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Volume 1, Number 1 |
CONTENTS Transportation Equity |
TRANSPORTATION
EQUITY
A Newsletter of the Environmental Justice Resource
Center at Clark Atlanta University
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For more than a century, people of color have struggled to end transportation discrimination, linking unequal treatment on buses and trains with violation of constitutionally guaranteed civil rights. History has shown that the stakes are high. In 1896, in Plessy v. Ferguson, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Louisiana's segregated "white" and "colored" seating on railroad cars, ushering in the infamous doctrine of "separate but equal." Plessy not only codified apartheid on transportation facilities, but served as the legal basis for racial segregation in education until its was overturned by the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka U.S. Supreme Court decision.The modern civil rights movement has its roots in transportation. From the legendary Rosa Parks to the Montgomery Bus Boycott to the Freedom Riders, all roads pointed to a frontal attack on racist transportation policies and practices. Today, transportation is no less a civil rights and quality of life issue. All communities are still not created equal. Some communities accrue benefits from transportation development projects, while other communities bear a disproportionate burden and pay the cost in diminished health. Generally, benefits are more dispersed, while costs or burdens are more localized. Having a seven-lane freeway next door is not a benefit to someone who does not even own a car.
Transportation equity is about access, opportunity, and fairness. Transportation equity is not a new concept nor is it a new goal. It has long been a goal of the modern civil rights movement. In recent years, social justice advocates (i.e., child care, health providers, housing, educators, environmentalists, organized labor, etc.) have reintroduced transportation equity on the political radar screens. The issues have been couched in social and economic justice contexts. Many poor people and people of color, who are concentrated in central cities, are demanding better transportation that will take them to the job-rich suburbs. Ideally, it would be great if jobs were closer to the inner-city residents' homes. However, few urban core neighborhoods have experienced an economic revitalization that can rival that of the suburbs.
Transportation equity concerns extend to disparate outcomes in planning, operation and maintenance, and infrastructure development. Transportation is a key component in addressing poverty, unemployment, equal opportunity goals, and ensuring equal access to education, employment, and other public services. In the real world, all transportation decisions do not have the same impact on all groups. Costs and benefits associated with transportation developments are not randomly distributed. Transportation equity is concerned with factors that may create and or exacerbate inequities. Environmental justice focuses on measures to prevent or correct disparities in benefits and costs. Disparate transportation outcomes can be subsumed under three broad categories of inequity: procedural, geographic, and social.
Procedural Inequity. Attention is directed to the process by which transportation decisions may or may not be carried out in a uniform, fair, and consistent manner with involvement of diverse public stakeholders. Here, the question is do the rules apply equally to everyone?
Geographic Inequity. Transportation decisions may have distributive impacts (positive and negative) that are geographic and spatial, such as rural vs. urban vs. central city. Some communities are physically located on the "wrong side of the tracks" and often receive substandard services. Environmental justice concerns revolve around the extent that transportation systems address outcomes (diversity and quality of services, resources and investments, facilities and infrastructure, access to primary employment centers, etc.) that disproportionately favor one geographic area or spatial location over another.
Social Inequity. The distribution of transportation benefits and burdens are not randomly distributed across population groups. Generally, transportation amenities (benefits) accrue to the wealthier and more educated segment of society, while transportation disamenities (burdens) fall disproportionately on people of color and individuals at the lower end of the socioeconomic spectrum. Intergenerational equity issues are also subsumed under this category. For example, the impacts and consequences of some transportation decisions may reach into several generations.
Transportation decisionmaking--whether at the federal, regional, state, or local level--often mirrors the power arrangements of the dominant society and its institutions. Some transportation policies distribute the costs in a regressive pattern while providing disproportionate benefits for individuals who fall at the upper end of the education and income scale. All transportation modes are not created equal. Federal transportation policies, taxing structure, and funding schemes have contributed to the inequity between the various transportation modes, e.g., private automobile, rail, buses, air, etc. Central cities and suburbs are not equal. They often compete for scarce resources. One need not be a rocket scientist to predict the outcome between affluent suburbs and their less affluent central city competitors. Freeways are the lifelines for suburban commuters, while millions of central city residents are dependent on public transportation as their primary mode of travel. But cuts in mass transit subsidies and fare hikes have reduced access to essential social services and economic activities.
After mounting scientific evidence and growing pressure from grassroots people of color groups, President Clinton, on February 11, 1994, signed Executive Order 12898, "Federal Actions to Address Environmental Justice in Minority Populations and Low-Income Populations." It has now been six years since President Clinton on February 11, 1994 issued Executive Order 12898, "Federal Actions to Address Environmental Justice in Minority Populations and Low-Income Populations." This Order is not a new law but is an attempt to address environmental injustice within existing federal laws and regulations. The Executive Order (EO) restates the provisions found in Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Title VI prohibits discriminatory practices in programs receiving federal funds. The full text of Executive Order 12898 can be viewed at http://www.ejrc.cau.edu/execordr.html.
The Executive Order also refocuses attention on the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), a law that sets policy goals for the protection and enhancement of the environment. NEPA's expressed goal is "to ensure for all Americans a safe, healthful, productive, and aesthetically and culturally pleasing environment." NEPA requires federal agencies to prepare a detailed statement on the environmental effects of proposed federal actions that significantly affect the quality of human health.
Executive Order 12898 reinforces the applicability of Title VI and all other federal laws, regulations and other authorities. Together they prohibit discrimination and underscore protection of health and the environment. Title VI expands the nondiscrimination mandate to federally funded entities and activities. They both reinforce the NEPA process.
Complying with the EO 12898, the Department of Transportation on April 15, 1997 issued Order 5680.2 to address environmental justice in minority populations and low-income populations by establishing policies that promote environmental justice in all programs, policies and activities. The DOT Order specifically addresses environmental justice for minorities (defined as Black, Hispanic, Asian American, American Indian or Alaskan Native) and low-income populations including whites (median household income below Department of Health and Human Services poverty guidelines). Pursuant to NEPA, all federally funded transportation planning and decisions must involve an environmental justice assessment process that explicitly considers adverse effects or the potential of adverse effects on these populations.
On December 2, 1998, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) issued its order. The FHWA Order sets forth policies for integrating environmental justice principles into existing operations, preventing disproportionately high and adverse effects, and actions to address disproportionately high and adverse effects on low-income and minority populations.
Executive Order 12898, the DOT Order, and the FHWA Order reaffirm NEPA, Title VI, and long-standing policy to ensure nondiscrimination in the programs and activities of Federal aid recipients, sub-recipients and contractors. Furthermore, the orders remind transportation officials to identify and prevent discriminatory effects and to ensure that social, economic and environmental impacts are addressed up front, from early planning through project implementation.
