Senate Transportation Panel to Weigh Rail-Crossing Money, Driverless Cars and CDL Oversight

The Texas Senate Committee on Transportation will gavel in at 9 a.m. Aug. 25 to take invited and public testimony on three interim charges: how the Texas Department of Transportation is spending a fast-growing pot of rail grade-separation money, how the state’s driverless-vehicle law is being carried out, and whether Texas is issuing commercial driver licenses carefully enough.

Public testimony will be limited to two minutes per witness, and anyone filing written testimony must bring 15 copies to the committee clerk, according to the hearing notice. The Senate does not operate an online comment portal, so the hearing room is the only place to be heard.

Sen. Tan Parker, R–Flower Mound, chairs the nine-member panel, which splits five Republicans to four Democrats and holds jurisdiction over highways, rail, motor vehicles and driver licensing. The timing is unusually live: the rail charge lands 11 days after TxDOT announced the largest state rail grade-separation award in the country, and the driver-license charge follows a wave of state and federal rule changes that took effect this summer.

On Prioritizing Public Safety at Rail-Grade Crossings, members are asked to examine how TxDOT is deploying increased funding for grade separations and whether the money is being steered toward the worst mobility and safety bottlenecks. The state program at issue traces to Senate Bill 1555, filed by Sen. Robert Nichols, R–Jacksonville, and effective immediately on May 24, 2025. This year the Texas Transportation Commission approved $160.4 million from the resulting Off-System Rail Grade Separation State Fund Program for five projects in Amarillo, Houston, Laredo and San Antonio, and set aside another $89.6 million as matching money for federal grants. That reserve paid off on Aug. 14, when TxDOT said it had won more than $755 million from the Federal Railroad Administration’s Federal-State Partnership for Intercity Passenger Rail program for 12 crossings — collectively the highest amount awarded to any state or local recipient, and part of a combined local, state and federal investment topping $953 million. Four members of this committee — Hagenbuch, Johnson, Miles and West — coauthored SB 1555.

The charge on Studying the Deployment of Autonomous Vehicle Technology turns to Senate Bill 2807, the 2025 law that made Texas the gatekeeper for commercial driverless operations. The statute took effect Sept. 1, 2025 and requires companies running vehicles at SAE Levels 4 and 5 — the tiers with no human driver — to hold an authorization from the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles, which can restrict or revoke it. TxDMV built the framework in its Chapter 220 rules and runs an Automated Vehicles Regulatory Program; compliance is not required until the later of May 28, 2026 or the 90th day after the Public Safety Commission adopts its own rules. Senators are also directed to quantify the technology’s effect on traffic collisions — a number the state has not previously had to produce.

The third charge, Strengthening Commercial Driver License Standards and Oversight, asks whether third-party CDL training schools and testing sites should face unannounced or undercover audits, and how roadside officers verify that a license and its supporting documents are real. The ground has shifted fast. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration issued a final rule in February tightening non-domiciled CDL issuance, and on June 1 the Texas Department of Public Safety ended Spanish-language CDL knowledge testing and barred interpreters while resuming non-domiciled licensing only for H-2A agricultural workers. DPS also certifies the private companies that give skills tests through its Third Party Skills Testing program, the oversight gap the charge singles out. The House is working the same ground from the other side; The Texas Dispatch reported that the House Transportation Committee took up foreign holders of commercial driver licenses on Aug. 17.

Because this is an interim hearing, the committee will take no votes and no legislation is before it. What members hear will feed the panel’s interim report and the transportation bills lawmakers file for the 90th Legislature, which convenes in January 2027.

Meeting at a glance

Committee members

• Sen. Tan Parker, R–Flower Mound (SD-12) — Chair
• Sen. Royce West, D–Dallas (SD-23) — Vice Chair
• Sen. Paul Bettencourt, R–Houston (SD-7)
• Sen. Brent Hagenbuch, R–Denton (SD-30)
• Sen. Juan “Chuy” Hinojosa, D–McAllen (SD-20)
• Sen. Nathan Johnson, D–Dallas (SD-16)
• Sen. Phil King, R–Weatherford (SD-10)
• Sen. Borris L. Miles, D–Houston (SD-13)
• Sen. Charles Perry, R–Lubbock (SD-28)