City News Roundup

Toll road body-check clobbers Dallas news this week

This dreamy photo of the Trinity toll road shows more park than road.

Photo courtesy Trinity Common Foundation

The week opened with a damning meeting on the toll road that likely did not go as advocates hoped. There was a yes vote for transparency, but a no vote on marijuana.

Here's what happened in Dallas news:

No more boondoggle
Trinity toll road advocates got body-checked on Monday, when a citizens advisory committee made a hastily-called presentation on the toll road project. This was the committee appointed by Mayor Mike Rawlings and Dallas city council member Sandy Greyson to review the toll road design by the so-called dream team.

The presentation included a soporific animation of how the roadway would look while driving; a less popular companion video shows the aerial point of view.

Greyson's appointees — former city council member Angela Hunt, state representative Rafael Anchia, and Dallas architect Robert Meckfessel — politely pointed out contradictions in the dream team plan, such as the fact that the road's curves would enable cars to travel at higher speeds than the official 45 mph. Hunt has a summary of their position on her website.

The Observer did a great recap, highlighting how the culture of Dallas politics has changed for the better; the Dallas Morning Newslisted "6 takeaways." City council member Philip Kingston wondered why no one questioned the misrepresentations made by committee members such as Lee Jackson, who claimed that design cannot predict speed. "I could drive the proposed road at 90 mph in your grandmother's Oldsmobile," Kingston said.

Council member Adam McGough asked why there were no representatives from the Parks department at the meeting, since the proposal is supposedly about building a park.

Council member Scott Griggs said the word "boondoggle" three times: "I am extremely concerned that this boondoggle continues. I am also extremely concerned about the lack of transparency. It's completely unacceptable. The public has said time and time again they want this boondoggle to end. 'Fix our streets!' Of course you don’t want public involvement, because the public will rise up and say, 'No more boondoggle!'"

No dope
The city council rejected a 6-month pilot program that would have streamlined marijuana arrests. Arrestees would have gotten a ticket instead of being booked and paying a $200 bond. Oddly, the council members in the districts with the most arrests for marijuana voted against it. Weird. Voting in favor were Adam Medrano, Lee Kleinman, Mark Clayton, Phillip Kingston, and Scott Griggs.

Exxxotica expenses
The city council passed a resolution requiring the city manager to bring all expenses in the Exxxotica lawsuit to the council for vote. It will allow the public to track the accounting of the lawsuit.

Voting against: Mayor Mike Rawlings, Adam McGough, Carolyn King Arnold, Erik Wilson, Monica Alonzo, and Tiffinni Young. All of them also voted to ban Exxxotica, meaning they're the ones potentially costing us money on a pointless lawsuit.

Casey Thomas, Jennifer Staubach Gates, and Rick Callahan were more accountable, voting for transparency, along with Griggs, Kingston, Greyson, Medrano, Clayton, and Lee Kleinman.

DART updates
According to this Brandon Formby tweet, the Dallas streetcar will connect to the Bishop Arts District by August, and the Blue Line will reach UNT Dallas in October.

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supreme suburbs

11 cities around Dallas make list of best places to live in the U.S.

Town of Flower Mound, Texas-Government/Facebook

Flower Mound is the 14th best place to live in the country, and 4th in Texas.

Nearly a dozen Dallas suburbs, including perennial favorite Flower Mound, have landed among the best places to live in 2025, according to U.S. News & World Report.

The annual list of Best Places to Live in the U.S. is designed to help readers make the most informed decisions when choosing where to settle down, using data from sources such as the U.S. Census Bureau, Department of Commerce, the Federal Reserve and the Bureau for Economic Analysis, as well as state and local sources.

For the 2025-2026 rankings, U.S. News expanded its coverage from 150 to 250 U.S. cities, and updated its methodology to examine each city based on five livability indexes: Quality of life, value, desirability, job market, and net migration.

The top three best places to live are located in Johns Creek, Georgia (No. 1), Carmel, Indiana (No. 2), and the Houston-area suburb of Pearland, Texas (No. 3).

Flower Mound ranked No. 14 nationwide, and it landed in the coveted No. 4 spot in U.S. News' separate rankings of the best places to live in Texas for 2025-2026.

Aspects of Flower Mound that put it at the top of the list include its high median household income ($163,766), median home values ($476,609), and its bustling population of more than 77,000 residents.

The city's population is a healthy mix of young individuals and families, with 26 percent of residents being under 20 years old and 28 percent of the population being between the ages of 20-44. Nearly a third of Flower Mound's population is between 45-64 years old, while only 13 percent of residents are over 65, the report says.

Flower Mound is a listmaker's favorite, landing the top spot of Livability.com's list of the best places to live in 2025 as well as a 2024 list that named it one of the most livable small cities in the country.

Flower Mound has many parks for families to enjoy.Flower Mound Parks and Recreation/Facebook

"Finding a community to be part of can play a major role in making a place feel like home," U.S. News said. "If you’re a parent with young children, you may want to live in a neighborhood with other people in that phase of life. If you’re a professional moving to a hot job market for your field, you may want to live in an apartment close to the office or within walking distance of friends and colleagues."

However, if people are looking for a public transportation-friendly city, they may need to look elsewhere. Almost all commuters in Flower Mound drive to their workplaces, making access to a vehicle absolutely necessary for living in the suburb. Flower Mound's 26.7-minute average commute time is also 4.7 minutes higher than the national average, U.S. News said.

The suburb's housing costs are admittedly more expensive than the national average home value ($370,489), but that shouldn't deter newcomers that are looking for a place to settle down.

"Flower Mound offers a better value than similarly sized cities when you compare housing costs to median household income," the report said.

Other Dallas-area suburbs
Mansfield ranked as the 27th best place to live in the U.S., and No. 9 in Texas. The city boasts a median household income of $117,680, and median home values at $364,136.

Residents in Mansfield also predominantly rely on vehicles for their daily commutes, spending an average time of nearly 28 minutes driving to work, U.S. News determined.

More than half (56.1 percent) of all Mansfield residents are married, and 51 percent of the population are between the ages of 25 and 64-years-old.

Here's how other Dallas-area cities faired among the top 150:

No. 30 – Frisco
No. 37 – McKinney
No. 64 – North Richland Hills
No. 82 – Carrollton
No. 83 – Rowlett
No. 102 – Wylie
No. 105 – Grand Prairie
No. 149 – Irving
No. 150 – Plano

Dallas drops out of the top 100
Though Dallas clawed its way back among the top 100 best places to live in U.S. News' 2024-2025 report, the city plummeted toward the bottom of the list for 2025-2026, coming in at No. 439. In addition, it ranked No. 65 in the statewide comparison, showing that the city has been eclipsed by its appealing suburban neighbors.

The top 10 best places to live in the U.S. are:

No. 1 – Johns Creek, Georgia
No. 2 – Carmel, Indiana
No. 3 – Pearland, Texas
No. 4 – Fishers, INdiana
No. 5 – Cary, North Carolina
No. 6 – League City, Texas
No. 7 – Apex, North Carolina
No. 8 – Leander, Texas
No. 9 – Rochester Hills, Michigan
No. 10 – Troy, Michigan

suburbs us news & world report rankings dallas flower mound mansfield