Friday
September 4, 2026
Today at a glance
- Weather 96° / 77°Showers first thing, then a break from the triple digits. Take the umbrella.
- Air quality 31 · GoodClear air. A great day to be outside.
- Lake Travis 94.9% fullClose to full, good for boats and for the water supply. Down a touch this week.
- Allergies LowA little grasses and ragweed around — most noses won't notice.
- Power grid NormalA busy afternoon: demand near 83,800 megawatts, with 99,700 on hand.
- Sunrise 7:09 a.m.Twelve hours and forty minutes of daylight — long enough for a swim after work.
Good morning, Austin. There is rain in the forecast, which after this summer feels like being handed something. Showers come through early, another round is possible late in the afternoon, and the high stops at 96, which lately counts as mild. If you are flying out today the airport wants you there two and a half to three hours early, and it means it. Everyone else: the ground is going to take whatever it gets, and so should you.
The Briefing
The machines arrive first, the rulebook second
Dozens of gold Cybercabs went into service on Austin streets Thursday. They seat two, they are hailed through Tesla's Robotaxi app, and they have no steering wheel and no pedals, so a passenger who wants to intervene has nothing to reach for. Austin has had Tesla robotaxis since June of last year. Those cars kept their controls.
The same afternoon, at a news conference and a City Council mobility committee meeting, Austin police set out what they now expect of a very different machine. After a review with Austin Transportation and Public Works and the city attorney's office, the city concluded that e-motos (pedal-less electric bikes with motors of 750 watts or more) are motor vehicles under state law. Riders need registration, insurance and a license. No sidewalks, no Butler Hike-and-Bike Trail. Officers will warn first.
Two machines, one rulebook, and in both cases the machine got here first. Assistant Chief Mike Chancellor said his officers are called out to children riding e-motos through neighborhoods at 40 to 50 miles an hour. He said the department has no figures yet on how many citations it has written since the campaign began this spring.
What's next: State troopers run Operation CARE, the Crash Awareness Reduction Effort, on Texas highways from Friday through Monday.
Sources: The Texas Tribune (Cybercab launch), CBS Austin (Cybercabs in Austin), Community Impact (e-moto briefing), KXAN (e-moto rules), KXAN (Operation CARE)
City Desk
Money & bills
Austin puts its adult leagues back on the schedule
The Parks and Recreation Department will keep running adult indoor basketball and volleyball at the Austin Recreation Center after players objected, then hand them to an outside company later. It had announced the cancellation after the city adopted its budget last month, alongside cuts to youth outreach, senior programs and the lending library. "The city needs additional time to find a suitable third-party vendor," the city said. Austin Current
Also
Texas Comptroller Don Huffines asked lawmakers to add $1 billion to the private school voucher program for 2028-29, which would take it past $2 billion. The Texas Tribune
Public safety & courts
City leaders say the immigration arrests in North Austin have not let up
Mayor Pro Tem Chito Vela told the Austin Chronicle there has been a sustained increase in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) activity in the North Lamar and Rundberg areas, and that the city had heard nothing from ICE or the Department of Homeland Security about it. U.S. Rep. Greg Casar said at an Aug. 14 news conference in Rundberg that government sources had described arrests running three to four times higher. Austin Chronicle
Texas keeps its own camera network switched on
Gov. Greg Abbott blocked state agencies from spending on Flock Safety cameras on Aug. 27, but the Department of Public Safety (DPS) said it will keep using the ones already installed and only stop adding more. The Texas Tribune reviewed a month of searches on the network and found 48 percent came from outside Texas. After those questions, DPS said Thursday it will restrict searches to agencies that have signed agreements with it. The Texas Tribune
Also
Austin police said e-motos count as motor vehicles under state law, so riders need registration, insurance and a license, and officers will warn before citing. CBS Austin
Austin police asked for help finding Uralene Davis-Williams, 86, last seen about 5:30 p.m. Thursday near the 1400 block of Bradbury Lane, and said she has medical and cognitive conditions. CBS Austin
Detectives released security images of a man they are trying to identify in an Aug. 29 auto theft in the 2300 block of Carson Ridge. City of Austin
State troopers run Operation CARE, their holiday traffic campaign, from Friday through Monday; last year's Labor Day version produced more than 63,015 citations and warnings. KXAN
Growth & infrastructure
Tesla's driverless two-seaters start picking up riders
The company put dozens of gold Cybercabs into service in limited areas of Austin on Thursday, hailed through its Robotaxi app. The cars have no steering wheel, no pedals, no back seat and no rear windshield. Kara Kockelman, a transportation engineering professor at the University of Texas at Austin, said she would ride in one, though a Waymo is safer because it adds radar and laser sensing to its cameras. CBS Austin
Overheard on X
I was fortunate enough to ride in a Cybercab in Austin after the launch event this afternoon 🙏
Got the perfect golden hour backdrop at one of my favorite places in town, Home Slice Pizza on South Congress! pic.twitter.com/A5dsszl5GQ
Overheard on Reddit
Tesla has a Robotaxi unveiling tonight downtown. Here’s one blocking traffic.
