Case Law Details
Laguna Greenbelt, Inc. v. USDOT
Project Description:
The San Joaquin Hills Transportation Corridor Toll Road (the Project) is a 17.5 mile long toll road between Newport Beach and San Juan Capistrano, California. The Project connects to I-5 in San Juan Capistrano. Part of the Project runs through an “ecological reserve” established by the University of California, Irvine. The Project also runs through habitat for the Coastal California Gnatcatcher. FHWA prepared an EIS and Section 4(f) determination in order to allow the connection to I-5. FHWA determined that there was no use of the ecological reserve under Section 4(f) because planning for the reserve assumed the existence of the road.
42 F. 3d 517
42 F. 3d 517
U.S. Court of Appeals – 9th Circuit
12/20/1994
San Joaquin Hills Transportation Corridor Toll Road
Highway
Case Summary
The plaintiffs filed suit against U.S. DOT and the San Joaquin Transportation Corridor Agency, challenging the adequacy of the EIS and the Section 4(f) determination. After the lawsuit commenced, wildfires swept through the Project area. FHWA, after analyzing whether the wildfires caused new environmental impacts, issued a Memorandum of Record documenting its reasons for determining that a supplemental EIS was not needed. Plaintiffs then amended their complaint to include a challenge the determination that no supplement EIS was needed.
Key Holdings
NEPA
Range of Alternatives. The court found that the three alternatives considered in the FHWA’s EIS constituted a reasonable range of alternatives. The court first noted that NEPA did not require a minimum number of alternatives to be considered. The court then noted that the range of alternatives included in the EIS was reasonable and that NEPA did not require an agency to consider alternatives that were not feasible or not reasonably related to a project’s purpose and need.
Induced Growth. The court found that an agency, in analyzing potential for induced growth, could rely on local planning documents that reflect the existence of the proposed project. The court also upheld the agency’s finding that, because the residential and commercial growth was predicted to occur with or without the project, there was no induced growth attributable to the project.
Section 4(f)
Joint Planning/No Use Determination. The court rejected Plaintiffs claim that FHWA had improperly determined that the Project did not use the ecological preserve because the creation of the preserve acknowledged the plan to construct the Project in or near the preserve. The court noted that documents creating the preserve clearly referred to the proposed toll road, and that the plan for creating the preserve anticipated greater access to the University through construction of the Project. The court found that “because the planning documents together with the accompanying public comments and responses specifically refer to the location of the tollroad, including the alignment using University property,” the FHWA properly concluded that there was no Section 4(f) use of the preserve.
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