Civil Rights and Legal Remedies
Anyone interested in transportation equity and the applicable civil rights laws should consult chapter 12 in Robert D. Bullard and Glenn S. Johnson's Just Transportation: Dismantling Race and Class Barriers to Mobility (New Society Publisher, 1997). The chapter, entitled "Civil Rights and Legal Remedies: A Plan of Action," was written by Bill Lann Lee when he served as the lead attorney for the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund's western regional office located in Los Angeles. Mr. Lee is currently the Acting Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Justice.
Mr. Lee's chapter covers a number of issue areas: discriminatory regulatory enforcement, civil rights laws, Title VI and its regulations, the Fair Housing Act, Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) program, and comparing civil rights and environmental enforcement. He offers some useful tips for prosecuting administrative civil rights complaints. He also describes some of the NAACP LDF transportation discrimination cases, including an in-depth analysis of the El Sereno and Long Beach Freeway lawsuit. See chapter 12, pp. 156-172 in Just Transportation for more information. The U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Civil Rights can be reached at (202) 514-2151 or http://www.usdoj.gov/crt/.
FHWA Publishes Community Impact Assessment and Mitigation Guides
The Federal Highway Administration, Office of Environment and Planning, has written two primers that transportation analysts can use to assess the consequences of transportation investments on communities. First, the Community Impact Assessment: A Quick Reference for Transportation outlines the community impact (CIA) process, highlights critical areas that must be examined, identifies basic tools, and information sources. It also provides tips for facilitating public involvement in the decision making process. Second, the Community Impact Mitigation: Case Studies provide five real-world examples that highlight ways in which transportation projects can avoid, minimize, and mitigate negative impacts and enhance the livability of community residents.
The case studies represent a broad cross-section of ethnic and socioeconomic communities. Although they were not written specifically to be environmental justice examples, the case studies illustrate the appropriateness of transportation projects avoiding, minimizing, and mitigating negative impacts on low-income and ethnic minority populations. The case studies include: community mitigation and enhancement in the mostly African American Crest Street neighborhood in Durham, North Carolina; community cohesion in an Orthodox Jewish neighborhood in Oak Park, Illinois; community preservation in Philadelphia's Chinatown; community reconstruction in the multi-ethnic several Seattle (Judkin Park, South Atlantic, and Mount Baker) neighborhoods; and community revitalization in a mostly African American Prichard, Alabama neighborhood. The case studies highlight the utility and appropriateness of transportation enhancements to aid economic development and neighborhood revitalization in minority and low-income communities. Contact FHWA Office of Environment and Planning (202) 366-0106. Also see the FHWA Southern Resource Center website at http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/resourcecenters/southern.
FHWA Sponsors Community Workshops on Environmental Justice and TEA-21
The Federal Highway Administration contracted with the EJRC to convene a National Environmental Justice Steering Committee to plan, develop, schedule, and conduct a series of regional and/or locally based transportation workshops. The workshops were conducted in October and November of 1998. The community-based workshops were intended to be a follow-up to the 1995 Environmental Justice and Transportation: Building Model Partnerships conference held in Atlanta, Georgia. The community-based workshops were designed to bring community, business, and government (local, state, and federal) transportation stakeholders to the table to discuss the progress made in developing common strategies and workable partnerships. The workshops were also designed to assist the Federal Highway Administration by integrating environmental justice principles into the FHWA National Environmental Policy Act process and the implementation of the Transportation Equity Act for the Twenty First Century or TEA-21.
The Atlanta workshop was organized by the EJRC and held on the campus of Clark Atlanta University. The New York workshop was held at Columbia University and coordinated by the West Harlem Environmental Action, Inc. The Urban Habitat Program coordinated the San Francisco Bay Area workshop that was held at the downtown campus of San Francisco State University. Representatives from the Tulalip Tribes coordinated a workshop on their reservation in Marysville-Snohomish County, Washington. The one-day workshops were planned, coordinated, and conducted by community-based organizations and environmental justice groups in the respective host cities. The workshops were originally planned for 30 participants per city. However, over 200 individuals and groups attended the four meetings.
Representatives from the grassroots environmental justice organizations were an integral part of the workshops as planners, speakers, and facilitators. Over half of the presenters represented grassroots groups and other nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). The workshop proceedings can be found at http://www.ejrc.cau.edu/dotworkshops.htm.
The Price of Congestion
Other than housing, Americans spend more on transportation than any other household expense. We spend over 2 billion hours a year in our cars. The average American household spends one fifth of its income----or about $6,000 a year----for each car that it owns and operates. We also waste $53 billion a year from tie-ups in traffic gridlock. Congested roads cost metropolitan Atlantans an estimated $21 billion in lost time and gasoline. Davis L. Schrank and Timothy J. Lomax, Texas A&M University researchers, in their 1998 Urban Roadway Congestion Annual Report, indicate that Atlanta's highway lane miles grew by an average of 5.8 percent for the period 1992-1996. This compares with .08 percent in San Diego, 1.3 percent in Phoenix, 1.9 percent in Miami, 2.4 percent in Dallas, and 2.6 percent in Houston. Building more highways has not solved Atlanta's traffic problem. Each metro Atlanta driver spends 69 hours each year in traffic delays. Delays in comparable Sunbelt cities include 37 hours in Phoenix, 38 hours in San Diego, 58 hours in Miami, 63 hours in Dallas, and 66 hours in Houston. Each driver in Washington, DC, the nation's capital, spends 82 hours in traffic delays each year. The report can be obtained from the Texas Transportation Institute at Texas A&M University, (979) 845-1713 or http://tti.tamu.edu.
Air Pollution Linked to Adverse Health Effects
Air quality impacts of transportation are especially significant to low-income persons and people of color who are more likely to live in urban areas with reduced air quality than affluent individuals and whites. For example, National Argonne Laboratory researchers discovered that 437 of the 3,109 counties and independent cities failed to meet at least one of the EPA ambient air quality standards. Specifically, 57 percent of whites, 65 percent of African Americans, and 80 percent of Hispanics live in 437 counties with substandard air quality. Nationwide, 33 percent of whites, 50 percent of African Americans, and 60 percent of Hispanics live in the 136 counties in which two or more air pollutants exceed standards. Similar patterns were found for the 29 counties designated as nonattainment areas for three or more pollutants. Again, 12 percent of whites, 20 percent of African Americans, and 31 percent of Hispanics resided in the worse nonattainment areas. No doubt, clean and energy efficient public transportation could give millions of Americans who live in polluted cities a healthier environment and possibly longer lives.
