Environment & Natural Resources

East Austin's 'wishbone' bridge takes shape as concrete beams almost span Lady Bird Lake

KUT 90.5 | By Nathan Bernier

Published March 31, 2025 at 9:57 AM CDT

Progress on the wishbone bridge as of last week. When the pedestrian crossing opens in 2026, it will link the Ann and Roy Butler Trail at Longhorn Shores, Canterbury Street and the Holly Peninsula in Town Lake Metropolitan Park.

Massive concrete beams now extend over the water at the east end of Lady Bird Lake as a new three-pronged pedestrian bridge – the first of its kind in Austin – comes together next to the Longhorn Dam. Only one gap remains before the bridge's skeleton is assembled.

Once complete in mid-2026, this long-awaited "wishbone bridge" will finally connect the city's most popular trail at a long-overlooked corner of the lake in East Austin. This is the last point along the 10-mile Ann and Roy Butler Hike and Bike Trail where people have to depart the pathway walk right next to traffic.

The bridge will connect will Longhorn Shores, Canterbury Park and an unnamed peninsula in Lady Bird Lake. The existing pedestrian bridge from the peninsula to Canterbury Street — indicated by the letter C — will be removed.

Even though the city began widening the bridge's notoriously slim 4-foot-wide sidewalks in 2021, many trail users don't want to stroll next to fast-moving vehicles on Pleasant Valley Road.

"I don't like walking on top of the bridge, because people really whip around it," said Mike Stumpf, who uses the trail two or three times a week. "I'm quite excited about [the wishbone bridge], because I think it's going to increase the people on this side of the trail. This side gets a little less foot traffic than the Auditorium Shores/MoPac loop."

Workers are now installing the support elements for a 76-foot-wide central plaza, designed to be both a gathering place and a scenic overlook.

These concrete beams will support a 76-foot-wide plaza in the middle of the three-pronged bridge.

The plaza will have shade, plants and 31 art benches, which can be named after someone for a donation of at least $15,000 to the Trail Conservancy. But those finishing touches are still more than a year away.

Austin design firm Lemmo Architecture and Design created benches for the pedestrian bridge plaza. The Trail Conservancy calls these "Maraca" benches, and they're made from reclaimed or salvaged hardwood from cypress trees. Members of the public can have a bench dedicated to someone at cost of $15,000 for ten years or $30,000 in perpetuity.

Immediately south of the bridge construction, crews have tunneled out a new pedestrian crossing beneath Pleasant Valley Road. The 30-foot-wide arched underpass replaces a dimly lit, 6-foot-wide tunnel that frequently flooded.

A new pedestrian tunnel, 30-feet-wide and 100-feet-long, will feature a 16-foot-wide sidewalk and art on the walls and ceiling.

The new tunnel will have a 16-foot-wide sidewalk and better lighting. Starting in December, Houston artist Reginald Adams will install a 4-foot-tall mosaic tile mural on the tunnel walls and a painted mural across the 100-foot-long ceiling.

"The artist wanted to cover the entire surface and still work within the budget for this project," said Lindsay Hutchens with the city's Art in Public Places program. A city rule requires 2% of the budget for capital improvement projects go toward public art.

This illustration is intended to give an idea of what the finished tunnel will look like after a four-foot-tall mosaic tile mural is installed along the side of the passage and a painted mural on the ceiling. "Absolute Equality," printed on the bottom left, is the theme of the art project.

Austin City Council recently took a closer look at hiring local artists for publicly funded work like this $190,000 tunnel mural. A plan to spend almost $11 million on art at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport was recently paused over concerns that not enough local artists were involved.

Adams was selected by a jury of three Austin artists in 2022 and approved by the City Council.

"We haven't heard any complaints at all," Hutchens said. "Reginald, as an artist, he does community-oriented artwork a lot. He's been doing work for over 30 years. He has over 180 community-based public art projects."

Those projects include a mosaic mural he created for the African American Cultural and Heritage Facility on 11th Street.

For the tunnel art, Adams held several public workshops inviting residents to make tiles. More than 200 handprints – and one dog's paw print – will be part of the installation.

Houston artist Reginald Adams outlines the handprint of a girl at a recent event where members of the public were invited to create tiles from their hands. The tiles will be installed near the entrances of the pedestrian tunnel under Pleasant Valley Road.

The $25 million wishbone bridge and tunnel project are paid for mostly with debt Austin voters approved as part of a 2020 transportation bond. That $20 million was supplemented by a $4.1 million federal grant obtained with the help of U.S. Rep. Greg Casar, D-Austin. The rest of the money came from other city sources including 2016 and 2012 bonds.

The $4.1 million federal grant won't be affected by a recent short-term budget approved by Congress that eliminated all earmarks for 2025, city staff said.

The federal budget did cancel some funding for two other Austin trail projects. A half-mile extension of the Northern Walnut Creek Trail from Oak Brook Drive to the Girl Scouts of Central Texas property lost $1.25 million. A piece of the Red Line Trail from Gracy Farms to the Walnut Creek Trail lost a $2 million grant.

"Trails have broad support across our region and routinely rank among the top community requests for public funding," Tom Wald with the Red Line Parkway Initiative said. "We're hopeful that the funding can be restored."