated it in January to keep pace with rapid advances, identifying 230 potential AI use cases to guide the agency over the next three years. “AI is no longer experimental at TxDOT,” says Marc Williams, executive director. “It is a strategic asset that is now integrated into our workflows and delivers measurable results.”
“AI is no longer experimental at TxDOT.”
—Marc Williams, TxDOT Executive Director
The broader technology initiative involves creating digital twins of finished assets, improving real-time traffic management and traveler information systems, using video analytics to detect incidents, and implementing a Texas Truck Parking Availability System that provides live data on commercial truck parking across the state.
For an agency that manages 11,000 projects across 268,000 square miles, system visibility is as vital as the construction itself. Roads are getting smarter, and so is the agency responsible for building them. With advanced tools and a record project portfolio, TxDOT is preparing the network for a Texas that shows no signs of slowing down.
