Texas is huge, so it probably shouldn’t be surprising that keeping the state connected takes a massive amount of money, planning, and construction. Still, the scale of Texas transportation infrastructure is pretty wild.

Texas Happens has a good related read on how highways helped shape the state’s growth and connectivity: How Did the Construction of Highways Transform Texas?

Texas spends over $15 billion a year on transportation infrastructure, supporting highways, bridges, major road improvements, safety upgrades, and congestion relief. And considering how much Texans rely on roads to connect cities, ports, suburbs, small towns, ranchland, energy hubs, and rural communities, that investment touches just about everyone.

A few quick facts about Texas roads:

• Texas has about 325,684 centerline miles of public roads statewide.
• Those roads add up to more than 707,000 lane miles.
• Texas roads carry about 842.8 million vehicle miles of travel per day.
• Truck traffic alone accounts for about 95.8 million daily vehicle miles.
• TxDOT maintains roughly 81,180 centerline miles, while local and off-system roads account for about 244,504 miles.
• Texas has the largest bridge inventory in the nation, with 56,620 bridges.
• The average Texas bridge is about 44 years old.
• Texas also has 33 international highway bridges, helping connect the U.S. and Mexico.
• Proposition 7 helps fund non-tolled roads and transportation debt reduction through dedicated sales tax and motor vehicle tax revenue.
• TxDOT’s 2026 transportation plan includes more than $146 billion in projected investment over 10 years.
• A lot of that funding targets safety, congestion relief, rural corridors, major economic routes, and the state’s most congested roadways.

It’s easy to joke that Texas roads are “always under construction,” but with this much traffic, freight, population growth, and distance to cover, it kind of makes sense.

This is Luther Wharton, photographed in 1913 by Lewis Hine for the National Child Labor Committee.

Luther was twelve years old and worked as a delivery boy for Sommers Drug Store. His schedule was brutal: school during the day, then work from 4:00 PM until midnight. On Sundays, he worked half a day. He made $5 a week.

This story also connects to the broader history of labor struggles in San Antonio, including later movements such as the city’s famous Pecan Shellers’ Strike.

He also delivered medicines to “Red Light places” several times a day, and Hine described the job as a heavy physical and moral burden for a boy his age.

This was happening in San Antonio, where messenger and delivery boys were part of the street economy.

It’s hard to look at this and not think about how recent this kind of child labor really was. This wasn’t medieval history. This was only a few generations ago, in the United States, and it took photographs like Hine’s to help show the public what “normal work” looked like for a lot of children.

Read the full write up - https://texashappens.com/oil-theft-in-texas-the-hidden-crime-costing-the-energy-industry-millions/

This image shows Lawrence Sullivan “Sul” Ross, governor of Texas from 1887 to 1891. Ross is one of those 19th-century Texas figures whose life reads like several careers stacked on top of each other: Texas Ranger, Confederate brigadier general, state senator, governor, and later president of what is now Texas A&M.

The image itself is almost as interesting as the man. It looks like an old photograph, but it’s actually a commercial color lithograph from around 1888. It came from W. Duke, Sons & Co.’s “Governors, Arms, Etc.” series, a set of tobacco trade cards featuring state governors and symbols. The Met lists this one as part of an unnumbered 48-card set.

These cards were basically 19th-century collectibles and ads rolled into one. Tobacco companies used small illustrated cards to promote brands, encourage repeat purchases, and get people collecting complete sets. This one promoted Honest Long Cut tobacco; another version of the same series promoted Duke’s cigarettes and related brands.

Ross’s public image at the time fit perfectly into this kind of advertising: a rugged, military, frontier-politics figure who could be packaged as a symbol of Texas. But his legacy is complicated. He was celebrated by many Texans for his Ranger service, Confederate service, governorship, and later work at Texas A&M, but his frontier career also included violence against Native communities, including the Pease River fight connected to the recapture of Cynthia Ann Parker.

So this little card is more than a portrait. It’s a tiny piece of late-1800s mass marketing: tobacco companies turning politicians, state pride, and frontier mythology into collectible advertising.

So we compared Texas and Mars across the metrics that truly matter: moons, population, traffic, BBQ, tacos, swagger, and general “could I survive there without crying?” energy.

