By this summer, the underpasses at Westlake Drive and Cedar Street were essentially finished. Crews moved the signals to permanent structures back in January, both bridges opened, and the two stoplights that used to stack up traffic just south of the river disappeared. If you drive that stretch of Loop 360 daily, you probably felt the difference before you read a single headline about it.
That relief was never the end of the story. It was the handoff. Four months ago, on April 29, TxDOT broke ground on the next segment north, at Courtyard Drive and RM 2222, a $68.4 million project that will run into 2029. And buried inside the paperwork for that project is something more interesting than another few years of orange cones: West Lake Hills and Rollingwood are using what gets built at 2222 as their case for what should get built next, at the intersection that actually shapes most residents' daily drive: MoPac and Bee Cave Road.
Two Projects, Easily Confused, Very Different Timelines
It is worth separating these clearly, because local chatter tends to blur them into one long "360 construction" story.
The Westlake Drive/Cedar Street project buried the Loop 360 mainlanes under both cross streets so drivers no longer stop at those two signals. Community Impact reported a $72.1 million price tag for that project, with completion expected this year. That work is functionally done.
The Courtyard Drive/RM 2222 project is a different animal entirely. It removes the signal at Courtyard the same way, sinking the mainlanes below it, but it also rebuilds RM 2222 itself into a diverging diamond interchange, a design where traffic briefly crosses to the opposite side of the road to eliminate left-turn conflicts at the ramps. The project was environmentally cleared back in 2021, broke ground this spring, and carries a joint TxDOT and City of Austin 2016 mobility bond budget of $68.4 million. Completion is targeted for late 2029, not next year.
If you've heard someone say the 2222 work will be done by Christmas, they were talking about the wrong project.
Where the Project Actually Stands Right Now
TxDOT breaks the Courtyard/2222 work into four phases, and the phase matters more than the calendar date if you live nearby.
- Phase 1 sets up the work zone, builds waterlines, and excavates the cliffs along the corridor. This is the loud, dusty phase, and it is where the cliff stabilization work the city has been posting about since spring feeds directly into the larger project.
- Phase 2 builds the new connector roads, drainage systems, braided ramps, and the Courtyard Drive bridge itself, along with the first shared-use paths. This is the phase where a lot of regular routes to MoPac start changing, and detours stop being the exception and start being the routine.
- Phase 3 rebuilds RM 2222 into the diverging diamond while the intersection stays open to traffic. Expect the most confusing signage of the entire project here, since drivers are essentially relearning how to cross the interchange.
- Phase 4 is final paving, striping, and the opening of the permanent pattern.
At a TxDOT community meeting in May, agency spokesperson Bradley Wheelis said Phase 2 was tentatively expected to begin about a year out, with the caveat that the schedule could still move. That means the loud work of Phase 1, laying waterlines and cutting into the limestone cliffs along the southbound lanes, likely continues well into 2027 before anyone's regular route to MoPac actually changes. For anyone off Westlake Drive, Redbud Trail, or Camp Craft Road, the honest read right now is patience, not a shortcut yet.
One change here has nothing to do with commute times. The informal shoulder parking that has long let drivers pull off Loop 360 to reach the Pennybacker Bridge overlook disappears under the new roadway configuration. The City Council voted unanimously in December 2024 to acquire about 1.5 acres near West Courtyard Drive for formal parking, sidewalks, and trail access to replace it, though TxDOT and the city are still finalizing that piece. The overlook itself isn't going anywhere. The unmarked pullout everyone has used for years is.
What One Diverging Diamond Taught the City
Diverging diamonds are still new enough in Central Texas that most drivers only know them from headlines about confused first-time crossings. TxDOT chose the design at 2222 specifically because it reduces conflict points for turning traffic, letting the Courtyard underpass handle straight-through movement while the diamond geometry at 2222 sorts out the turns.
West Lake Hills paid close attention to what that redesign was projected to do. According to figures Mayor James Vaughan shared with Community Impact, a diverging diamond intersection is projected to cut peak-hour delays by 48 to 58 percent, with westbound delays dropping as much as 83 percent and northbound delays dropping 75 percent. Those aren't small numbers for a city whose commuters spend real time stacked up at intersections feeding MoPac.
There's a reason city officials feel justified pushing for more. At a TxDOT community meeting in May, agency staff said roughly 90 percent of the traffic moving through the Courtyard/2222 corridor is through traffic, drivers headed somewhere else entirely. One longtime West Austin resident put the frustration more bluntly at that same meeting: "It's for thoroughfare traffic, for people from Leander and Cedar Park to get south." If most of the congestion outside your window belongs to people just passing through, it's easier to understand why local officials are willing to hold up a regional project until the next intersection actually serves the people who live here.
So when the Central Texas Regional Mobility Authority opened its environmental assessment comment period on the MoPac South expansion this spring, and when West Lake Hills and Rollingwood city councils sat down to decide what conditional support would look like, the diverging diamond at RM 2222 wasn't just a nearby construction project. It was proof of concept.
On April 22, the two city councils voted to jointly send a letter of conditional support for the MoPac South project, with three specific requirements attached:
- Fund a diverging diamond interchange at MoPac and Bee Cave Road
- Extend traffic noise barriers to the Rollingwood side of the highway, matching what already exists on the Zilker side
- Maintain lane elevation at the previously designated height
Vaughan called the underlying design fight "a pretty controversial issue in the county," and it has been simmering longer than this year's vote suggests. Rollingwood has raised concerns about the MoPac South plan since at least 2021, arguing that successive design iterations prioritized north-south highway throughput over the east-west access residents actually rely on, including the proposal to eliminate direct access between the southbound express lanes and Bee Cave Road. That concern hasn't gone away. As of this spring, the Mobility Authority still listed the Bee Cave Road diverging diamond as "pending funding coordination with local municipalities," meaning the fix Vaughan is asking for isn't guaranteed. It's a request the cities are making with leverage they didn't have before this year, because they can now point to a real diverging diamond going in four miles up the road and say: build us the same thing.
What This Means If You Drive Bee Cave Road or Loop 360 Every Day
None of this resolves quickly. The comment period on the MoPac South environmental assessment closed May 3. The next step is a final environmental assessment document submitted to TxDOT, and if no significant impact is found, the Mobility Authority can vote to move into funding, design, and construction. That is a process measured in years, not months, and the Courtyard/RM 2222 project itself won't wrap until late 2029.
In the meantime, West Lake Hills isn't only waiting on the regional process. The city has separately moved to install nine AI-managed traffic signals along Bee Cave Road, a lower-cost, faster-to-deploy fix aimed at improving flow on that corridor while the bigger diverging diamond fight plays out at the regional level. It's worth watching whether that pilot shows measurable results this year, since it's the kind of near-term data point that could show up in the next round of negotiations with the Mobility Authority, the same way the RM 2222 numbers showed up in this one.
If you live off Loop 360 or drive Bee Cave Road daily, the practical takeaway is this: the finished underpass at Westlake Drive bought a season of quiet before Courtyard's own excavation work settles in for the long haul, and the diverging diamond taking shape at RM 2222, still a phase or two from opening, isn't just solving that one intersection. It's the reference case West Lake Hills and Rollingwood will keep pointing to the next time they're in a room with the Mobility Authority arguing for the fix that would actually change your commute on Bee Cave Road.
Staying current on shifts like this, not just home prices but the infrastructure decisions that shape how a neighborhood actually lives day to day, is part of knowing Westlake well. If you're curious how changes like this factor into the way Gay Puckett talks with clients about this market, or you just want a local resource who's paying attention to the same things you are, feel free to reach out. Let's connect, call or email to start the conversation.
