For 50 years, the upper decks of I-35 have loomed over Central Austin and lifted traffic noise high into the air. With those elevated lanes slated to come down starting next year, people who live alongside them must decide by today if they want a new concrete barrier in their backyards.
At 21-feet tall and nearly half-a-mile long, a proposed noise wall in the Cherrywood neighborhood would stretch from 30th Street to 38 1/2 Street with gaps for cross streets. The barrier is meant to block some of the sound from the largest-ever expansion of the highway, which has run through Central Austin since 1962.
“I think a 21-foot-wall is really extreme,” said PJ Raval, a filmmaker and UT associate professor. “That’s going to block the sun.”
The concrete wall would be built just 3 feet from Raval’s backyard. His home on Robinson Avenue is among a line of midcentury houses that now sit on the edge of the interstate’s widened footprint. Businesses that once served as a buffer between homes and the highway have been torn down to make space for the extra lanes…