Mars has two moons, no traffic, and a lot of mysterious red-planet vibes.

Texas has tacos, BBQ, Buc-ee’s, 31.7 million people, and the confidence of a planet that has not technically been recognized by NASA.

Final ruling:

Mars wins on moons and traffic sanity.

Texas wins on food, guns, attitude, and mystique.

Honestly, Mars may be cool, but until it gets a decent breakfast taco and a gas station with 80 gas pumps and spotless restrooms, we are not impressed.

From the top, you can see downtown landmarks, surrounding neighborhoods, and distant Hill Country terrain. An elevator ride takes visitors to the observation deck for panoramic city views.

A revolving restaurant and indoor exhibits add to the experience. Clear days provide the best visibility, especially around sunset.

Notable facts:

• HemisFair ’68 celebrated San Antonio’s 250th anniversary.
• San Antonio approved $5.2 million in bonds for construction of the tower.
• Began in 1966 and was completed in about 18 months.
• Designed by noted San Antonio architect O’Neil Ford.
• The Flags Over Texas Observation Deck offers panoramic views of San Antonio.
• Its 1.4-million-pound “top house” was built at ground level and lifted into place using steel rods.
• It served as the theme structure and centerpiece of HemisFair ’68.

The Tower of the Americas offers one of the highest viewpoints in South Texas.

In the late 19th century, the Texas Rangers embodied frontier justice, law enforcement, and rugged independence. This historic image of Company D from 1887 shows men whose jobs took them across wide open country, small towns, and unsettled borders to maintain order in an era of rapid population growth and economic change.

Rangers tracked outlaws, protected settlers, and pursued cattle rustlers — often under harsh conditions and without the modern tools of policing that exist today. Their uniforms, rifles, and quiet confidence became iconic symbols of Texas law enforcement and resilience.

While their legacy is complex, encompassing both celebrated service and controversial episodes, the Rangers’ impact on Texas identity remains undeniable. Portraits like this one capture a chapter of history when lawmen were on horseback, paths were unpaved, and authority was as mobile as the frontier itself.

#TexasHistory #TexasRangers #FrontierLaw #1880s #LawAndOrder

This image is a 1907 postcard showing San Pedro Springs Park and Lake in San Antonio, Texas. It was published by Raphael Tuck & Sons, a major postcard publisher of the era, and is now part of the University of Houston Libraries Digital Collections.

San Pedro Springs Park is one of the most historically layered places in San Antonio. Long before it became a city park, the springs were a gathering place for Indigenous peoples, including the Payaya, whose village Yanaguana was located near the water. Spanish explorers later recognized the springs as a crucial water source, and the area became tied to the early development of San Antonio itself.

The park was set aside for public use under Spanish rule in the 18th century, and in 1852 San Antonio formally dedicated the area as a public square. Over the years it became a major leisure spot, with gardens, pavilions, ponds, a small zoo, concerts, boating, and later a swimming pool and theater.

What I like about this postcard is how it captures San Pedro Springs as both a natural landmark and a civic pleasure ground. The lake, walkways, trees, and figures in the scene make it feel like a turn-of-the-century travel souvenir, but the place itself goes back much further than the postcard era.

It is a small image, but it shows a site connected to Indigenous history, Spanish colonial settlement, early San Antonio, Victorian-era recreation, and Texas park history all at once.

So Elon Musk apparently wants to build TERAFAB, a gigantic chip-manufacturing project tied to Tesla, SpaceX, and xAI. The pitch is basically: “We need more AI chips than the world can supply, so we’ll just make our own.” Very normal sentence. Nothing weird there.

The proposed chip factory would be the latest chapter in Elon Musk’s growing Austin tech empire, connecting Tesla, SpaceX, xAI, and Texas’ broader push to become a serious semiconductor and AI hub.

I’m skeptical.

Not because custom chips are a bad idea. Tesla, SpaceX, and xAI all have obvious reasons to want priority access to silicon: self-driving cars, Optimus robots, AI training/inference, satellites, maybe even orbital data centers. If you believe Musk’s roadmap, every one of his companies eventually becomes a chip-gobbling monster.

