Help Us Defeat Plans to Widen US-50!

Do You Want More Traffic, Noise, and Pollution in Your Neighborhood?

Local Sacramento residents are taking action on a serious threat to our neighborhoods – CalTrans intends to WIDEN Sacramento’s US-50 through Downtown Sacramento from I-5 to Watt Boulevard. We must act now! Our quality of life and our climate are at stake.

WHY NOT WIDEN THE HIGHWAY?
As concerned citizens, we want Sacramento to be a Green City and a Livable City.
Widening highways makes us just another dirty city because it:
1. Increases noise and air pollution (including greenhouse gases)
2. Induces demand (encourages people to drive more who wouldn’t otherwise). Expanding our freeways won’t decrease congestion.
3. Other local needs should take financial priority.

WHAT ABOUT GLOBAL WARMING?
Bigger freeways and more cars increase our emissions, making it impossible to do our part to halt global warming. Fact: we cannot meet our regional goals for GHG reductions unless we develop real alternatives to driving.

ISN’T THIS A CARPOOL LANE?
CalTrans is disingenuously calling this project “green” under the guise of a carpool lane. Carpool lanes have been shown to not significantly increase the number of people who carpool or the throughput of people. We support turning an existing lane into a carpool lane, or even turning this proposed lane into a transit only lane.

WE’RE CHALLENGING CALTRANS
With this lawsuit we are demanding that CalTrans acknowledge and compensate for the increase in greenhouse gas emissions and traffic impacts that will result from more cars and more car trips on a wider freeway. We want to stop these projects in our area and have the money spent on transportation that keeps our streets livable and unclogged, gives us transit that gets us where we need to go, and helps reverse climate change.

WE NEED MONEY TO WIN
We must raise $11,000 to take this stand to cover our legal fees. You can take the stand with us by contributing online on our “gofundme” page, or by donating to ECOS directly via our website (www.ecosacramento.net) by clicking the donate button. (Just be sure to mark your donation for “Highway 50 litigation” – donations are tax deductible.)

WITH YOUR HELP – WE CAN WIN!

Click here to read more about the project on the Caltrans website.

Click here to read our July 2017 press release.

Click here to read the article published by the Sacramento Bee about this lawsuit.

Sacramento eyes new transportation tax, but are residents willing to pay?

By Tony Bizjak

September 7, 2017

The Sacramento Bee

Proponents say they misfired with the local transportation tax measure last year because they didn’t take enough time to reach the public early on and to get vocal grass-roots support.

“The criticism from groups was that the process was too truncated and not inclusive enough,” said Sacramento City Councilman Jay Schenirer.

Read the article here.

Note: the Environmental Council of Sacramento believes that the last transportation tax proposal, Measure B, allocated far too much for new road construction and far too little for transit. Click here to read the letter ECOS submitted about this last measure.

ECOS’ Comments on the 2017 SB 375 Update

July 28, 2017

The Environmental Council of Sacramento, along with Organize Sacramento, the Sacramento Housing Alliance, the Planning and Conservation League, Mogavero Architects, 350 Sacramento and the California Bicycle Coalition submitted our collective comments on the recent update to SB 375, The Sustainable Communities and Climate Protection Act of 2008. Below are our opening comments, with a link to the letter in full.

Dear Chair Nichols, Air Resources Board Members, and Staff:

In 2004, the Sacramento Area Council of Governments (SACOG) adopted the Blueprint. This plan provided vision for how the region would integrate land use and transportation planning to curb sprawl, reduce vehicle emissions, and cut down on traffic congestion to improve quality of life. This is to be accomplished by encouraging a sufficient variety housing options close to jobs, schools, and other critical community amenities. The adoption of the Blueprint—and subsequent Metropolitan Transportation Plans/Sustainable Communities Strategies (MTPs/SCSs)—has made SACOG a leader in the state and the nation in its efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) and vehicle miles traveled (VMT), and build more equitable communities.

While we support the recently adopted MTP/SCS, we also believe there is tremendous room to improve the plan. We believe that neither the SB 375 target recommendations made by SACOG staff (-18%) or Air Resources Board (ARB) staff (-19%) represent the full GHG reduction potential from improved land use and transportation behavior in the Sacramento region. Considering the substantial amount of greenfield development anticipated in the current SACOG MTP/SCS and the extremely low densities of the existing urban footprint, we feel that a stronger GHG reduction target is very feasible.