Ground-level ozone may exacerbate health problems such as asthma, nasal congestion, throat irritation, respiratory tract inflammation, reduced resistance to infection, changes in cell function, loss of lung elasticity, chest pains, lung scarring, formation of lesions within the lungs, and premature aging of lung tissues. Air pollution is not thought to cause asthma and related respiratory illnesses, however, bad air hurts and is a major trigger. A 1996 report from the federal Centers for Disease Control shows hospitalization and death rates from asthma increasing for persons 25 years old or less. The greatest increases occurred among African Americans. African Americans are two to six times more likely than whites to die from asthma. The hospitalization rate for African Americans is 3 to 4 times the rate for whites. Asthma has reached epidemic proportions in the Atlanta region. Atlanta area residents are paying for sprawl with their hard-earned dollars as well as with their health. A 1994 CDC-sponsored study showed that pediatric emergency department visits at Grady Memorial Hospital increased by one-third following peak ozone levels. The study also found that the asthma rate among African American children is 26 percent higher than the asthma rate among whites. Since children with asthma in Atlanta may not have visited the emergency department for their care, the true prevalence of asthma in the community is likely to be higher. A 1999 Clean Air Task Force report, Adverse Health Effects Associated with Ozone in the Eastern United States, linked asthma and respiratory problems and smog. High smog levels are associated with rising respiratory-related hospital admissions and emergency room visits in cities across the nation. The full text of the study can be downloaded from the internet at http://www.abtassociates.com/reports/environment-download.html.
Walking Can Be Hazardous to Your Health
Recent data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reveal that the Atlanta metropolitan area is the third most dangerous large metropolitan area for walking. The region ranked just behind Fort Lauderdale and Miami, Florida for pedestrian fatalities. Over 300 pedestrians were killed in Cobb, DeKalb, Fulton, and Gwinnett Counties during 1994-1998. The Atlanta region pedestrian fatality rate has remained higher than the national rate. Pedestrian fatality rates were highest for Fulton and DeKalb Counties. Rates also varied by ethnicity. Rates for non-Hispanic blacks and Hispanics were two and six times greater, respectively, than for non-Hispanic whites. Although people of color account for less than one third of the population in the region, they account for nearly two thirds of all the pedestrian fatalities in the region. The report suggests that rate differences by race/ethnicity may be due in part to differences in walking patterns. For example, national studies show that blacks walk 82 percent more than whites, and Hispanics walk 58 percent more than non-Hispanic whites. The study is reported in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, 48 (1999) and can be viewed at http://www.cdc.gov/epo/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm4828a1.htm.
A Victory Against Transit Racism
Today, millions of Americans are fighting to get on the bus. They are also struggling to get public transit systems linked to jobs centers. Federal tax dollars subsidized many of the nation's roads, freeways, and public transit systems. From New York City to Los Angeles, environmental justice groups are demanding a fair share of the benefits that accrue from transportation investments. They are also demanding an end to the kind of transit racism that killed 17-year-old Cynthia Wiggins of Buffalo, New York. Wiggins, an African American, was crushed by a dump truck while crossing a seven-lane highway because Buffalo's Number Six bus, an inner-city bus used mostly by African Americans, was not allowed to stop at the suburban Walden Galleria Mall.
The Wiggins family and other members of the African American community sued the mall owners, bus company, and trucking firm for using the highway as a racial barrier to exclude blacks. The high-profile trial, argued by O.J. Simpson's former attorney Johnnie L. Cochran Jr., began on November 8, 1999. The lawsuit was settled 10 days later for $2.55 million. No amount of money will make up for the loss of young Cynthia Wiggins. However, transit racism will not likely end until the individuals and organizations that break the laws are forced to pay for their crimes. Robert D. Bullard's and Glenn S. Johnson's 1997 Just Transportation book is dedicated to Cynthia Wiggins and Rosa Parks.
For an in-depth discussion of the Cynthia Wiggins tragedy and settlement see David W. Chen, "Suit Charging Racism at Suburban Mall is Settled," New York Times, November 18, 1999, p. A25.
ATLANTA TRANSPORTATION EQUITY PROJECT
Major Transportation Equity Project Underway
Researchers at the Atlanta-based EJRC have embarked on a comprehensive transportation equity initiative. The initiative, currently funded by the Turner Foundation, Ford Foundation, and Surdna Foundation, builds on the environmental justice and transportation work the EJRC began in 1995. The two-year Atlanta Transportation Equity Project (ATEP) will explore transportation investments, decision making, and public involvement and the impact on low-income and people of color residents in Metropolitan Atlanta. The ATEP will use an interdisciplinary approach to examine equity impacts of Atlanta's transportation investments: (1) Demographic Trends, (2) Governance, (3) Public Policy and Planning, (4) Minority Opportunities, and (5) Social, Economic, and Physical Mobility. The project will expand the transportation work currently underway at the EJRC and SOC. The project currently has ten major components: (1) Transportation Equity Study, (2) Ethnic Working Group, (3) Lecture Series/Speakers Bureau, (4) Newsletter, (5) Multi-Ethnic Media Campaign, (6) Brochures and Fact Sheets, (7) Community Access to the Internet, (8) Transportation Resource Directory and Tool Kit, (9) Video, and (10) Atlanta Transportation Equity Summit. The ATEP will work in collaboration with local community based organizations, networks, and national groups in identifying common strategies and solutions to regional transportation equity issues. An in-depth description of the project can be found at http://www.ejrc.cau.edu/atepannouncement.htm .
Bus Riders Union Film Premiere
The Environmental Justice Resource Center hosted a premiere showing of Academy Award cinematographer Haskell Wexlers' BUS RIDERS UNION, a new documentary that traces three years in the life of the Los Angeles Bus Riders Union as it forges a powerful multiracial movement to fight transit racism, clean up LA's lethal auto pollution, and win billion-dollar victories for real mass transit for the masses. BUS RIDERS UNION has important implications for multiracial organizing around transportation equity issues in Metro Atlanta since transit racism and transportation apartheid are major factors that have kept the region racially, economically, and spatially divided. BRU screenings were also held in Los Angeles, New York, Boston, and Toronto. To learn more about the transit racism struggle in Los Angeles contact Eric Mann, Labor Community Strategy Center, 3780 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 1200, Los Angeles, CA 90010, (213) 387-2800, or visit their web site at http://www.igc.org/lctr.
The Los Angeles - Atlanta Transit Connection
Two of the Bus Riders Union's film stars, Eric Mann, who directs the Labor/Community Strategy Center, and Barbara Lott-Holland, who is a member of the Bus Riders Union Planning Committee, were in Atlanta to help kick off the Atlanta Transportation Equity Project. "Atlanta and LA have very similar problems with transit racism. Groups on the ground have to demand that dollars are spent on transit that improves the mobility of the transit dependent," says Mann. He also placed modern transit struggles in a historical context. "In Atlanta and LA today, Rosa Parks could not take a train to get to where she needed to go, she'd have to take a bus," says Mann. For Barbara Lott-Holland, the key to success is organizing transit riders to understand that they have a right to clean, efficient, convenient, and affordable public transportation. "We have to move beyond code words that equate transit with 'dirty buses.' Poor people have a right to ride in comfort just like folks in the suburbs," states Lott-Holland.
