If you have driven anywhere in the city of Denton over the past few years, you have noticed it. Orange barrels. Lane closures. Freshly churned earth where sidewalks used to be.
Here is my opinion, formed by watching this city tear itself apart and rebuild wider: We are committing more than $1 billion to projects that will worsen our air quality, and we are doing it while congratulating ourselves for having a climate plan.
The scale is hard to overstate. A $583-million I-35 widening that runs through January 2029. A separate $584-million I-35E/W split project will span nearly five years. Denton County has allocated another $295 million from a road bond for roughly 120 additional projects since 2023. All told, state and county agencies have committed more than $1.4 billion to major road projects affecting Denton—work that will reshape the city’s streets well into the next decade. The justification is familiar: Denton’s population has grown about 26 percent since 2020, and the roads must keep up. Addressing that growth often requires immediate capacity improvements, even as longer-term solutions are harder to implement.
