Except Houston doesn't want or need this project.
What they are trying to do is force a huge amount of construction to remove the current elevated 45 through down town, then route it all through the existing 59 corridor, and add extra lanes underground. It would completely screw traffic through Houston (far more than it already is, which is saying something) for a decade, and the end result will be that all north-south traffic goes through a single bottleneck that will be incredibly flood-prone. You think we had issues with freeways flooding during emergencies and disasters before?
If that is the plan, best it got killed.