The city of Austin and other Project Connect partners are creating a working group of stakeholders to help provide feedback and input for the urban rail plan.

The first meeting will be June 26 at 3:30 p.m. at Austin City Hall, and Mayor Lee Leffingwell said the group will meet infrequently this summer.

Urban rail is one piece of a regional transportation plan dubbed Project Connect. Within the plan are five corridor studies that will provide a more detailed look at what types of transportation services would be appropriate for connecting different areas in Central Texas. The studies also look at cost, ridership and alignment. Urban rail will fit into the Central Corridor of Project Connect and will cover Austin's core.

Leffingwell said it is possible the group could have a plan by this fall that could look at the alignment for the initial phase of urban rail. He said the group will go through the public hearing process to allow for citizen comments and the group would report back to the Transit Working Group, which is overseeing the planning of Project Connect.

The mayor would like to see the urban rail plan put before voters in May or November of 2014.

A separate team of stakeholders has just completed work on three maps for the North Corridor study that runs from downtown Austin to Georgetown and is bordered by MoPac, I-35 and SH 130. The North Corridor team will host a series of open house events the week of June 24 to unveil the maps to the public and receive feedback. The maps include possible routes for a variety of bus and rail services that would connect activity centers and transport people throughout the region.

Round Rock Mayor Alan McGraw, who has been chairing the North Corridor Project Advisory Group, said the planning has not been a rubber stamp process and that the project has a solid framework for moving forward.

For information on meeting locations and times, visit www.connectcentraltexas.org.

Project Connect update

The TWG also officially approved the framework for the $4 billion Project Connect plan that details an outline for potential funding, the organization and a system-level map. The group will take a break from meeting until August.

"This is s a good solid framework, and we've worked to develop a good vision the public can discuss," said Jeremy Martin, senior vice president at the Greater Austin Chamber of Commerce. "The challenges before us are with funding and the organization and how we flush those out."

Once all the details of Project Connect are fleshed out, the plan will be incorporated into CAMPO's 2040 long-range plan and meshed with plans CAMPO has for the region. CAMPO has the ultimate deciding factor in planning for the region, but many of the CAMPO board members also sit on the TWG, including Will Conley, CAMPO board chair and Hays County Commissioner.

"[Project Connect] is a big piece that will drive a large portion of that [CAMPO 2040] plan and how that will be developed," Conley said.