Transmission Lines

The Katy Prairie is one of the largest conserved prairies in Texas. We are bigger than any local state park, and we provide access to hunters, birders, and trail walkers all while being only an hour outside the nation’s third largest city. Unfortunately, this also seems to make our lands a target for major infrastructure projects such as transmission lines.

We have had to engage attorneys to ensure these lands would not be bisected by high voltage power lines, and we have participated in meetings to ensure the preservation value of our lands would not be compromised. We have engaged leading experts like Dr. Bart Ballard from the Caesar Kleberg Wildlife Research Institute at Texas A&M University-Kingsville. Dr. Ballard’s research – the first of its kind in Texas – demonstrated the overwhelming numbers of migratory birds that come up along the coast and that could have been impacted by these transmission lines. 

We have engaged Dr. John Jacob, a leading wetland scientist and Director of the Texas Coastal Watershed Program to demonstrate how some of the proposed lines along roadways would have less impact on the natural environment (as well as people) than placing a brand new line across Coastal Prairie Conservancy lands. 

And we have engaged many of you, in public comments and in meetings to help us showcase the value our lands bring to our local communities.

Thanks to these efforts and to you, Texas Public Utility Commissioners selected a route that avoided Coastal Prairie Conservancy lands, and we are working to keep it that way for everyone forever.

We continue to advocate that conservation lands should be protected from eminent domain threats like power lines in the future as well. It would require a change in the law, but it is possible and would ensure our conservation lands – both parks and conservation easements – are treated equal for the values that they provide to all Texans. 

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