On the Road

A surprising number of San Antonio households are car-free

San Antonio is the No. 3 car-free big city in Texas.

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You might not be able to tell by our frequent traffic, but a surprising number of San Antonians don't have cars. While Dallas claims the top spot as the No. 1 car-free big city in the Lone Star State, Houston and San Antonio are tailgating on that ranking.

In another lane are Fort Worth and Austin, which are the most car-dependent large Texas towns.

A CultureMap review of estimates for 2011-15 from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey shows 9 percent of households in San Antonio didn't have vehicles during that period.

Here are the 2011-15 figures for the four other major cities in Texas:

10.1 percent of households in Dallas didn't have vehicles
9.3 percent of households in Houston didn't have vehicles
6.6 percent of households in Austin didn't have vehicles
6.5 percent of households in Fort Worth didn't have vehicles

One explanation for Dallas’ standing as the top car-free big city in Texas is its AllTransit score from the Center for Neighborhood Technology. The score measures a city’s public transit connectivity, access, and frequency.

Dallas has the highest AllTransit score — 6.8 — among the state's five major cities. Next is Houston, with a score of 6.2, followed by San Antonio at 5.7, Austin at 5.5, and Fort Worth at 3.1.

Interestingly, Austin is the only Texas city that appears on the Money Crashers personal finance blog's ranking of the 10 best U.S. cities to live in without a car. In naming Austin to the list, the blog cited Austin's bike-friendly culture, bus system, commuter rail system, and presence of pedicabs.

Going even further, the U.S. PIRG Education Fund and the Frontier Group think tank in 2015 declared Austin was the No. 1 city for leading "full and engaged lives without owning a car." The groups took into account the availability of car-sharing, rail-hailing, bike-sharing, and other tech-oriented transportation services.

"Expanding the availability of shared-use transportation modes and other technology-enabled tools can give more Americans the freedom to live 'car-free' or 'car-light' lifestyles — avoiding the cost of owning, insuring, maintaining, and garaging a private vehicle," the groups wrote in a report. "Even when these services provide access to a car, they still make it easier for Americans to reduce their auto dependence by enabling easy access to a vehicle without the constant use associated with ownership."

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Hold Your Horses

San Antonio City Council considers plan to phase out horse-drawn carriages

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A scant majority of San Antonians like the idea of ending the practice.

In a special session on Thursday, October 31, the San Antonio City Council will deliberate on possibly phasing out horse-drawn carriages. A proposal called "A Just Transition from Horse Drawn Carriages" has led to a one-to-three-year plan for replacing the horses with electric carriages.

An early project proposal in November of 2022 — written by District 2 Councilmember Jalen McKee-Rodriguez and District 3 Councilmember Phyllis Viagran — laid out concerns for the horses' wellbeing, quoting the Animal Welfare Institute. Concerns included exposure to traffic and pollution, long periods standing and walking on hard surfaces, and extreme weather, among other things. In addition to the effect on horses, the request also mentioned environmental effects from slowed traffic.

It proposed completely stopping any new use of horse drawn carriages and letting any existing permits expire. The request also mentioned pedicabs as an alternative alongside the electric carriages, but the pedicabs seem to have fallen away from the public discourse.

Following up on the proposal, a city survey that concluded in August of 2024 found that of 50,476 respondents, a scant majority (51.98 percent) said they liked the idea to "Transition horse-drawn carriages to electric carriages and pedicabs and ban horse drawn carriages completely." Other options like changing hours and location of horse-drawn carriage use were unpopular, and 29.01 percent said they wanted to continue with the current system of use.

A majority of respondents (53.83 percent) had never ridden in a horse drawn carriage at all, and an strong majority of those survey takers cited the treatment of the horse as the reason they hadn't tried it. Those who had ridden on the carriages mostly liked it for the "historical and cultural experience," with examples including feeling nostalgic and learning about San Antonio's history.

The survey did not disclose how many of the people who rode on the carriages were tourists, but tourists made up 21.66 percent of respondents.

In addition to the survey, council members also unanimously voted on August 19, 2024, to have a plan drafted by city staff that would phase out the horse-drawn carriages in one to three years.

The only item on the special session agenda (aside from approval of minutes) is a briefing and possible action on the proposal, meaning that a decision is not guaranteed.

More information about city council meetings is available at sa.gov.

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