The State Highway Administration (SHA) has released the new ICC Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) on the Internet http://iccstudy.org/DEIS/index.php which means that those who oppose this destructive highway must act now to counter the flood of public relation misinformation being spread by its advocates. Disregarding inherent flaws in the entire DEIS process, local newspapers, chambers of commerce, and representatives of the SHA itself are touting benefits of an ICC that do not exist.
MICC and the other Save Our Communities campaign members continue to seize every opportunity to testify, write letters, and galvanize citizen support against the ICC. With the release of the DEIS, this is your opportunity to join in actively. We have asked for your support in the past, but now we need your direct involvement. It is vitally important that we introduce as many comments against the ICC DEIS as possible into the public record. If you truly want to stop the ICC, here are the things that you need to do:
• Write your personal comments on the DEIS (http://www.iccstudy.org/deis_form.php) no later than February 15, 2005. Review the DEIS if you can, but also look for claims to question online at ICCfacts.com or savecommunities.org. Mail letters to the project manager, Mr. Wesley Mitchell, Mail Stop C-301, Project Planning Division, Maryland State Highway Administration, 707 North Calvert Street, Baltimore MD 21202.
• Testify and demonstrate against the ICC at the four public hearings, and most importantly, attend the mass anti-ICC rally at the James Blake High School, 9:30 a.m., January 22nd.
Tues. Jan. 4, 5-11 pm (program starts at 6 pm)
Eleanor Roosevelt High School
7601 Hanover Parkway, Greenbelt, MD
Wed. Jan. 5, 5-11 pm (program starts at 6 pm)
Gaithersburg High School
314 S. Frederick Ave., Gaithersburg, MD
Sat. Jan. 8, 9 am - 6 pm (program starts at 10 am)
James Blake High School
300 Norwood Rd., Silver Spring MD
Sat. Jan. 22, 9 am - 6 pm (program starts at 10 am)
James Blake High School
300 Norwood Rd., Silver Spring MD
ANTI-ICC Rally 9:30 am
Now is the time to step up against the ICC; now is the time for everyone to act.
Also, please renew your membership to MICC and send in a contribution to our legal fund so that we have the resources to fight the ICC on all fronts. Thank you for your support against the ICC.
A United Longmead Community States Its Case Against the ICC
By Roger D. Plaut
If you walk through the community of Longmead Crossing in Silver Spring, the first thing you notice is how calm it is. There are hundreds of trees in a wide stretch of untouched land where birds sing and animals forage. Children play soccer in the fresh air on a wide, green athletic field next to the community swimming pool.
Yet, if Governor Ehrlich and his State Highway Administration have their way, all this will change. Our community is threatened by the prospect of having a six-lane highway running right through its center.
If built, the Corridor 1 route of the ICC would replace the existing Longmead Forest with a 300-foot wide swath of asphalt. The 5,000 people living here would be exposed to the noise pollution, air pollution, and visual impact of this intrusion. The highway would be immediately adjacent to the soccer field, exposing children playing there to the toxins in the exhaust from the cars, tractor-trailers, and fuel tankers thundering by. Despite the claims of the Ehrlich administration, the ICC would certainly not improve our quality of life.
According to a survey conducted by the homeowners’ association, ninety percent of Longmead residents oppose the ICC. The Board of Directors of the HOA has written letters to our elected officials expressing our strong opposition to the ICC and asking for their help in preventing its construction. We oppose the ICC on either of the alignments, because of its effects on nearby communities. Our residents are mobilized to fight it.
In the past few months, we have had two ICC-related events in Longmead. First, we had a Stake-Out. Residents assembled to hear our state Delegate, Adrienne Mandel, express her own outrage at the prospect of the ICC. We then moved out into the community, carrying stakes with balloons attached. Linking the stakes with yellow caution tape, we marked out the potential ICC route. This made it clear to all who passed exactly how disruptive the highway would be.
Second, we had a forum on the potential health impacts of highways. Two environmental health scientists outlined the results of studies that showed that those who live near highways are at increased risk for such serious health problems as asthma, leukemia, and premature and low birth-weight babies.
We will continue to express our outrage by submitting written comments and testifying publicly at the hearings in January. Our residents are committed to avoiding the dramatic change in character the ICC would undoubtedly bring to our community.
