CONSERVATION
AND ENVIRONMENTAL STREAMLINING
IN
TRANSPORTATION PROJECTS
Prepared by
Defenders of Wildlife, National Wildlife Federation
and The
Humane Society of the United States, Washington, D.C.
Presented
to the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee
September
19, 2002
Our organizations submit the
following testimony to the public record on behalf of our millions of members
and supporters, who support strong environmental protections as well as
sustainable transportation solutions.
There is no question that America=s
transportation infrastructure is imperative to our mobility, productivity and
success. However, it has also had
significant impacts on ecosystems of the U.S.
Four million miles of roadways in the U.S. cover an area approximately
the size of the state of South Carolina, and impacts beyond the road surface
extend to as much as 20% of the total land area. Unfortunately, roads have not always been planned wisely, leaving
a destructive B and permanent
B footprint
on landscapes and wildlife habitat.
That is why it is imperative that transportation decisions are made
after careful consideration of not only the immediate need and purpose, but
also the long term and cumulative effects.
In addition, transportation decisions cannot be made in a vacuum, but
only after consultation with all stakeholders and interested parties.
Our primary concern with
environmental streamlining, as some have proposed it, is simple and
transparent: the potential for weakening
environmental considerations required by the National Environmental Policy Act
(NEPA). NEPA is the foundation for
environmental protection in this country, and is largely credited for the level
of environmental quality we enjoy today.
When the 91st Congress enacted NEPA, the intent was clearly
to declare environmental protection a national priority B not to
delay projects, or pit agency against agency.
The NEPA review process was intended to ensure that the actions of
federal agencies reflect the nation=s dedication to environmental
quality. It was not intended to be an
assembly line of meaningless paperwork in pursuit of a mindless rubber-stamp
approval. However, when agencies
perceive the process as a nuisance, it not only contributes to the added costs
and delays, it is an aberration of Congressional design and a miscarriage of
the trust and responsibility endowed upon these agencies by the American
people.
Rather than advocating solutions that
would shortchange critically needed environmental reviews required by NEPA, we
believe that administrative actions that have been adopted in response to
streamlining provisions in TEA-21 are fundamentally working. Some state streamlining activities,
including early involvement of natural resource agencies in highway planning,
coordination with existing natural resource planning efforts and enhanced
application of mitigation approaches, can further reduce project completion
time and do so without the need for additional legislation.
Past streamlining debates resulted in
the inclusion of an environmental streamlining provision in the Transportation
Equity Act for the 21st Century (TEA-21). This provision, Section 1309, mandates that the Department of
Transportation (DOT) work to reduce delays in project delivery while
maintaining environmental protection: AThe
Secretary shall develop and implement a coordinated environmental review
process for highway and mass transit projects.@[1]
Since then, great strides have been
made in expediting the environmental review process. A report to Congress by the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA)
in February 2002 examined states= efforts in carrying out Section
1309. The report found significant
progress across the country, in particular that Athrough trial and error, innovation,
testing, and early lessons learned, much of the transportation community has
adopted a new way of thinking to get beyond the usual environmental process
bottlenecks._[2] Among other findings were that every state
has adopted or initiated a process for streamlining that clarifies, amends, or
re-invents the project development process.
Nearly half of the states (24) have focused their efforts on integrating
planning and NEPA activities. Forty-one
states have some level of delegated authority for historic resources permitting.
Streamlining, as set out in TEA-21,
is working. Improved project delivery
is already being realized, simply by improving the process. One measure of that achievement, cited by
FHWA, is that the length of time spent processing environmental documents has
declined by eight months between 1999 to 2001.
There is no doubt that some
transportation projects stretch far beyond their projected time frame for
delivery. However, there is little
evidence to suggest that environmental regulations are the cause of most
project delays. Three new studies, from
the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO)
and FHWA, quantify the impact that the NEPA process has had on transportation
projects. The results of these studies
call into question the complaints that environmental regulations are the source
of delays, and provide further evidence that efforts to reduce review time are
successfully under way.
Federal Highway Administration
published two reports on transportation project delay in late 2000. The first study examined 89 projects
requiring an environmental impact statement (EIS) that have yet to complete the
review process after five or more years.
Contrary to popular belief, the most common reason for delay was lack of
funding or low priority (32 percent), local controversy (16 percent), or the
inherent complexity of the project (13 percent). These issues, as well as changing or expanding the scope of the
project (8 percent) far outweigh environmental review as causes of project
delay.[3]
The second study, conducted by the
Louis Berger Group, set out to establish a baseline of the length of time
required to comply with the NEPA process.
The study found that the average (mean) time required to complete the
NEPA process was about 3.6 years. The
median time was only three years B which in this case is a better
indicator because of outliers in the sample.
It is important to note that the time required to complete the NEPA
process is not necessarily additive to the project planning and design process,
and may be coincident with other phases of the project.[4]
A third study, commissioned by AASHTO
and conducted by the consulting firm TransTech Management, looked specifically
at the causes of delay for projects receiving a Categorical Exclusion or
requiring an Environmental Assessment.
According to AASHTO=s survey of 32 state DOTs, the vast
majority of transportation projects require only a Categorical Exclusion
(CE). In fact, the AASHTO study found
that fully 92 percent of environmental documents processed by state DOTs are
CEs. Environmental assessments (EA) make
up seven percent, with Environmental Impact Statements (EIS) rounding out the
sample at less than 2 percent.[5]
We fully support efforts to reduce
costly delays in transportation projects to the extent that they do not
compromise environmental safeguards. We
emphasize several measures which can expedite project delivery while enhancing
natural resource conservation. Each of
these measures is authorized in TEA-21, and many states are already taking
advantage of the benefits.