Read our full comment letter by clicking here or on the image of the letter below.

Photo: Smog over LA – is this what we want for the Sacramento region?

Would a new carpool lane bring more cars to Highway 50 downtown? New lawsuit says yes.

By Tony Bizjak

July 17, 2017

The Sacramento Bee

An environmental group has sued Caltrans over the state’s plans to build carpool lanes on Highway 50 in downtown Sacramento, saying the state has failed to analyze the health impacts on local residents from potential increased vehicle emissions.

The lawsuit, filed by the Environmental Council of Sacramento earlier this month in Sacramento Superior Court, is focused on the state’s plan to extend its existing Highway 50 carpool system west from Watt Avenue to Interstate 5. The freeway already has a set of carpool lanes running east from Watt Avenue into El Dorado County.

Read the full article here.

ECOS Sues Caltrans on Highway 50 Expansion Project

July 17, 2017

On July 3, 2017, the Environmental Council of Sacramento (ECOS) filed a Petition for Writ of Mandate with the Sacramento County Superior Court challenging the adequacy of the Initial Study/Environmental Assessment with a Mitigated Negative Declaration prepared by the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) for a project to expand Highway US 50 in the City of Sacramento. Specifically, this project would add high-occupancy vehicle (HOV or carpool) lanes to US 50 between I-5 and Watt Avenue.

The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) requires State agencies to identify any adverse environmental impacts of proposed projects, and explore ways to lessen those impacts. As mandated under CEQA, Caltrans prepared a Mitigated Negative Declaration for this US 50 expansion project that asserts no significant impacts on air quality, human health and safety, or regional growth patterns — even though this project would lead to a significant increase in vehicles on the freeway.

Carpools are an important part of a sound transportation policy, and ECOS could support a Mitigated Negative Declaration provided Caltrans approved Alternative 3 to convert two existing lanes to HOV lanes, instead of constructing two new lanes (one in each direction). However, Caltrans wants to increase the number of lanes, without reviewing the potential impacts on air quality and neighborhood quality of life that a full environmental impact report (EIR) would provide. Several studies have shown that freeway expansion leads to increased vehicle miles traveled (VMT) (“induced demand”) and encourages sprawl, thereby exacerbating the region’s traffic and air quality woes, and increasing greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to climate change. The ECOS petition cites numerous deficiencies in Caltrans’ environmental assessment for this project, including the failure to estimate the impacts of increased traffic volumes that would result from adding lanes to US 50.

“Sacramento’s elected officials, planners, and the public need an accurate assessment of the environmental costs of expanding this freeway,” commented Ralph Propper, Co-Chair of the ECOS Transportation, Air Quality & Climate Change Committee, and previously an air pollution research specialist with the California Air Resources Board’s health research branch. “This stretch of US 50 passes through residential areas, and near-road exposure to vehicular emissions has been linked to increased incidence of asthma, premature births, low birth-weight babies, cancer (especially from diesel exhaust), and cardiovascular disease such as strokes and heart attacks. In addition, the increased emissions will exacerbate the Sacramento region’s severe ozone smog, which damages the lungs of the young, the elderly, and those who exercise outdoors. We need an evaluation of the relative benefits of road expansion compared with alternatives such as expanded light rail. By submitting its ‘Negative Declaration’, Caltrans is preventing the public and the region’s policy makers from receiving the information needed to make a sound transportation planning decision.”

The Environmental Council of Sacramento is a coalition of individuals and environmental and civic organizations that supports land use and transportation planning that makes more efficient

Contact: John Deeter, Co-Chair of ECOS Transportation, Air Quality & Climate Change Committee — (916) 952-1268, <jdeeter[at]gmail[dot]com>

Access a PDF of this press release here.

Volkswagen emissions fraud sleuth chosen to head Sacramento air agency

By Tony Bizjak

May 25, 2017

The Sacramento Bee

Alberto Ayala, a state air pollution executive who helped uncover Volkswagen’s massive diesel cheating scandal, has been named head of the Sacramento region’s air quality efforts.

The Sacramento Metropolitan Air Quality Management District board voted on Thursday morning to name Ayala its executive director, replacing retiring executive Larry Greene.

Ayala, a deputy executive officer at the California Air Resources Board, launched the state’s initial review of diesel engines in 2012 that lead to the discovery that Volkswagen had illegally programmed millions of its vehicles internationally, including in California, to pass emissions tests.