A proposal by the Los Angeles MTA (Metropolitan Transit Authority) to eliminate monthly bus passes and to raise fares sparked a grassroots movement. In 1996, the Labor Community Strategy Center and the Bus Riders Union (a grassroots group of transit users) sued the Los Angeles MTA over its plan to raise bus fares and build an expensive rail system at the expense of bus riders, who made up 95 percent of transit users. The MTA bus system, comprised largely of low-income persons and people of color, only received 30 percent of the MTA's transit dollars. Grassroots organizing and the Bus Riders Union's legal victory resulted in $1.5 billion for new clean-fuel buses, service improvements, lower fares, a landmark Title VI Civil Rights Consent Decree, and a vibrant multiracial grassroots organization of over 2000 dues-paying members.
A ten-member Atlanta delegation visited Los Angeles in early February of this year. The primary mission of the four-day trip was to observe and gather information on the groundbreaking organizing, technical, and legal transportation equity work of the Labor Community Strategy Center and Bus Riders Union. The Atlanta leaders attended Strategy Center-hosted workshops, participated in a class of the National School for Strategic Organizing, and rode the MTA buses and trains to observe first hand the problems and concerns (such as overcrowding and users getting passed up by buses) of LA transit users.
MARTA has grown from 13 rail stations in 1979 to 36 rail stations in 2000. Two additional stations (Sandy Springs and North Springs) along the north line are under construction. These two new northern stations are expected to open in December 2000. With its $270.4 million annual budget, MARTA operates 700 buses and 240 rail cars. The system handles over 534,000 passengers on an average weekday. MARTA operates 154 bus routes that cover 1,531 miles and carry 275,000 passengers on an average weekday. MARTA's rail lines cover 100 miles with rail cars carrying 259,000 passengers on an average weekday.
A recent rider survey revealed that 78 percent of MARTA's rail and bus riders are African American and other people of color. Whites make up 22 percent of MARTA riders. Over 45 percent of MARTA riders live in the city of Atlanta, 14 percent live in the remainder of Fulton County, 25 percent live in DeKalb County, and 16 percent of MARTA riders live outside MARTA's service area.
MARTA provides nearly 21,000 parking spaces at 23 of its 36 transit stations. Parking at MARTA lots is free except for the overnight lots that cost $3 per day. MARTA provides 1,342 spaces in four overnight lots. All of the overnight lots are on MARTA's North Line. It is becoming increasingly difficult to find a parking space in some MARTA lots. A recent license tag survey, "Who Parks-and-Rides," covering the period 1988-1997, revealed that 44 percent of the cars parked at MARTA lots were from outside the MARTA Fulton/DeKalb County service area. MARTA can be reached at (404) 848-4711 or http://www.itsmarta.com.
MARTA Proposes Nearly 17 Percent Fare Increase
On February 18, 2000, Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transportation Authority or MARTA officials proposed raising one-way fares
from $1.50 to $1.75, a 16.6 percent increase. The MARTA fare increase is proposed to offset a $10 million shortfall associated with the openings of Sandy Springs and North Springs stations, two northern suburban stations. The proposal also calls for increasing the weekly transit pass from $12 to $13 and the monthly pass from $45 to $52.50. National studies show that a ten percent fare increase will reduce ridership by about four percent. The fare increase would fall heaviest on the transit dependent, low-income households, and people of color who make up the majority of MARTA users. While the increase of $7.50 a month may not seem like a lot at first glance, it could do irreparable harm to a $5.15 per hour minimum-wage transit user. MARTA's one-way fare has crept upward from $1 in 1990, $1.25 in 1992, $1.50 in 1995, and a proposed $1.75 in 2001. Elmer Hamilton, president of the Amalgamated Transit Union, has gone on record opposing the proposed fare increase. The MARTA board is scheduled to decide on the fare increase by May 25. However, before any fare increase can take effect, MARTA is required by law to hold a public hearing.
Metro Atlanta Transportation Equity Study Commissioned
The EJRC under its Atlanta Transportation Equity Project (ATEP) has commissioned ten policy papers from leading transportation experts, researchers, planners, analysts, and activists in the field. The policy papers will (1) analyze and critique the current problem, (2) project impacts of current policies and alternative strategies, (3) develop and articulate alternative visions for the Atlanta region, and (4) communicate the alternative visions and recommendations. The research component of this project will draw upon the expertise from local and national transportation and policy experts to retrieve, analyze, and report on transportation investments, social equity, and environmental justice and transportation equity implications. The policy papers will explore such areas as equity implications of highway investments, regional transit, transit-oriented development, representation and transportation decisionmaking, price of ozone pollution, commuter rail, cost of congestion, land use, residential housing patterns, business and economic development, air quality and public health, access to jobs, and mobility. The paper abstract can be viewed at http://www.ejrc.cau.edu/atepcompapab.htm.
Feds Criticize Atlanta's $36 Billion Regional Transportation Plan
Most Atlantans may not realize it but the Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) recently adopted a $36 billion Regional Transportation Plan (RTP) and a draft three-year, $1.9 billion Transportation Improvement Plan (TIP). These plans are supposed to improve air quality, provide more alternatives to driving, protect and enhance the environment, promote energy conservation, and enhance mobility and job access.
In a March 21, 2000 preliminary review of the pending TIP and RTP, the Federal Transit Administration and Federal Highway Administration expressed concerns that could affect a conformity determination that complies with the law. The concerns revolve around five areas:
Land Use Assumptions: The pending RTP and TIP assume significantly different zoning land and use policies from those currently adopted in the Atlanta metro area, and this likely has significant effects on future emissions and transit usage.
Fiscal Constraint: The RTP and TIP appear to fall significantly short of the spirit and letter of fiscal constraint in many areas: (a) transit and highway operations and maintenance costs are not accounted for, (b) for some capital projects, the local match as 100% locally funded projects (and phases of projects), the amount or sources of local revenues is not identified; (c) there appears to be a lack of commitment for the state share of funding for some projects; (d) the cost of new buses is understated by $50,000-$70,000 per bus, and (e) Federal discretionary funds are identified as the source of 180 new CNG-fueled buses, without any apparent basis. In short, the current financial data on both costs and revenue sources are insufficient for fiscal constraint purposes, and are highly vulnerable to legal challenges.
Highway Speeds: No recent speed data have been collected specifically to verify the reliability of speeds estimated by the models . . . Because speed has a significant effect on projected NOx emissions, FHWA/FTA cannot rely for conformity purposes on methods of estimating speeds that have not been verified in an area, which has undergone the level of transportation changes that Atlanta has experienced over the past 10 years.
Transit Mode Share: The mode shares predicted for transit appear to be very ambitious compared to current transit model shares in Atlanta and experiences in other cities.
