After an accident this afternoon involving an 18-wheeler and a bus left oil on the road, the northbound side near 11400 IH-35 (near Onion Creek) is currently closed while crews clean up. [KXAN via Twitter]......

Road closures downtown for tomorrow's festivities. City of Austin needs more lifeguards to keep summer water programs operating. Holly Street neighborhood concerned about five-story condo development set to be built across the street from the old power plant. New Leander high school will be named after a soldier (and Leander High grad) killed in Iraq. A woman may have lured a man into a Fourth Street alley where he was robbed and beaten by two men Monday night....

A chunk of Cesar Chavez will be closed from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. this Sunday as the City continues converting the downtown street to 2-way. They will be installing conduit for a streetlight at the Guadalupe/Cesar Chavez intersection, and the street will be closed from about San Antonio to Lavaca; the S. 1st Street bridge will be closed at Riverside. Plan any downtown excursion on Sunday accordingly! [City of Austin]......

The Austin Police Department is conducting a web survey about driving safety and driving behaviour. With just a few clicks you can agree or disagree with questions like "There are a lot of bad drivers on the road." "Bad" seems redundant, but there are certainly a lot of drivers on the road, so umm ... "Strongly Agree" seems right....

A wall at Rice University campus collapsed this afternoon, trapping four people. Millions of pounds of toxins from Mexico may soon be headed for incineration in Port Arthur if the EPA approves an exemption. Gov. Perry agrees with his buddy in the White House on lifting the ban on offshore exploration. "This is likely not the finest moment for DPS," Texas Public Safety Commission chairman admits after an internal investigation into how an arsonist was able to bypass security and set fire to the Governor's Mansion. Worst exit in Texas at southbound IH35 and MLK, second worst at northbound IH35 and Riverside. Or so this study says, anyway....

Candidate for City Council Cid Galindo failed to list over $60,000 worth of expenses on his campaign finance forms. 21-yr-old man accused of propositioning 12-yr-old boy at Ruiz Library. After this second alcohol-related arrest in a month, former Longhorn Cedric Benson is cut from the Chicago Bears. San Antonio man driving the wrong way on IH35 in Georgetown dies early this morning after hitting a truck head-on. Not really a surprise: burn ban set for Travis County....

Around 9:00 p.m. on Sunday evening, an event police are calling a "freak accident" took the life of a driver who fell from the Ben White overpass above I-35. ...

Students at Clayton Elementary win national math championship. Pedestrian dies after being hit by two cars (neither of which stopped) last night near Riverside and Montopolis. The shoe with human remains found this weekend near Lake Travis matches one found a mile away in 2007. Chief fires fireman who chose to pick up food from a restaurant before responding to a respiratory distress call. A New York state judge rules that Dell engaged in false advertising practices....

South African mob violence leads to the deaths of 22 immigrants. Here's a nice piece on Bush's current efforts to lower oil prices before the the U.S. Presidential election. U.S. soldier is refusing to serve in America's "illegal war." The latest science on sexual orgasms. Those of who commute on I-35 each day, take note. Lots of delays planned. UT just approved a new student activity center with a $69 million pricetag. That whole......

It may be best to stay off IH35 this weekend; the highway closure in Buda will surely slow down traffic in Austin. Don't forget the municipal election tomorrow! Yeah, yeah, we know already: Perry reaffirms that he will run again for governor in 2010. Sinkhole overtaking the town of Daisetta....

First the traffic cams, now this: Chief Acevedo wants surveillance cameras on high-crime zones. Rep. Krusee from Round Rock, who fought for harsher DWI laws, was arrested last night on DWI charges. Blame a water main break on why you were stuck in traffic this morning near Lavaca and Fifth. American Lung Association gives our city a D for ozone pollution....

Ben Wear has a nice entry on his Statesmen pseudo-blog about the myth that gas taxes fully pay for highway construction, indicating that in the past, the legislature directly contributed to highway construction from the general fund. Didn't we just pass a five billion dollar general obligation bond for TXDOT? Highways don't pay for themselves, even if you only compare gas tax revenues to construction and maintenance costs. Gas taxes generally pay for less than half of the construction and maintenance costs of any new highway. If you take costs associated with congestion, sprawl and global warming into account, highways look like an even bigger waste....

The lower deck of northbound IH-35 is currently closed as authorities deal with an 18-wheeler that jack-knifed earlier this afternoon near the 38 1/2 St. exit. You should definitely plan on taking an alternate route if you're headed north this afternoon. [Statesman: Lower deck of northbound I-35 shut down]......

"We're not publishing the list in our news columns, period": Statesman Editor Oppel on why the paper will not include a listing of precinct voting locations on election day. McCain stopped in San Antonio today. Bill Clinton spoke in town today. On the primary race between Glen Maxey and incumbent Nelda Wells Spears. Power outage in East Austin this afternoon. While her father was tied up, a robber sexually-assaulted a 15-year-old girl in a South Austin apartment yesterday morning. Semi veers off Dallas highway ramp and falls onto Continental Avenue; at least 3 are dead. ...

Red light camera locations announced this afternoon. New TYC conservator rules out the use of pepper spray in youth prisons, except for in emergency cases. Dallas cop serving in Hillary's motorcade this morning killed after his bike hit a retaining wall. Little Walnut Creek library location is opening tomorrow after almost a year of renovation....