The problem is that designing chips and manufacturing leading-edge chips are wildly different sports. A fab is not a car factory with cleaner floors. It is chemistry, optics, ultra-pure water, advanced lithography, insane process control, yield management, materials supply chains, packaging, testing, and years of operational discipline. ASML’s own EUV history took decades, billions in R&D, and a global technical ecosystem to become viable at scale. (ASML)

And the numbers are already getting Musk-y. The public-facing announcement was framed around a $20B-ish Austin project, but Grimes County’s official public-hearing notice says SpaceX is proposing $55B for initial phases and up to $119B if additional phases are built. That is not a rounding error. That is “the original headline may have been the teaser trailer” money. (DataCenterDynamics)

Why would he do it anyway?

Because this gives him leverage. Even if TERAFAB never becomes the TSMC-killer implied by the branding, announcing it helps Musk tell investors, suppliers, politicians, and competitors: “I am not just another Nvidia customer.” It supports the narrative that Tesla/SpaceX/xAI are vertically integrated AI infrastructure companies, not merely car/rocket/chatbot companies waiting in line for GPUs.

It also gives him a bargaining chip with existing chipmakers, a tax-incentive magnet, a recruiting billboard, and a way to justify why all his companies should be treated as one giant AI ecosystem. If you squint, TERAFAB is not just a fab. It is a valuation story.

For Austin/Central Texas, the impact could be huge — but not all upside.

Best case: more high-paying engineering jobs, more semiconductor suppliers, more construction work, more university partnerships, and Central Texas becomes a serious AI hardware corridor alongside Samsung in Taylor and Tesla in eastern Travis County. Samsung’s Austin/Taylor footprint reportedly supported tens of thousands of regional jobs and billions in economic impact, so the upside is real. (Samsung Semiconductor Global)

Worst case: Austin gets the hype, land speculators get rich, local governments hand out incentives, and residents get stuck with the boring physical reality: water demand, power demand, wastewater, traffic, housing pressure, and another wave of “economic development” that mostly benefits people who already owned land.

Water is the big red flag. Tesla’s Giga Texas treated-water use reportedly rose almost 60% from 2023 to 2025, reaching 556 million gallons annually and making it Austin Water’s third-largest customer. A water expert quoted by Austin Current said a typical North American semiconductor plant might need one to two million gallons per day, and a TERAFAB-scale facility could need even more. (Austin Current)

Housing is the other one. Look at Taylor: Samsung’s fab is bringing jobs and investment, but local reporting also describes residents dealing with affordability pressure and displacement fears. A new Musk megaproject would probably pour gasoline on that dynamic across eastern Travis County, Bastrop, Taylor, Hutto, Manor, and possibly the Bryan/College Station–Grimes County corridor. (Austin Free Press)

My guess: Austin proper gets the R&D, recruiting, executive theater, and “future of civilization” press conference energy. The actual heavy industrial footprint goes wherever Musk can get thousands of acres, enough power, water access, and the friendliest tax deal. The newer Grimes County filing already points in that direction. (Kut)

Could he pull it off? Maybe, but “build the world’s biggest vertically integrated AI chip fab” is not the same category as “move fast and weld stainless steel.” Even TSMC’s Arizona expansion is a multi-fab, multi-decade, $165B-scale effort, and that is from the company that already knows how to do this better than anyone. (TSMC)

So yeah: I don’t read TERAFAB as “Elon casually entering chip manufacturing.” I read it as a sign that his AI ambitions are so supply-constrained, capital-hungry, and narratively inflated that he now has to pretend the only reasonable next step is reinventing the semiconductor supply chain in Texas.

Looking through recent small-business data for Texas, and the growth over the latest five-year public-data window is pretty significant.

High-level numbers:

• Texas now has 3,517,343 small businesses
• Small businesses make up 99.8% of all businesses in the state
• They employ more than 5.1 million Texans
• The small-business count increased by about 557,000, or 18.8%
• Most of the growth came from businesses without employees, such as sole proprietors, independent contractors, freelancers, consultants, and owner-operated businesses
• Small-business employment still grew too, adding more than 237,000 workers
• Some of the biggest industry gains were in transportation/warehousing, construction, professional services, administrative support, and real estate

It also lines up with some of the broader industries driving the Texas economy, including construction, logistics, real estate, professional services, and energy-related sectors:
https://texashappens.com/what-are-the-top-10-industries-in-texas/

The biggest takeaway to is that Texas small-business growth is not just about traditional storefronts or employer companies. A lot of it is coming from solo operators and independent businesses, which says a lot about how entrepreneurship is changing.