Environmental Justice: As a result of a threatened lawsuit, US DOT has been working with ARC and others in Atlanta on an EJ review. . . . [W]e believe that it is important for ARC to bolster their TIP and RTP from an EJ perspective, in two ways: (a) Responsiveness to EJ Input. Given the magnitude of EJ concerns raised in Atlanta, ARC should document how the pending RTP and TIP have been responsive to EJ input. (US DOT requested this information of ARC earlier, but ARC has not provided it yet.) In particular, it would be important for ARC to identify the projects they have incorporated in the RTP and TIP for EJ purposes, specify how these projects support EJ, provide cost estimates, and demonstrate that revenue sources have been identified for them. (b) Analysis of benefits and burdens. As provided in the legal settlement, ARC should develop an approach for analyzing the benefits and burdens of the TIP and RTP by socioeconomic group. It would be an important show of good faith for ARC to describe their planned approach to this analysis before final action is taken on the pending RTP and TIP. For more information on the Atlanta Regional Commission contact (404) 463-3100. To view the pending regional transportation plan, see http://www.atlreg.com/whats_hot/to_rtp.html.
South Atlanta Residents and Architect Firm Draft Alternative Plan
The Campbellton Road Coalition (CRC), a group representing more than 250 homeowners, and Sizemore Floyd Architects met in community information sessions for homeowners in the communities of Ben Hill, west Cascade Road and Sandtown in Atlanta, just southwest of Interstate-285 in unincorporated Fulton County. The meeting was conducted by Sizemore Floyd with neighbors to see what they would like to preserve, readapt or change about Campbellton Road. A second session will be held to chart a course of action in Phase 2 of the community's vision of the Campbellton Road neighborhood. As the Coalition's town planners, Sizemore Floyd will engage neighbors in a Character Preference Survey in order for residents to decide how their community should look.
The Campbellton Road Coalition was formed two years ago amid fears that the DOT's plan to redesign 6-miles of Campbellton Road beginning at Barge Road to Fulton Industrial-to a four-lane highway with two 12-foot lanes in each direction and separated by a raised 20-foot median-will bring dangerous truck traffic, air pollution and unsafe conditions for residents living on Campbellton and adjoining subdivision streets. The CRC is supported by Fulton County Government, Commissioner Michael Hightower, and Southwest Fulton Revitalization Inc. The information gathered from the residents will be presented to the Georgia Regional Transportation Authority (GRTA) and the Georgia Department of Transportation (DOT).
Last summer, the CRC hired noted traffic engineer, Ian Lockwood from West Palm Beach, Florida, to assist with a conceptual
design of a community-friendly Campbellton Road. The Group has taken Lockwood's recommendations to bring in a town planner, engineers and architects to develop further an alternative plan to the DOT. The group has also enlisted the help of nationally renowned traffic engineer Walter Kulash, who is noted for instituting traffic-calming measures in other communities around the country. The Sandtown and Ben Hill communities want Kulash to assist them in designing traffic-calming solutions as an alternative to GA DOT's plan to widen the road and install a raised median. Residents fear the DOT plan will make the corridor more dangerous to pedestrians.
Sandtown, Ben Hill and west Cascade Road communities comprise mostly middle to upper middle class African American communities with a mixture of old and new homes. There are four schools on Campbellton Road; nearly a dozen churches; and a neighborhood park that feed into the state road. The community is home to many elderly people, young professionals and families. For more information, contact Jill Strickland (404) 635-1997 or (404) 822-0145.
Georgia's "Super" Transportation Agency Turns One Year Old
Realizing the urgent need to address traffic gridlock and metro Atlanta's growth problems, gubernatorial candidate Roy Barnes promised to create a "superagency" to handle transportation. One of the first acts the newly elected Governor Barnes pushed for was the creation of the Georgia Regional Transportation Agency or GRTA. The GRTA was created by the Georgia General Assembly in March 1999 to address the state's traffic and air quality problems. A 15-member GRTA board was appointed by the Governor in June 1999. Governor Barnes cautions Atlantans not to expect GRTA to be a "miracle cure" that brings immediate relief to gridlocked commutes and the thick smog that blankets the skyline. He states: "This is not the end of problems. . . . It's not even the beginning of the end. But it does give us the tools to begin with." The GRTA board has the authority to coordinate projects in the metro region; fund and operate a new mass transit system and coordinate existing systems; withhold state funding to counties to motivate participation in regional transportation; veto regional development and transportation projects; provide loans or construction agreements to industries that contribute to lowering air emissions; and, identify nonregional air pollution sources impacting the region and offer assistance or bring them under authority auspices. ." GRTA can be contacted at (404) 463-3000 or http://www.grta.org.
New Study Finds Sprawl Heightens Racial Disparities
A new Turner Foundation funded study from the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University examines the impact of urban sprawl on communities in the ten-county Atlanta metropolitan region. The report entitled, "Sprawl Atlanta: Social Equity Dimensions of Uneven Growth and Development," concludes that Atlanta is rapidly becoming the "sprawl capital" of the nation. Sprawl-fueled growth is widening the gap between the 'have' and 'have nots.' It is pushing people further and further apart geographically, politically, economically, and racially. The study team of social scientists, urban planners, educators, and environmentalists report that many government policies--including housing, land use, transportation, environmental, and education--have actually aided and in some cases subsidized urban sprawl.
While sprawl is not blamed for all of the social ills in the Metropolitan Atlanta region, there are some clear side effects that can be linked to the sprawl development pattern. These side effects can be grouped under three broad categories: social, environmental, and health effects.
The social effects include concentration of urban core poverty, closed opportunity, limited mobility, economic disinvestment, social isolation, and city/suburban disparities. Over 88% of the metro area's poor blacks lived in Fulton and DeKalb Counties, 62% in the city of Atlanta, and 6% lived in Cobb and Gwinnett Counties. On the other hand, 40% of the metro area's poor whites lived in Fulton and DeKalb Counties, 13% in Atlanta, and 34% in Cobb and Gwinnett Counties. Over 84.1% and 44.1% of Atlanta's poor live in high poverty neighborhoods and extreme poverty neighborhoods, respectively. Comparatively, 44.4% and 18.8% of the region's poor live in high poverty neighborhoods and extreme poverty neighborhoods, respectively.
Fair housing laws are not uniformly enforced across the Atlanta region. Housing discrimination is a major barrier for Black Atlantans. African Americans are twice as likely to experience housing discrimination in the region's suburbs than in the city of Atlanta. African Americans are treated less favorably than whites 30% of the time in Atlanta and 67% of the time in Atlanta's suburbs.
The environmental effects of sprawl include urban infrastructure decline, increased energy consumption, automobile dependency, air pollution, and threats to farmland and wildlife habitat. People of color are disproportionately represented in the Atlanta region's "dirtiest" zip codes based on the U.S. EPA's toxic release inventory data. While people of color comprise 29.8 percent of the population in the five largest counties contiguous to Atlanta (Fulton, DeKalb, Cobb, Gwinnett, and Clayton Counties), they represent the majority of residents in five of the ten "dirtiest" zip codes in these counties.
