Case Law Details
Southwest Williamson County Community Association v. Slater
Project Description:
The Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT) planned and designed a project to provide an alternative route around Nashville, Tennessee. The highway, constructed solely with state funds, starts at I-40 West, runs south of Nashville, crosses I-65 South and I-24, and terminates at I-40 East. TDOT prepared three Environmental Assessments (EA): one for the interchanges at I-40 East and I-24, one for the interchanges at I-65 and I-40 West, and one for a 53-mile portion of the highway running between I-24 and I-40 West. The FHWA issued a Finding of No Significant Impact (FONSI) for the two EAs analyzing the interchanges, but took no action on the EA for the highway between I-24 and I-40 West.
243 F. 3d 270
243 F. 3d 270
U.S. Court of Appeals – 6th Circuit
03/14/2001
Route 840 South (“I-40 Bypass”) Project
Highway
Case Summary
Plaintiffs, the Southwest Williamson County Community Association, challenged the project in federal district court alleging violations of NEPA, ISTEA, and Tennessee state law. The district court found that the NEPA claims were barred by the statute of limitations, dismissed the ISTEA claims, and refused to consider the state law claims. On appeal, the court of appeals affirmed the dismissal of two of the three NEPA claims but remanded the matter to the district court to determine if the construction of the 53-mile portion of the highway between I-24 and I-40 West was a major federal action for NEPA purposes. On remand, the plaintiffs filed an amended complaint, again alleging that the 53-mile portion of the highway was a major federal action, and requesting that the court order FHWA to prepare an EIS for that portion of the highway project. Plaintiffs also requested a preliminary injunction. The district court denied the preliminary injunction finding that plaintiffs had little likelihood of success on the merits of their NEPA claim. The court of appeal affirmed the denial of the injunction.
Key Holdings
NEPA
Major Federal Action. The court held that NEPA applies to project that do not receive federal funding based on the “aggregate of federal involvement from numerous federal agencies, even if one agency’s role in the project may not be sufficient to create a major federal action in and of itself.” The court then stated that there are two alternative tests for determining if a non-federally funded project is a major federal action subject to NEPA. One test examines whether the non-federal project “restricts or limits” a federal agency’s choice among alternatives when the federal agency is required to provide some approval for the state project. The other test requires an analysis of whether the federal decision-makers have authority to exercise sufficient control or responsibility over the non-federal project so as to influence the outcome of the project.
The court then found that neither of the two alternative tests established that the project was a major federal action under NEPA. The court found that the construction of the highway was not so advanced so as to limit FHWA’s choice of reasonable alternatives when considering the state’s interchange approval requests. The court also found that neither the Corps of Engineers nor the National Park Service, each of which was required to approve some aspect of the project, had been limited in the range of reasonable alternatives available when making issuing the requested approvals. Applying the other test, the court found that nothing in either NEPA or the “Federal-Aid Highways Act” conferred jurisdiction on the FHWA to oversee construction of the highway between the federally regulated.
Litigation Procedure
Mootness. The Court rejected FHWA’s claim that the case was moot. FHWA argued that because it had previously acted on the requests for interchange approvals, and no further requests for approvals were pending, plaintiffs’ claim that the state highway project was a major federal action was moot. The court found that because: (1) the issue raised in the complaint was centered on whether the construction of the highway between the interchanges was a major federal action, and (2) the highway was not yet substantially completed, plaintiffs’ claim was not moot. The court stated that a “case is not rendered moot merely because the federal defendants assert that, under their own interpretation of the statute, they are not required to act.”
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