SHA Admits ICC Won’t Relieve Traffic, Will Cost 40% More
In a one-two blow that could help put out the lights for an ICC, the State Highway Administration (SHA) admitted in separate instances that this long-resisted highway will not relieve traffic on I-270, 495, or I-95, and that the estimated cost for building it has risen from $1.7 billion to $2.1-$2.4 billion. On September 17th, 2004, the Washington Post reported that Astate officials have dropped claims that the highway would reduce traffic congestion on the Capital Beltway or other major roads, though it would ease traffic on local roads.
The reduced local traffic claim seems questionable, too, since the 1997 environmental impact statement estimated that local traffic would increase by 8%, due to cars getting on and off the ICC rather than traveling its entire 17.5 mile length. The same study revealed that only 5% of ICC users would travel from one end of the road to the other. In fact, with the addition of a toll for each use, the likelihood of more frugal and low-income drivers using local roads instead would seem to increase.
In November, the Washington Post reported that state officials had announced that the capital cost estimates for building an ICC had gone up from $1.7 billion to $2.1-$2.4 billion. They claimed that the reason for the higher cost stemmed from greater environmental safeguards. However, the Maryland-National Capital Park & Planning Commission recently admitted that the cost to the environment, the destruction of forests, wetlands, and streams, could not be mitigated.
The higher costs reported by the SHA now have Maryland transportation head Robert Flanagan scrambling to urge state legislators to raise the ceiling imposed earlier this year on the amount of money they can borrow for the ICC. At present, they are allowed to borrow only up to13% of the $400-$500 million federal highway funds allocated to Maryland each year. Flanagan wants the percentage of state funds dedicated to an ICC to go up to 20%, so that he can borrow $1 billion with the hope of beginning construction on an ICC in 2006, the year of Ehrlich’s re-election bid.
This means that Maryland taxpayers would be liable for interest payments on this amount no matter what federal funding comes our way, while all other worthy state projects would take a back seat to paying this enormous ICC mortgage. The total cost to Marylanders including interest payments would soar above $3.1 billion. On top of paying federal and state taxes to support the ICC, taxpayers also would have to pay a toll of $5.40 per ride. To sum it all up, Maryland taxpayers would pay for an ICC in three ways; federal taxes, state taxes, and $5.40 or more for tolls, all for a road that will not reduce traffic congestion.
Tell your state senator and delegate that you do not want to finance a road that won’t relieve traffic and will hinder funding for other more worthy projects. Send them an e-mail at http://mlis.state.md.us/cgi-win/mail32.exe.
MICC Testifies Before the COG Transportation Board Against the ICC
On October 20th, 2004, MICC testified before the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments (COG) Transportation Policy Board, which was considering the ICC for its long-range regional transportation plan. Despite the testimony below and that of the vast majority at the meeting, the Board voted the ICC into its regional plan. This vote took place before the release of the new SHA Draft Environmental Impact Statement.
My name is Dan Wallace, I represent the 4,000 members of the Montgomery Intercounty Connector Coalition, which has opposed an ICC since 1989. I want to thank the Board for this opportunity to comment today.
For some 40 years, advocates of an ICC have claimed that it would relieve traffic on our major arteries, the Beltway, I-95, and I-270. Yet, every study has shown that an ICC would reduce traffic minimally, especially when compared to alternatives such as upgrading existing roads and transit opportunities. Still, the ICC pros pushed traffic relief, crowing that it would take 21,000 cars off of the Beltway, as though it were a bathtub, not a traffic stream.
Then, suddenly these same proponents went quiet on dropped traffic relief. Indeed, the Washington Post reported September 17th that state officials have dropped claims that the highway would reduce traffic congestion on the Capital Beltway or other major roads. So, the pros went to economics, and how great it would be for Prince George's County, which would get 6,294 new jobs according to an SHA-sponsored economic study that has yet to release its data, or methodology, by the way. These results are suspect, too, because building I-270 has proven to cost Prince George's County 96,000 jobs. That's a dramatic disconnect, which raises the question, if the reasoning put forth for an ICC keeps changing, we have to ask what's going on here?
Maybe politics fueled by support from special interests have something to do with it. Perhaps a more pointed question is why are we hurrying to a decision, before the new environmental impact statement has been released? Well, we know that the governor of Maryland wants part of it built by 2006 just in time for his reelection bid.
Again, folks, we've been at this for more than four decades, what's the rush to decision now? It seems like a bum's rush, and if that's so, who are the bums, we the public? You have an opportunity to defy any political pressure being exerted by voting on the merits of an ICC alone. Repeatedly, all studies have shown that an ICC possesses no merit. Do us, our kids, and our grandchildren a real service for now and the future, first by waiting for the new impact statement, then by turning down an ICC once and for all.