Atlanta metro residents who live in majority white zip codes (five-county area) are exposed to an average of 38.2 pounds of toxic releases per person annually. Atlanta metro residents who live in majority people of color zip codes are exposed to an average of 208.6 pounds of toxic releases per person annually. The "dirtiest" zip code (i.e., 30354) in the five-county area is located in Fulton County and receives over 1.55 million pounds of toxic releases annually. People of color make up 69.1 percent of the population in zip code 30354. Residents in zip code 30336 are subjected to a whopping 873.9 pounds of toxic releases per person annually. This Fulton County zip code is 98.2% black.
The Atlanta region is a nonattainment area for ground level ozone. Cars, trucks, and buses are the largest source of this pollution. The region has more than 2.5 million registered vehicles. Atlantans lead the nation in miles driven per day (over 100 million miles per day). That translates into an average of 34 miles per day-50% further than Los Angeles residents. Sprawl is exacerbated by the fact that Georgia's motor fuel tax is the lowest in the nation (7.5 cents per gallon) and currently can only be used for roads and bridges.
Getting people out of their cars and into some form of coordinated and linked regional public transit may well be the key to solving a major part of the region's transportation problem. Atlanta's Metropolitan Rapid Transit Authority or MARTA is regional only in name since it serves only Fulton and DeKalb Counties. The mostly white and suburban Cobb County created its own bus system that has limited links to MARTA.
Only 4.7% of the region's workers commute by public transit. Public transit is utilized more by the region's people of color than by whites. Over 34.9% of Atlanta's black females and 24.3% of black males use public transit to get to work. For whites, 5.2% females and 4.2% males use public transit to get to work.
Clearly, transportation is implicated in Atlanta's sprawl, pollution, and growing health problem. The study calls for a change in Georgia's state constitution to allow for its gas tax to be used for alternative transportation modes. The study also recommends the creation of an Atlanta regional transportation authority that will plan, administer, link, and coordinate mass transit services in the region. This new regional transportation authority will also need to address land use and link existing and new public transit services (i.e., buses, light rail, and commuter rail) in an effort to maximize resources, increase access and mobility, and reduce air pollution and congestion in the Atlanta region.
The health effects of sprawl-driven development can be seen in rising asthma and other respiratory illnesses. Although air pollution is not thought to cause asthma and related respiratory illnesses, it is a major trigger and exacerbates these illnesses. African Americans are two to six times more likely than whites to be hospitalized for or die from asthma. Asthma is the number one reason for childhood hospitalization in Atlanta. Pediatric emergency clinic visits in Atlanta increased by one-third during peak ozone level. Four counties in the Atlanta metropolitan region (DeKalb, Douglas, Fulton, and Rockdale Counties) exceed national ozone standards. A disproportionately large share of the childhood asthma cases, (90.1 percent) in the Atlanta nonattainment area occur in Fulton and DeKalb counties--two counties with the largest share of people of color.
It will take a concerted effort on many fronts to arrest the runaway sprawl pattern that typifies the Atlanta metropolitan region and most major American urban centers. To continue down the current road of sprawl is too costly for everyone. The future of the region is intricately bound to how government, business, and community leaders address Atlanta's quality of life and social equity issues. To view the "Sprawl Atlanta" Executive Summary and maps, please visit the EJRC's web site at http://www.ejrc.cau.edu/sprlatlexecsum.html.
Atlanta Subject of New Sprawl Book
A serious but often overlooked impact of the random, unplanned growth --commonly known as "sprawl" -- that has come to dominate the American landscape is its effect on economic and racial polarization. Sprawl-fueled growth pushes people further apart geographically, politically, economically, and socially. Atlanta, Georgia is experiencing one of the most severe cases of sprawl in the country, and offers a striking example of sprawl-induced stratification.
Sprawl City: Race, Politics and Planning in Atlanta uses a multi-disciplinary approach to analyze and critique the emerging crisis
resulting from urban sprawl in the ten-county Atlanta metropolitan region. Local experts including sociologists, lawyers, urban planners, economists, educators, and health care professionals consider sprawl-related concerns as core environmental justice and civil rights issues. All of the contributors examine institutional constraint issues that are embedded in urban sprawl, considering how government policies, including housing, education, and transportation policies have aided and in some cases subsidized separate but unequal economic development, segregated neighborhoods, and spatial layout of central cities and suburbs.
Contributors offer analysis of the causes and consequences of urban sprawl, and outline policy recommendations and an action agenda for coping with sprawl-related problems, both in Atlanta and around the country. The book illuminates the rising class and racial divisions underlying uneven growth and development, and provides an important source of information for anyone concerned with these issues, including the growing environmental justice movement as well as planners, policy analysts, public officials, community leaders, and students of public policy, geography, planning, and related disciplines. Sprawl City (Island Press, Spring, 2000, ISBN: 1-55963-790-0) is edited by Robert D. Bullard, Glenn S. Johnson, and Angel O. Torres. To view book description see http://www.islandpress.org/books/bookdata/sprawlcity.html. The books can be ordered from Island Press at 1-800-828-1302 or orders@islandpress.org.
NASA Scientists Discover Atlanta's Heat Island Creating Thunder Storms
NASA scientists show that Atlanta, one of the fastest growing cities in the country, is "so thick with asphalt and air conditioners that it's become a 'heat island,' soaking up radiant energy during the day and holding onto it at night."
They also found that thunderstorms have grown with the city's growth. The big culprit is sprawl. Sprawl supports wasteful energy consumption associated with commuting from distant suburban subdivisions. Sprawl also fuels deforestation and loss of green vegetation and increases the heat island and energy consumption. Sprawl-fueled deforestation occurs at the rate of 50 acres per day. Data from NASA Landsat Satellite show that from 1988 to 1998, the Atlanta metro area lost about 190,000 acres of tree cover. The NASA scientists recommend that the region resurface roads, roofs, and parking lots in lighter colors so as to reflect the heat instead of absorbing it and plant trees and other vegetation to lower temperatures. To view MSNBC story and NASA images see http://www.msnbc.com/news/372774.asp?cpl=1&cpl=1.
Atlanta Tagged the "Most Sprawled Threatened" Big City in the U.S.
Every week, 500 acres of green space, forest, and farmland in the Atlanta region are plowed under to make way for new housing subdivisions, strip malls, shopping centers, and highways. The Sierra Club rated Atlanta the "most sprawled threatened big city in the U.S." Other sprawled-threatened big cities that made the Sierra Club's "top ten" list included St. Louis, MO, Washington, DC, Cincinnati, OH, Kansas City, MO, Denver, CO, Seattle, WA, Minneapolis-St. Paul, MN, Fort Lauderdale, FL, and Chicago, IL. The criteria for the ranking included such factors as population trends, land use, traffic congestion, and open space. To view the full text of "The Dark Side of the American Dream: The Costs and Consequences of Suburban Sprawl" see http://www.sierraclub.org/sprawl/report98/index.html. To view "Solving Sprawl: The Sierra Club Rates the States" see http://www.sierraclub.org/sprawl/report99/.