U.S. Small Business Administration Office of Advocacy, 2025 Texas Small Business Economic Profile - https://advocacy.sba.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/Texas_2025-State-Profile.pdf

Texas Scientists Confirm Texas Has the Tallest Mountain in the World

AUSTIN, TX — In a breakthrough that has stunned the global scientific community and mildly annoyed Colorado, a joint team of researchers from the University of Texas and Texas A&M has confirmed that Texas is home to the tallest mountain in the world.

The discovery was made during what began as a routine research project to measure geological formations in West Texas. According to officials, the project quickly became “less routine” after scientists noticed that every measurement they took somehow became larger whenever the word “Texas” was written next to it.

“We started with Guadalupe Peak,” said Dr. Landry McGraw, a University of Texas geologist wearing a burnt-orange lab coat and carrying a laser rangefinder shaped suspiciously like a barbecue thermometer. “At first, the numbers looked normal. But then we adjusted for Texan pride, local legend, brisket density, and football-season elevation. That’s when the mountain shot up past Everest.”

The research team, made up of Longhorns and Aggies, reportedly spent six months debating methodology, three months debating barbecue sauce, and one entire afternoon debating whether a mountain can be measured from sea level if Texas does not emotionally recognize sea level as an authority.

Texas A&M scientist Dr. Earl “Rock” Henderson said the team’s findings are undeniable.

“Traditional geology measures a mountain from its base to its peak,” Henderson explained. “But traditional geology was invented by people who clearly were not from Texas. We used a more accurate model: base to peak, plus historical significance, cowboy hat height, state confidence, and the number of times someone has said ‘Don’t mess with Texas’ within a 50-mile radius.”

Using this advanced system, the researchers determined that Texas’ tallest mountain is not merely Guadalupe Peak, nor any known physical formation. Instead, the tallest mountain is the entire state of Texas “when viewed from the correct angle.”

That angle, according to the report, is “from Texas.”

The mountain, now officially referred to by researchers as Mount Texas, is believed to rise approximately 4.7 million feet above ordinary measurement standards. Scientists admitted the exact number may fluctuate depending on humidity, high school football rankings, and whether an Aggie or Longhorn is holding the calculator.

“We checked the math several times,” said Dr. McGraw. “Then Texas A&M checked it. Then we checked their math. Then we both got mad and checked it again. Eventually, we all agreed the mountain was tall enough to end the argument.”

The discovery has already caused tension in the global mountain community. Mount Everest released no official statement, though sources close to the Himalayas described the mood as “thin air and hurt feelings.”

Colorado scientists were especially skeptical.

“This is absurd,” said Dr. Meredith Pike of the Rocky Mountain Institute. “A state cannot simply declare itself a mountain because it feels tall.”

Texas officials responded by reminding Colorado that it is “a lovely little hill collection with excellent skiing.”

The research paper, published in the respected journal Texan Advances in Extremely Confident Science, includes charts, satellite scans, cowboy boot diagrams, and one graph labeled “Height, but Make It Texas.” The graph shows Texas towering above Everest, K2, Denali, and “all other places that tried their best.”

The study also notes that Texas’ elevation increases significantly during the following events: college football season, rodeo weekends, bluebonnet photo shoots, chili cook-offs, and whenever someone from out of state says, “Texas isn’t that big.”

Governor’s office representatives have reportedly ordered new highway signs reading:

WELCOME TO TEXAS: PLEASE BEGIN YOUR ASCENT

Tourism officials are also considering guided expeditions across the state. Suggested equipment includes water, sunscreen, boots, a strong opinion about barbecue, and at least one relative who claims to know a shortcut.

Despite the rivalry between the universities, both UT and Texas A&M scientists say the project has brought them closer together.

