UCTC RESEARCH PROJECT FINAL REPORT

 

 

 

Project Title:              Equity and Environmental Justice in Transportation

 

 

Principle Investigator:                       Martin Wachs, Director                       

                                                            Institute of Transportation Studies

                                                            109 McLaughlin Hall

                                                            University of California, Berkeley

                                                            Berkeley, CA 94720-1720

 

                                                            Telephone:   510-642-3585

 

                                                            Fax:              510-643-3955

                                                           

                                                            E-mail:           mwachs@uclink4.berkeley.edu

 

 

 

Funded by a UCTC Research Grant for Academic Year 2001-02, with extension granted through Academic Year 2002-03.    

           

Overview of the Research:

 

            Environmental Justice is a longstanding principle of American governance that combines concerns for civil rights with environmental protection.  During the past decade, EJ has moved into the mainstream of American policy making, receiving increasing attention from federal, state, and local officials.  Transportation is an important arena in which EJ obligations have emerged, leading to some contentious lawsuits and aggressive regulatory initiatives at federal, state, and local levels.  Many formal legal and regulatory obligations are now included in transportation policy, embracing transportation health, equity, and conservation objectives. 

 

Environmental justice is an increasingly important element of policy making in transportation.  It is not specific to any mode of transportation, community, or single policy issue.  It is fundamentally about fairness toward the disadvantaged and often addresses the exclusion of racial and ethnic minorities from decision making. The federal government has identified environmental justice as an important goal in transportation, and local and regional governments must incorporate environmental justice into transportation programs. Because ideas about justice differ between communities, local and regional governments have flexibility in how they change their policies to reflect environmental justice. Communities and local governments struggle to balance competing interests and interpretations of environmental justice.

 

To parents living in a neighborhood with a lot of bus service, environmental justice might mean converting buses from diesel to natural gas, reducing their children’s exposure to air pollution. A security guard working the night shift might feel that environmental justice has been served if the bus she takes deviates from its regular route to drop her off closer to home. Environmental justice to a non-English speaking neighborhood might mean having bilingual staff and community leaders running a public meeting. To low-income workers relying on bus service in a large downtown, environmental justice might mean that a city increases the frequency of buses instead of building a new light rail line that would serve upper-income commuters. In short, there is no single definition of environmental justice: its meaning depends on context, perspective and timeframe.

 

Environmental justice issues arise most frequently when:

 

• Some communities get the benefits of improved accessibility, faster trips, and congestion relief, while others experience fewer benefits;
• Some communities suffer disproportionately from transportation programs’ negative impacts, like air pollution;
• Some communities have to pay higher transportation taxes or higher fares than others in relation to the services that they receive;
• Some communities are less represented than others when policy-making bodies debate and decide what should be done with transportation resources.

 

Racial and ethnic minority groups, low-income people, the elderly, and people with disabilities have all been the victims of environmental injustices in transportation.  Sometimes an affected community is primarily geographic, consisting of those living in a particular corridor or in a neighborhood near a certain transportation facility.  Or those affected might share similar racial, ethnic, or economic characteristics. These groups are often referred to as “environmental justice communities.” But because power and needs change over time and space, the term “environmental justice communities” is problematic. Environmental justice is used to protect the needs of the powerless, whomever they might be and as they change.

 

Many community members are becoming involved with transportation decisions that impact their mobility needs, health, and overall quality of life. Members of the public concerned with environmental justice might be involved with making transportation decisions as: 

• A citizen appointed to an environmental justice task force or committee;
• A member of a disempowered group, representing the group’s interests to an advisory committee for the purpose of discussing and influencing transportation policy choices.  ;
• A member of an advocacy group active in transportation issues;
• An employee of a non-profit agency that wants to be involved because of the effect that transportation policies have on its constituents; or
• A resident or business owner affected by a transportation decision.

 

Because many such people participate in transportation planning and policy making,  and many of them are new to the requirements and the terminology associated with EJ in transportation, this project was designed to provide them with a resource in the form of an introductory guidebook on EJ in transportation.. 

 

This project reviewed the legislation, regulation, and litigation as well as the theoretical and applied literature on transportation and environmental justice.  It then produced a short (thirty page) handbook in a colorful and attractive format for use by citizens who are new to the concept of environmental justice and who need basic knowledge about the regulations, requirements, and processes related to EJ in transportation.  The handbook is entitled:  Environmental Justice in Transportation:  A Citizen’s Handbook.  Five thousand copies of the handbook have been printed, and 1,500 have already been distributed.  It is also available for downloading from the Internet. Availability of the Handbook was announced on the website of the Institute of Transportation Studies and UCTC, and was summarized in the ITS Review as well as its Technology Transfer Newsletter.   The handbook has already been employed by Metropolitan Planning Organizations and environmental advocacy organizations around the country.  

           

            Research was conducted by a team of three people, including Professor Martin Wachs and two UC-Berkeley Graduate Student Researchers, Shannon Cairns and Jessica Greig, both of whom have recently graduated with MCP degrees.  The project staff coordinated its work with a team of consultants to and employees of the California Department of Transportation, who were at the time producing a desk reference or handbook on Environmental Justice in Transportation.  Although it was critically important that the Citizen’s Handbook be written in accessible language so that it would be useful to lay citizens, every effort was made to insure that it was also accurate in presenting federal requirements and elements of economic and political theory.  In order to insure that the Handbook was both accurate and readable, several drafts were circulated widely to nearly twenty different academics, MPO officials, and staff of environmental advocacy organizations.  Many sections were rewritten several times in response to the many comments that were received.

 

            The Citizen’s Handbook defines environmental justice generally and with specific reference to transportation.  It presents a legal history of the concept and summarizes legal requirements under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and under several federal executive orders, and defines key terms that indicate which groups are protected under EJ requirements.  The booklet also addresses how transportation projects and plans are evaluated and the role of EJ in such evaluations. Basic evaluation tools such as major investment studies, and benefit-cost analysis are summarized for readers who are not yet familiar with them.   The Handbook also summarizes requirements for environmental reviews under NEPA.  It introduces the reader to the notion that EJ can be incorporated into transportation policy and also relates EJ to transportation finance.  The Handbook  offers advice to interested individuals and groups as to how they may be heard in the planning process.  It incorporates several case studies that illustrate how EJ concepts can be used in transportation policymaking and project-level planning.  At the back of the Handbook, “further readings” are recommended, and “useful internet links” are provided so that users of the handbook can pursue the topic in greater depth if and when they wish to do so. 

 

            During the coming academic year, consideration will be given to the possible production of an improved EJ Handbook, to the production of a video based on this concept and to the offering of training courses in Environmental Justice through the Technology Transfer Program of the Institute of Transportation Studies.

 

 

  Reference:

 

Shannon Cairns, Jessic Greig, and Martin Wachs, Environmental Justice & Transportation:  A Citizen’s Hanbbook.  Institute of Transportation Studies, University of California, Berkeley, 2003.  ISBN 0-9673039-9-0, 30 pages.