Dumping in Dixie Book Updated
It has now been a decade since Dumping in Dixie: Race, Class and Environmental Quality (Westview Press, 2000) was first published. During this period, the terms "environmental justice," "environmental racism," and "environmental equity" have become household words. Out of the small and seemingly isolated environmental struggles emerged a potent grassroots movement. The 1990s saw the environmental justice movement become a unifying theme across race, class, gender, age, and geographic lines. It is fitting that Dumping in Dixie, the first book on environmental justice, examines the widening economic, health, and environmental disparities as we enter the 21st century. Today, many Americans ranging from constitutional scholars to lay grassroots activists now recognize that environmental discrimination is unfair, unethical, and immoral. The practice is also illegal. The book emphasized that all Americans have a basic right to live, work, play, go to school, and worship in a clean and healthy environment. The issues addressed center on equity, fairness, and the struggle for social justice by African American communities. The struggles against environmental injustice are not unlike the civil rights battles waged to dismantle the legacy of Jim Crow in Selma, Montgomery, Birmingham, and some of the "Up South" communities in New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Detroit, Chicago, and Los Angeles. The 3rd edition of Dumping in Dixie includes an analysis of the Citizens Against Nuclear Trash 1997 administrative court victory over Louisiana Energy Services (LES), the St. James Citizens for Jobs and the 1998 environment victory over Shintech, the successful struggle waged by Citizens Against Toxic Exposure (CATE) to get their residents relocated from a neighborhood built on a toxic dump site, and many other cases of corporate welfare and environmental racism. The book can be ordered from Westview Press at 1-800-386-5656. The book description is found at http://www.perseusbooksgroup.com/perseus-cgi-bin/search.
New People of Color Directory Available in Spring 2000
The People of Color Environmental Groups Directory (3rd edition, 2000) will be available from the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation in the Spring. This new edition of the directory, compiled by the Environmental Justice Resource Center, lists over 400 people of color, resource, and legal groups from 40 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, Canada and Mexico. Over 5,000 copies of the directory were distributed to grassroots groups, environmental and civil rights organizations, governmental agencies, and journalists. The directory includes resource groups on a wide range of technical, research, legal, education, and training support. It also profiles more than a dozen people of color grassroots struggles from Alaska to Puerto Rico. It has an annotated bibliography, list of videos, and selected web sites. To order a free copy of the directory contact the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation, 1200 Mott Foundation Building, Flint, MI 45802 or call their Publication Hotline at (810) 766-1753.
ABA Posts New Environmental Justice Service
The American Bar Association's Section of Environment, Energy and Resources offers a web-based update service for new developments in the law of environmental justice. The electronic service, which is free of charge, is designed to provide continuous updates to the ABA's book, The Law of Environmental Justice, published in August 1999. The service may be accessed at http://www.abanet.org/environ/Committees/ejupdatemain.html. This page provides information about the book and "Update Information." The updates summarize new judicial and administrative decisions, settlements, studies, and the like. Readers are invited to submit information about new developments to the editor by hitting the "Submit Updates" button.
Bullard, Robert D. and Glenn S. Johnson, eds., Just Transportation: Dismantling Race and Class Barriers to Mobility (New Society Publishers, 1997). This is a book with essays by a wide range of environmental and transportation activists, lawyers, and scholars who trace the historical roots of transportation struggles in our civil rights history. The book examines the dynamics of disparate incomes and transportation equity, as well as the impact of transportation policy on inner city environments. Contact EJRC at (404) 880-6911 or ejrc@cau.edu.
Robert D. Bullard, Glenn S. Johnson, and Angel O. Torres, eds. Sprawl City: Race, Politics, and Planning in Atlanta. (Island Press 2000). This book illuminates the rising class and racial divisions underlying uneven growth and development, and provides a timely source of information for anyone concerned with those issues. Contact EJRC at (404) 880-6911 or ejrc@cau.edu.
Robert D. Bullard, Glenn S. Johnson, and Angel O. Torres. "Atlanta: Megasprawl," Forum: For Applied Research and Public Policy, Vol.14, No.3, Fall 1999. This article provides a comprehensive overview on how sprawl-driven construction projects such as low-density residential housing and strip malls have turned Atlanta into the fastest growing human development in history. Contact EJRC at (404) 880-6911 or ejrc@cau.edu.
Urban Habitat Program, Inc. Crash course in Bay Area Transportation Investment (February ,1999). An analysis of the social equity and environmental implications of Bay Area regional transportation funding. Urban Habitat Program, Inc. (415) 561-3333 or uhp@igc.apc.org.
Eric Mann. A New Vision for Urban Transportation: The Bus Riders Union Makes History at the Intersection of Mass Transit, Civil Rights, and the Environment. Los Angeles. Labor Community Strategy Center,1996. The report provides a detailed description of the historical backdrop, players, strategy, public policies, and civil rights legal case brought by local groups who challenged the Los Angeles MTA. Contact Labor Community Strategy Center at (213) 387-2800 or laborctr@igc.apc.org.
Center for Community Change. Getting to Work: An Organizer's Guide to Transportation Equity. Washington, DC, August 1998. This book describes the federal transportation bill and provides examples on how poor communities can use this bill to improve transportation services in their communities. Contact Center for Community Change at (202) 339-9343 or info@communitychange.org.
Conservation Law Foundation. City Routes, City Rights: Building Livable Neighborhoods and Environmental Justice by Fixing Transportation. Boston, Mass.: CLF, 1998. This guidebook is an organizing tool for inner city residents to address major community and environmental justice issues in their respective communities. Contact Conservation Law Foundation at (617) 350-0990 or http://www.clf.org.
David J. Forkenbrock and Lisa A. Schweitzer. Environmental Justice and Transportation Investment Policy. Public Policy Center University of Iowa, 1997. This report provides practical insights on how to measure transportation system changes and their impacts on humans and their environment. Contact University of Iowa Public Policy Center at (319) 335-6800 or http://www.uiowa.edu/~ppc.
Websites
Center for Community Change.. http://www.communitychange.org. The Center for Community Change has launched the Transportation Equity Network at the University of Toledo Urban Affairs Center. The monitoring project is designed to determine whether Metropolitan Planning Organizations or MPOs are taking into account environmental justice and civil rights in their decision-making.
Conservation Law Foundation. http://www.clf.org. The Conservation Law Foundation works to solve the environmental problems that threaten the people, natural resources and communities of New England. CLF's advocates use law, economics and science to design and implement strategies that conserve natural resources, protect public health, and promote vital communities in our region. Founded in 1966, CLF is a nonprofit member-supported organization.
Deep South Center for Environmental Justice. http://www.xula.edu/dscej. The Deep South Center for Environmental Justice (DSCEJ) was developed in 1992 in collaboration with community environmental groups and other universities within the region to address environmental justice issues. The DSCEJ provides opportunities for communities, scientific researchers, and decision makers to collaborate on programs and projects that promote the rights of all people to be free from environmental harm as it impacts health, jobs, housing, education, and a general quality of life.
