Federal Judge smacks down environmental challenge to Bigelow Gulch Road expansion.
In a sharply worded 13-page ruling, Federal District Court Judge Robert H. Whaley has concluded the U.S. Department of Transportation has complied with federal environmental rules and can proceed with a controversial road expansion project in eastern Spokane County.
The Bigelow Gulch Road/Forker Road Urban Connector is part of the Spokane Corridor Project that will connect Interstate 90 to U.S. Highways 2 and 95. The project would widen the road from two lanes to four and increase its length by nearly a third.
On behalf of Orchard Prairie residents who’d be affected by the expansion, the Center for Justice brought suit against DOT, arguing that it had failed to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and agency rules guiding NEPA compliance.
But in his ruling issued Monday, Judge Whaley roundly rejected the Center’s arguments on all fronts. Whereas the Center argued that a full Environmental Impact Statement was warranted, the judge ruled that a more cursory Environmental Assessment (EA) was adequate and within the agency’s discretion. He also agreed with Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew S. Biviano that DOT’s findings of no significant impacts in areas contested by the suit to have been appropriate. Moreover, Judge Whaley repeatedly sided with Biviano in the disputes over whether the EA, in final form, was responsive to public comments and early internal criticism by a DOT lawyer that it was inadequate in several areas of real and potential environmental impacts.
“Plaintiff’s best argument,” Judge Whaley wrote, “is that Defendants failed to consider a 35 mph speed limit alternative along the entire corridor, which could arguably serve the project’s stated goals with less impact. Plaintiff’s are correct that the final EA does not evaluate this alternative.” But, he added, “[V]iewed as a whole, the record demonstrates that Defendants adequately considered alternatives. The final EA actually seems to go well beyond the ‘brief discussion of reasonable alternatives’ required by the case law. And the Court finds the decision to reject the 35-mph alternative as unreasonable to be within the agency’s discretion.”
–CFJ
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