It just stopped at the intersection and put its hazard lights on for no reason.
Also
Austin City Council moved to let houseplex projects of up to four units be built under the International Residential Code, which is simpler and cheaper than the code they use now. KXAN
The council also started work on Austin's first mold rules, directing the city manager to draft code amendments on inspection and remediation; the property maintenance code has none. KXAN
Lane closures at East Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and Interstate 35 are lifted for Saturday's game, with the Texas Department of Transportation's (TxDOT) bridge work far enough along to reopen them. KXAN
Austin-Bergstrom International Airport asked departing travelers to arrive two and a half to three hours early on Friday, its second such day running, expecting more than 35,000 to fly out. CBS Austin
Parking at Commons Ford Ranch Metropolitan Park is limited to marked areas from Saturday through Monday, with towing outside the gate and no entry once the park is full. City of Austin
Schools
A university department proposes cutting two programs and building one
The University of Texas at Austin's new Department of Social and Cultural Analysis proposed eliminating the race, indigeneity and migration major and the LGBTQ studies minor and creating a six-track interdisciplinary major, according to internal documents obtained by The Daily Texan. The documents say the two overlap other offerings. The university and the department chair did not answer the paper's requests for comment. The Daily Texan
Also
About 100 Texans testified Aug. 31 on how Islam and Christianity appear in new high school social studies standards, which the State Board of Education approved on first reading Sept. 1. Community Impact
Business & street life
The tallest building in Texas opens its first big tenant
1 Hotel Austin has opened inside Waterline, with restaurants, a rooftop pool and more than 300 jobs. Instead of cutting a ribbon the staff planted a tree. Raul Leal, chief executive of Starwood Hotels, said the company had been working on an Austin property since 2018, and Tom Noonan of Visit Austin said the opening lands before a busy season of festivals and big events. CBS Austin
Also
MML Hospitality and the owners of Bartlett's expect to start building a second location in the old Threadgill's space in south Austin in early 2027, at a cost of about $4 million. Community Impact
Bat Fest turns 20 on the Ann W. Richards Congress Avenue Bridge on Saturday, running 3 p.m. to 11 p.m., with the bats due out sometime after 7. KXAN
The Austin Tattoo Invitational runs Friday through Sunday at the Palmer Events Center, with more than 350 artists showing work and tattooing on site. KXAN
The Bullock Texas State History Museum is free from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Sunday, with water-themed activities, a story time and a film. CBS Austin
Overheard on X
It's Labor Day weekend 1981 in Austin and you're at Barton Springs Pool👙🩲 pic.twitter.com/p4MblLSEha
Overheard on Reddit
Making friends with other child-free couples?
My wife and I are in our early 30s and have made the decision to not have kids; we’ve got our hands full with plenty of rescue dogs, anyway! As many of our friends opt for parenthood (happy for them; love being the fun aunt/uncle) it would be nice to broaden our social circle and make friends with other child free folks in Austin. …
Weather
Today: a chance of showers before 1 p.m., then a slight chance of showers and thunderstorms until 4 p.m. Partly sunny, high near 96, heat index up to 104, with rainfall under a tenth of an inch. No active alerts for Travis County. Tonight: mostly clear, low around 77. National Weather Service
The first round of showers comes early and a second is possible late in the day, KXAN's forecasters say, with a 1-out-of-4 flood risk for Friday. Rain chances thin out to about 10 percent over the holiday weekend, and temperatures stay off triple digits before the upper 90s return next week. KXAN
August's heat and lack of rain dried the soil around Austin foundations faster than the soil beneath them, and the uneven stress cracks drywall and sticks doors. Repair firms disagree over whether watering a foundation helps. KXAN
The Back Page
1 day until Texas football · Texas State at Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium (DKR), Sept. 5, 2:30 p.m.
A small rescue group in Livingston, out east where the last of Edouard put water where it had no business being, called Austin on Wednesday night and said its foster homes were flooding. Austin Pets Alive! sent for them: 15 cats, nine Chihuahuas and about a dozen mid-sized dogs, including one that had been frightened enough by the storm to jump through a closed window and needed a vet before it could travel. The transport was due at the shelter on Thursday afternoon. The shelter's ask of the city was simple — come and foster them, and if you cannot, foster or adopt one of the animals already here so there is room. Intake will be slow, the group warned, because the animals are likely to be rattled. CBS Austin