TxDOT outlines hurricane evacuation in SE Texas with traffic procedures and route guidance during National Preparedness Month

FEMA has declared September as National Preparedness Month.

It’s a reminder that it’s never too early to prepare for an emergency or natural disaster. This is especially true when living along the Gulf Coast during hurricane season. ABC13 Meteorologist Elyse Smith recently spoke with the Texas Department of Transportation, known as TxDOT, to learn more about the latest evacuation procedures for the region.

Matthew Heinze is the Maintenance and Emergency Management Coordinator for Statewide Emergencies for TxDOT. He tells ABC13 that hurricane evacuation procedures across the Texas coast are reviewed ahead of each hurricane season. This includes any updates to routes that might need to change based on population growth and any new or ongoing construction.

“When we look at population growth in the Houston and southeast Texas area over the last 10 to 20 years, it has exponentially grown. So that adds another layer because not only is that more people, but that’s more people that did not experience that particular evacuation,” Henize said.

Henize is referencing Hurricane Rita, as Wednesday marks the 20th anniversary of the storm.

Heinze tells ABC13 that certain projects, like the I-10 expansion west of Houston towards Katy and San Antonio, were a direct result of what unfolded during the evacuation of Hurricane Rita. Another is a change in how the region evacuates altogether. Southeast Texas now evacuates by zip code, known as “Zip Zones” in TxDOT’s evacuation guide, and not by county. This is to help space out who’s evacuating when and where to prevent heavy congestion on roadways.

It’s also important to know the difference between two potential evacuation procedures: contraflow and evaculanes. The latter is a new addition, with more being implemented across town within the past 20 years.

Contraflow is when lanes are opened to both sides of a road or highway to allow for traffic to flow in the same direction. It’s like driving on the wrong side of the road to get out of town. An evaculane is either a shoulder, feeder road, or county road that can be utilized in the same direction of traffic for an evacuation. In other words, it acts as an additional lane of traffic that otherwise isn’t used.

While evaculanes can remain open for the duration of an evacuation or storm, contraflow does not. Heinze says the reason for that is to allow for emergency personnel to stage themselves ahead of the storm.

“We have to give them about 24 hours before landfall to get that resource down there,” he tells ABC13.

The only time Texas has ever used contraflow for an evacuation was during Hurricane Rita.

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