Environmental Justice Resource Center. http://www.ejrc.cau.edu. The Environmental Justice Resource Center (EJRC) at Clark Atlanta University, founded in 1994, serves as a major resource, database, and information clearinghouse on environmental justice, environmental racism, transportation equity, urban land use, suburban sprawl, and civil rights.
Labor Community Strategy Center. http://www.igc.apc.org/lctr/. The Labor/Community Strategy Center is a multiracial anti-corporate "think-tank/act-tank" committed to building democratic internationalist social movements. The Strategy Center's work encompasses all aspects of urban life: it emphasizes rebuilding the labor movement, fighting for environmental justice, truly mass transit, and immigration rights, as well as actively opposing the growing criminalization, racialization, and feminization of poverty. Through direct grassroots organizing by the Strategy Center's WATCHDOG environmental project, Bus Riders Union, and Urban Strategies Group, and through research, policy development, strategy formation, and publication, the Labor/Community Strategy Center is generating a creative and aggressive response to the growing power of the corporate-led political Right.
New York Environmental Justice Alliance. http://www.nyceja.org. Founded in 1991, the New York City Environmental Justice Alliance is a citywide network that links grassroots organizations, low-income neighborhoods and communities of color in their struggle against environmental racism. The NYCEJA also produces a bi-weekly Transportation Justice newsletter.
Sierra Club. http://www.sierraclub.org. The mission of the Sierra Club Foundation is to advance the preservation and protection of the natural environment by empowering the citizenry, especially democratically based grassroots organizations, with charitable resources to further the cause of environmental protection. The Sierra Club is the vehicle through which the Sierra Club Foundation generally fulfills its charitable missions."
Sprawl Watch Clearinghouse. http://www.sprawlwatch.org. The Sprawl Watch Clearinghouse mission is to make the tools, techniques, and strategies developed to manage growth, and to be accessible to citizens, grassroots organizations, environmentalists, public officials, planners, architects, the media and business leaders. At the Clearinghouse we identify, collect, compile and disseminate information, on the best land use practices for those listed above.
Surface Transportation Policy Project. http://www.transact.org. The goal of Surface Transportation Policy Project is to ensure that transportation policy and investments help conserve energy, protect environmental and aesthetic quality, strengthen the economy, promote social equity, and make communities more livable. They emphasize the needs of people, rather than vehicles, in assuring access to jobs, services, and recreational opportunities.
Urban Habitat Program. http://www.igc.apc.org/uhp/. Founded in 1989, the Urban Habitat Program is dedicated to building multicultural urban environmental leadership for socially just, ecologically sustainable communities in the San Francisco Bay Area. UHP has played a leadership role in broadening environmental justice's national agenda. At the metropolitan regional scale-through actions, networking, conferences, publications, teaching, and advocacy----UHP has assisted over a hundred organizations working on environmental justice issues: health, food security, recycling, energy, military base conversion, arts and culture, education, immigration and population, parks and open space.
Videos
Just Transportation, 45 min. Running time, Clark Atlanta University: EJRC-CAU Television (1996). This video includes highlights from the "Environmental Justice and Transportation: Building Model Partnerships Conference" that was held in Atlanta, Georgia in 1995. The Atlanta conference brought together grassroots organizers, civil rights activists, local, state, tribal, and federal transportation planners, public officials, legal experts, and academics to discuss strategies for building livable and just communities. Transportation issues in people of color communities are explored and shot on location in Atlanta, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Harlem (New York City), and Washington, DC. For more information contact: Environmental Justice Resource Center Clark Atlanta University Atlanta, GA 30314 (404) 880-6911 (404) 880-6909 fax, E-mail: ejrc@cau.edu, http://www.ejrc.cau.edu.
Bus Riders Union Film, 86 min. Running time, The Labor/Community Strategy Center (2000), This video is a new documentary of Academy Award cinematographer Haskell Wexlers' that traces three years in the life of the Los Angeles Bus Riders Union as it forges a powerful multiracial movement to fight transit racism, clean up LA's lethal auto pollution, and win billion-dollar victories for real mass transit for the masses. For more information contact: The Labor/Community Strategy Center 3780 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 1200 Los Angeles, CA 90010 (213) 387-2800 (213) 387-3500 fax, E-mail: laborctr@igc.apc.org, http://www.igc.org/lctr.
Divided City: The Route to Racism. 22 minutes running time, Films for the Humanities and Science (2000). This video is from the ABC News Nightline where the death of Cynthia Wiggins from Buffalo, New York is discussed. Ms. Wiggins was killed by a dump truck while crossing a seven-lane highway to get to her job at the Walden Galleria Mall. The mall's operators and planners were charged with racism because the bus route that served inner-city residents were prevented from stopping at the shopping mall. For more information contact: Films for the Humanities & Sciences, P.O. Box 2053, Princeton, NJ 08543-2053, 1-800-257-5126 or (609) 275-1400 (609) 275-3767 (fax), E-mail: custserv@films.com, http://www.films.com
Tango 73: A Bus Riders Diary. 28 min. running time, New Day Films. A documentary film by Gabriela Quiros that illustrates the importance of public transportation. The documentary uncovers the social rituals of bus riders who travel the number 73-bus line along the east shore of the San Francisco Bay Area. Contact New Day Films, 22-D Hollywood Avenue, Hohokus, NJ 07423 or 1-888-367-9154, (201) 652-1973 fax, E-mail: orders@newday.com.
ABOUT THE EJRC
The Environmental Justice Resource Center (EJRC) at Clark Atlanta University was formed in 1994 to serve as a research, policy, and information clearinghouse on issues related to environmental justice, race and the environment, civil rights, facility siting, land use planning, brownfields, transportation equity, suburban sprawl, and Smart Growth. The overall goal of the center is to assist, support, train, and educate people of color, students, professionals, and grassroots community leaders with the goal of facilitating their inclusion into the mainstream of environmental decision-making. The center is multi-disciplinary in its focus and approach. It serves as a bridge among the social and behavioral sciences, natural and physical sciences, engineering, management, and legal disciplines to solve environmental problems. The center's programs build on the work that its staff has been engaged in for over two decades.
Transportation Equity is published four time a year by the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University, 223 James P. Brawley Drive, SW, Atlanta, GA 30314, (404) 880-6911, fax: (404) 880-6909 E-mail: ejrc@cau.edu, Website: www.ejrc.cau.edu
Transportation Equity is a newsletter of the Atlanta Transportation Equity Project. Editor, Robert D. Bullard. Editorial Staff: Marie Green, Chad G. Johnson, Glenn S. Johnson, Ruth Neal, and Angel O. Torres. We welcome the submission of short articles, notices of publications, videos, conferences, and other announcements. Copyright 2000 by the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University. [All rights reserved.]