1.
Early, continued, substantive and
supported involvement by regulatory agencies
Many projects are delayed because
they are planned and designed before consultation with regulatory
agencies. If regulatory agencies are
involved from the beginning, they can steer DOTs clear of problems early. We support the facilitation of agency
representation at the early stages of project design. Early agency consultations can identify decision points and
potential conflicts before considerable time and resources have been committed
to a particular plan of action which may later be discovered to be unacceptable
or inconsistent with existing standards.
NEPA reviews are but one of many
responsibilities of federal land and resource management agencies. Delays are often the result of inadequate
funding and understaffed field offices.
When agencies are fiscally restrained, their ability to respond to
applicants= requests
is likewise restrained. TEA-21
significantly increased transportation funding, resulting in an increase in transportation
projects requiring environmental review.
TEA-21 did not, however, increase funding to the agencies charged with
reviewing and permitting these projects.
The experience of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) provides an
excellent example. Between 1998 and
2000, USFWS experienced a 77 percent increase in transportation project
workload. However, since 1994 the USFWS
budget and personnel levels for transportation technical assistance have
increased only 1 percent.
Section 1309 allows transportation
funds to be used to reimburse permitting agencies for staff hours and expenses,
so that these agencies can dedicate staff time to reviewing proposed road
projects early on and in a timely manner. Such reimbursement is an efficient
investment that prevents delays in project delivery and increases natural
resource conservation. To date, several
states have taken full advantage of the reimbursement provision and are reaping
the streamlining benefits of early, continued and supported involvement.
2. Incorporate conservation into transportation
planning
Substantial progress can be made in
reducing project delays by coordinating conservation planning and
transportation planning. Several
states, including Florida and Massachusetts, have undertaken comprehensive
wildlife conservation plans which identify the most important habitats for
sustaining the full complement of species in the state into the future. Under the State Wildlife Grants program in
the FY2002 Interior Appropriations Act, states are now receiving federal
funding that can be used to develop these state plans. State natural resource agencies are awarded
formula-based grants with the requirement that it complete a comprehensive
wildlife conservation plan by 2005. Transportation
plans and projects will have reduced impacts on wildlife and proceed more
smoothly if they take these conservation plans into account by avoiding impacts
to ecologically important lands and directing mitigation funds to the
preservation of those lands.
Florida=s Efficient Transportation
Decision-Making (ETDM) process is an example of coordination of conservation
plans with transportation plans. ETDM
was developed as a streamlining program, in which transportation plans, very
early on in the process, are evaluated in terms of their environmental impacts,
including impacts to the state=s strategic habitat conservation
areas. The ETDM system also enables
more rapid permitting by moving the permitting to earlier stages of the
process.
3. Advance programmatic mitigation or
conservation banking
Better coordination of conservation
plans and transportation plans can allow transportation agencies to avoid and
minimize impacts to biodiversity. These
conservation plans can also inform mitigation efforts, when impacts to
remaining natural areas cannot be avoided.
Current mitigation practice, however, is not only time-consuming and
expensive for action agencies; it may not always provide the best return for resource
agencies. Most mitigation is done on an
on-site, project-by-project basis, which often misses important indirect and
cumulative impacts. On-site mitigation
is often necessary, but project-by-project mitigation can result in isolated
patches of protected land that are not ecologically viable and are more
vulnerable to continued development.
We support innovative efforts by
state DOTs to conduct advance programmatic mitigation and conservation banking
for endangered species. In these
efforts, state DOTs acquire or Abank@ large blocks of conservation lands,
from which they can extract conservation credits for those projects deemed to
have negative environmental impacts.
Mitigation funds are used most effectively when directed toward the
acquisition of lands identified as ecologically important in state or
eco-regional conservation plans. We support wider use of conservation
mitigation and banking as part of expediting project delivery, with appropriate
regulations and guidance, and with assurances proper sequencing would not be
compromised. We believe that this
approach will save DOTs considerable time and expense, while implementing state
and ecoregional conservation goals.
In closing, we reiterate that
implementation of TEA-21 has largely resulted in faster project delivery and
meaningful streamlining that still preserves environmental standards. Our points of emphasis above (early
involvement, coordination with conservation planning, and advance mitigation)
are all authorized and supported in TEA-21.
Major legislative changes in streamlining are not needed. Finally, we urge the committee to embrace
the reformative ideals of Section 1309 without losing sight of the original
intent of NEPA: to protect and preserve our natural heritage.
[1] Transportation Equity Act for
the 21st Century, Pub. L. No. 105-178, '1309.
[2] Federal Highway Admin.,
Highway and Transit Environmental Streamlining Progress Summary (Feb.
2002).
[3] Federal Highway Admin.,
Reasons for EIS Project Delays (Sept. 2000).FHWA. Reasons for EIS Project Delays. September 2000.
[4] The Louis Berger Group, Federal
Highway Admin., Evaluating the Performance of Environmental
Streamlining: Development of a NEPA
Baseline for Measuring Continuous Performance (2000).
[5]
American Assn of State Highway and Transp. Officials,
Environmental Process Streamlining: A Report on Delays Associated with States' Categorical Exclusion and Environmental
Assessment Processes (Oct. 2000).