“For one brief moment, we put aside our differences,” said Henderson. “We stood there, looked at the data, and realized something bigger than all of us was happening.”

“Texas,” McGraw added.

At press time, the same research team announced plans for a follow-up study investigating whether the Texas sky is technically higher than the rest of the world.

This mural is “Texas Longhorn—A Vanishing Breed,” painted by Ila Turner McAfee in 1941 for the post office in Clifton, Texas.

It was part of the Treasury Department’s New Deal-era public art program, which put murals and sculptures in post offices across the country. The idea was simple but kind of beautiful: bring art into everyday public spaces, not just museums.

The scene shows longhorns grazing among cactus, bluebonnets, and open Texas country—a nostalgic image of a breed and landscape that were already being framed as disappearing. I love that it’s still hanging right there in the Clifton post office, quietly doing its job decades later.

There’s been a lot of back-and-forth over whether Fort Worth or Austin is now the fourth-largest city in Texas. For a brief moment, estimates showed Fort Worth pulling ahead. Then updated numbers had Austin reclaiming the No. 4 spot.

But honestly, the population race is only part of what makes this interesting.

Fort Worth and Austin feel like two very different versions of Texas growth.

Fort Worth’s growth feels more spread out, practical, and industry-driven. It has the Stockyards identity, a strong Western/cowtown culture, aerospace, defense, logistics, manufacturing, and room to keep expanding. This DFW Happens piece on why Fort Worth feels different from Dallas gets at that local identity pretty well: Fort Worth is part of the Metroplex, but it does not feel like a Dallas clone.

Austin’s growth feels more tech-driven, dense, and culture-heavy. It has the state capital, UT, startups, tech companies, music, festivals, and that “weird Austin” identity, even if a lot of longtime residents would say that culture has changed a lot with growth and rising costs. This Austin Happens article on Silicon Hills and Austin’s tech culture sums up how much Austin’s modern identity is tied to tech, entrepreneurship, and creative energy.

So when people argue over which city is bigger, I think the better question is: which city is growing in a more sustainable way?

Fort Worth seems to have more room to absorb growth, but it also has to figure out infrastructure, transit, and identity as it becomes a million-person city.

Austin has a stronger national brand and tech economy, but housing costs and congestion have made growth feel more strained.

Both cities are booming, but they’re not becoming the same place.

Fort Worth feels like Texas’ next big-scale growth city. Austin feels like Texas’ established innovation/culture capital.

Curious what others think: is the No. 4 ranking actually meaningful, or is metro influence/culture more important than city-limit population?

There’s been a lot of back-and-forth over whether Fort Worth or Austin is now the fourth-largest city in Texas. For a brief moment, estimates showed Fort Worth pulling ahead. Then updated numbers had Austin reclaiming the No. 4 spot.

But honestly, the population race is only part of what makes this interesting.

Fort Worth and Austin feel like two very different versions of Texas growth.

Fort Worth’s growth feels more spread out, practical, and industry-driven. It has the Stockyards identity, a strong Western/cowtown culture, aerospace, defense, logistics, manufacturing, and room to keep expanding. This DFW Happens piece on why Fort Worth feels different from Dallas gets at that local identity pretty well: Fort Worth is part of the Metroplex, but it does not feel like a Dallas clone.

Austin’s growth feels more tech-driven, dense, and culture-heavy. It has the state capital, UT, startups, tech companies, music, festivals, and that “weird Austin” identity, even if a lot of longtime residents would say that culture has changed a lot with growth and rising costs. This Austin Happens article on Silicon Hills and Austin’s tech culture sums up how much Austin’s modern identity is tied to tech, entrepreneurship, and creative energy.

So when people argue over which city is bigger, I think the better question is: which city is growing in a more sustainable way?

Fort Worth seems to have more room to absorb growth, but it also has to figure out infrastructure, transit, and identity as it becomes a million-person city.

Austin has a stronger national brand and tech economy, but housing costs and congestion have made growth feel more strained.

Both cities are booming, but they’re not becoming the same place.

Fort Worth feels like Texas’ next big-scale growth city. Austin feels like Texas’ established innovation/culture capital.

Curious what others think: is the No. 4 ranking actually meaningful, or is metro influence/culture more important than city-limit population?