Judge set to rule on I-630 request

LR residents seek injunction to block widening project

U.S. District Judge James Moody Jr. said Monday that he will issue a decision today on whether to stop construction on an $87.3 million project to widen a 2.5-mile section of Interstate 630 in west Little Rock.

Moody’s announcement came at the end of a daylong hearing on a motion for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction sought by a group of Little Rock residents who contend federal and state authorities should have done a more indepth assessment of the project’s impact on the environment, particularly air quality.

The judge said his decision today will simply be a “yes” or “no” he will email to the parties. Citing his caseload this week, Moody said a formal order explaining his decision will come later.

The lawsuit was filed Wednesday, two days after Manhattan Road & Bridge Co. of Tulsa began work on

the 18-month project. The company has already spent millions of dollars staging 103 pieces of equipment, including six cranes, and 94 workers on the project, according to Mark Swindle, vice president of Arkansas operations for the company.

The project will widen the section of I-630 between Baptist Health Medical Center and South University Avenue to eight lanes from six and is considered an extension of the Interstate 630/Interstate 430 interchange. The interchange was improved in a series of three projects completed three years ago at a cost of $125 million.

Work to remove the Hughes Street overpass began Friday and was scheduled to be completed over the weekend. But work was delayed by strong storms that moved through the state late Friday and early Saturday. A new overpass is scheduled to be built within three months.

Moody, who was assigned the case on Thursday after another judge recused, held a informal hearing the same day to discuss the case with attorneys. At that time, he declined a request from Richard Mays, an attorney for the plaintiffs, to stop the overpass from being dismantled and said he wanted to wait to until Monday’s hearing to decide whether to grant his motion.

The lawsuit takes issue with a determination by the Arkansas Department of Transportation and the Federal Highway Administration, an agency of the U.S. Department of Transportation, to move forward with the project as “categorically excluded” from a detailed environmental analysis.

Under federal regulations, projects that don’t “individually or cumulatively have a significant impact on the human environment” don’t require more in-depth analysis, such as an environmental assessment or an environmental impact statement.

All three agencies, which are defendants in the lawsuit, argued that federal law exempts projects under a “categorical exclusion” from air quality analysis.

They also said Little Rock’s air quality exceeds air-quality standards set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, another factor that doesn’t require air-quality analysis.

The project, the need for which was identified by regional planners as far back as 1999, is being built to accommodate future traffic. More than 100,000 vehicles travel the section every day. Traffic projections show that number will rise to 138,000 vehicles by 2037.

Those additional vehicles will increase air pollutants in residential areas, which include schools and churches, along the corridor, Mays said, citing three studies, including one that found an increase in the higher incidence of vascular disease in people who live in communities adjoining high-traffic freeways.

They also pointed out the I-430/I-630 project received the same “categorical exclusion.”

But Mays charged that state and federal transportation officials used the “categorical exclusion” designation to avoid the time, expense and effort to do any more in-depth analysis. He noted that no one challenged the designation for the I-430/I-630 project.

“If no one challenges it, you can do anything you want, can’t you?” Mays asked one Federal Highway Administration official, Randal J. Looney, the environmental coordinator for the agency’s Arkansas division.

Looney disagreed and said categorical exclusions, which happen on more than 90 percent of state highway projects involving federal aid, are determined based on historical data as well as federal regulations.

Looney said his agency and the Arkansas Transportation Department long has an agreement on what projects are eligible for “categorical exclusion.” Other states have similar agreements with the Federal Highway Administration, he said.

In closing arguments to Moody, Mays said the use of the “categorical exclusion” eliminated any other in-depth review of the project.

“This is a major project,” he said. “It has major consequences.”

He also said it should be studied in relation to the ongoing planning of the $630.7 million project to improve a 6.7-mile section of Interstate 30 through downtown Little Rock and North Little Rock as well as a project to improve the Interstate 430/Cantrell Road interchange, which also is in the planning stages.

“There has been no comprehensive or cumulative impact analysis of these projects,” Mays said. “All of these are going to have cumulative impacts.”

He called the “categorical exclusion” an “incentive to avoid complying” with the National Environmental Policy Act, which governs environmental assessments on all major government actions.

Attorneys for the government strongly took issue with Mays’ characterization of the agencies’ actions.

“We are not trying to slip anything past anybody,” said Christopher Scott Jones, an attorney for the Federal Highway Administration.

In fact, the “categorical exclusion” and supporting documentation totals 150 pages, the same number of pages identified as the limits of an environmental impact statement. The document included a noise abatement study that identified several places where noise barriers will be required.

“It belies any idea we handled this project in a perfunctory fashion,” Jones said.

The plaintiffs had plenty of opportunities to object earlier but instead waited until after the project began.

“Any kind of emergency here is of the plaintiff’s own making,” Jones said.

Projects under a “categorical exclusion” determination are exempt from the air quality analysis that the lawsuit said should have been performed.

Work to remove the Hughes Street overpass began Friday and was supposed to be completed over the weekend. But work was delayed by the strong storms that moved through the state late Friday and early Saturday. A new overpass is scheduled to be built within three months.