Having won the Iowa Democratic Primary, U.S. Presidential candidate Barack Obama appears to be rocking and rolling with new momentum. The latest numbers show Obama leading the pack in the New Hampshire Democratic Primary, with Hillary Clinton lagging in second place by a 10 point gap. What's going on here?...

This weekend human rights activists protested against the family immigration detention center in Taylor. Body left for San Antonio medical examiner after traffic accident wasn't dead yet. McKinney man caught after following UPS trucks and stealing packages left outside homes. Was Jessica Simpson's appearance at the Cowboys game yesterday the reason they lost? If not, can we blame her anyway?...

Image from Fix290.org. Despite TXDOT's incessant bleating about lack of funds, they apparently still have plenty of cash to build the controversial Phase II toll roads, including the particularly controversial twelve-lane highway in the sky at the Y (71 and 290 in Oak Hill). In an era of concerns about budget cuts, pollution of Barton Springs and CO2 emissions, it seems like an egregious waste of resources to build this monstrosity that helps Hummer-drivers hurtle......

Photo of Rick Noriega by Matt Wright on flickr After the muggy weekend, some Central Texas counties (not Travis) are under freeze warnings tonight. Today Rick Noriega officially launched his campaign against Cornyn for the Senate seat. Cedar Park police going after drivers who skip out on paying 183A tolls. House State Affairs Committee to review TxDOT's "Keep Texas Moving" ad campaign. Gov. Perry is now heading up the Republican Governor's Association. AT&T is leaving......

Image from Austin City Connection.According to the Statesman, our beloved mayor nearly pulled a Chuck Norris when a Monarch construction truck blocked traffic on West Fifth Street. Story is he got out of his car, walked to the construction site and ripped into the project superintendent. He later indicated that he was sorry if his vulgarity offended any construction workers. Many Statesman commenters noted that if the mayor thinks it is bad to get stuck......

*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors Every city goes through its own little evolution. Not always pretty, not always clean, but always in the process of becoming. Our little oasis is no different. There is a change upon us, and it is high time we grabbed the wheel and started to do some stunt steerin’. You know, to......

Photo by Lorrie McClanahan on flickrWarning to today's travelers: if you are flying to DFW today, or stopping there on your way somewhere else, get ready to wait. A software issue this morning blocked communications to the East and West Towers at DFW for about twenty minutes. To deal with that, air traffic controllers increased the space between flights. As a result, your wait to fly out from or land at DFW could be long;......

Image from Myspace; Photo by Colin Smith The Ponys + Chin Up Chin UpWednesday November 14The Mohawk (912 Red River)Doors at 9pm, Free![info] [The Ponys MySpace] [Chin Up Chin Up MySpace]Chicago's The Ponys traffic in post-punk and dark overtones, and have been tirelessly touring the club circuit for years. The band have recently opened for both Spoon and Bloc Party, but are now headlining their own fall trek through the South. Their latest work Turn......

Photo by Miss Barbara on flickr After all that this morning, no one was found inside McBride's after the police got in. Over the weekend, a Hays County deputy found 730 pounds of marijuana when he pulled over a Suburban in Buda. LaBare trying to get permits to set up shop off of Braker and IH35; the neighbors aren't too excited about it. Cops on the lookout for woman (and two accomplices) who robbed a......

Photo by hamron on flickr Austin City Council is pretty much ready to sign a contract setting up red-light cameras at 15 intersections (to start with). Big Brother - er, APD - is watching your energy usage. And Austin Energy is cool with that! Southeast Austin standoff this morning ends with cop shooting the suspect. Round Rock police on the lookout for a suspected stalker. Local company under Neil Bush (Dubya's bro) is being investigated......

Former Westlake High teacher resigns to teach at a lower-income school; less than pleased, Eanes school district attempts to get him suspended A UT journalism student has a nice chat with Dan Rather during a morning Jet Blue flight from Austin to New York City A routine traffic stop in Hunt County turns up two dozen embalmed human heads in the back of a tractor-trailer A woman in the Dallas/Fort Worth area comes forward with......

Same thing, another week. As you move on to the next line on the calendar, you're still out there trying to make a connection. Sadly you let most of them slip by without saying a word. We understand, no one wants to be overzealous and get shot down. If only you had some place to find a second chance. Oh yes, Missed Connections. If only you had someone to sort through and find the......

Will Wynn renewed calls for an Austin streetcar at today's Downtown Austin Association Annual Luncheon. Moving forward would require two votes in the 2008 election - one to allow the project and another for bonds to finance it. The new plan would include connections to the airport (along Riverside), downtown, UT, the Triangle and Mueller. We are generally fans of mass transit, rail especially, and naive optimism is our default position, so a streetcar sounds......

The first two of six new commuter rail trains arrived in Austin this week. The diesel-electric trains trains, the last of which should arrive by late spring, were purchased from Swiss manufacturer Stadler Bussnang AG ("We Track Clever Solutions" -- get it?) for $34 million. Cap Metro plans to start testing these cars next month along the rail line from Howard Lane and Mopac down to 47th Street and Airport Boulevard—each will be run......

The Northcastle Apartments (8100 North MoPac) have become the newest front in the affordable housing/density wars. Trammell Crow Residential is seeking a zoning change in connection with a plan to demolish the complex and replace it with a larger, denser, more expensive complex. The Zoning and Platting commission will be hearing the request at their meeting tomorrow (item 13). Some residents aren't happy to be displaced, but other residents don't seem to like living there......