The Original Sin of Environmental Review
No EIS necessary. Photo: tlindenbaum/FlickrIn the past few months we've reported on opponents of bike lanes, car-free parks, and congestion pricing using the pretext of environmental review to stymie initiatives that would reduce vehicle emissions. Norman Oder at the Atlantic Yards Report points us to another unintended consequence of the National Environmental Protection Act, the 1970 legislation that established the EIS process.
AYR recounts a talk given by progressive developer Jonathan Rose, who says that NEPA -- favored by a real estate industry that did not want to subject itself to an alternative law based on land use planning -- was flawed from the start:
"So the effect was that we turned our back on national planning, and weturned our back on a national infrastructure policy," Rose said. "And,at the same time, here’s what happens: 1000 individuals choose tosubdivide a parcel in the suburbs, or the exurbs, and it falls underthe screen of an environmental impact statement, each one is oneindividual act."
"One person chooses to build a 1000-unit urbanproject in a city and they get held up for five years in anenvironmental impact statement," he concluded. "And so the unintendedconsequence of NEPA actually was one more of the many things that madeit easier for suburban sprawl to proceed from 1970 to 2000 instead ofurban redevelopment."
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