May 22, 2005

Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) Region 1

18500 East Colfax

Aurora, Colorado  80011

Re:      Response to I-70 Mountain Corridor

           Draft Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement

            CORRECTED

Dear CDOT:

The purpose of this communication is to provide public comment to the I-70 Mountain Corridor Draft PEIS, December 2004.  This is official agency comment from the Clear Creek Watershed Foundation made in addition to all previous comment.

The Clear Creek Watershed Foundation is a 501(c)3 dedicated to the health of the Clear Creek Watershed both ecologically and economically.  We find that the prospect of six-lane widening through this watershed is the greatest threat to health, safety, and welfare faced in the last 100 years.  CDOT is currently the largest industrial polluter in this watershed.  This draft PEIS foretells of a huge cumulative increase of that effect.

We find significant policy assumptions hidden within the bowels of the document that are fallacious and not supported by fact.  CDOT has not followed its own guidance contained in the CDOT Environmental Stewardship Guide.  This begins with the environmental ethics statement and CDOT’s mission statement and commission policies “to provide the best multimodal transportation for Colorado that most effectively moves people, goods, and information” and continues with Performance Based Transportation Investment Strategy Environmental Objectives.  To wit:

• The manipulation of Tier I and Tier II analysis stymies the early detection of show-stopper issues such as conflicts with a National Historic Landmark District and residuals from historic milling of metals within the right-of-way.  In both instances, the Tier I analyses were suspended when it became apparent that further analysis would favor elevated AGS in the form of CHSST or its equivalent over at-grade construction.  It is known to CDOT that the right-of-way and “constructive use” impact zones contain many aspects that must be protected by law.  This includes residual deposits of elemental mercury and cyanide not mentioned in the PEIS and which must not under any circumstances be mobilized into the waters of the United States.  This contains many historic properties including the mining setting in which they are located that must be protected.  Early analysis is required while the full range of alternatives is available.  This is a requirement of CDOT guidance and law and it has not been done.  Moreover, the draft PEIS makes a fallacious policy assumption that these aspects can be mitigated after the impairment by construction.
   
• The policy assumptions that all modes under consideration require the construction of the same length and size bore at Eisenhower/Johnson tunnels is fallacious.  In fact, one or more modes actually fit in the ventilation spaces of the existing tunnels and can be configured to enhance ventilation from the highway pollution of cars and trucks in the spaces below.  The policy assumption the FHWA and FTA cannot share the same facility is also fallacious.
   
• The cost comparisons make the fallacious assumption that modes of different design lives, different fundability profiles, and different physical lengths can legitimately be compared by first cost over a fixed 20-year period.  Such a policy assumption borders on public fraud meeting the tests of: 1) knowingly false, and 2) an attempt to gain.
   
• Energy efficiencies are similarly computed on false premises.  In fact, simple analysis performed by senior and graduate students at Colorado School of Mines shows that CHSST is five times more energy efficient in terms of passenger miles than highway efficiency.
   
• The impacts on mountain economies between early off-line construction of CHSST or equivalent compared to highway widening are not shown.  The public was told that the model used for analysis could not break out county-by-county impacts and benefits when, in fact, current versions can.  The 15-year cone zone depression brought on by highway widening through Clear Creek County can be avoided by early deployment of CHSST or its equivalent.
   
• The public statement by CDOT that “we do not do transit” is a digression to the old Colorado Department of Highways and is not consistent with the current mission statement.
  
  
• With regard to subsidies, our runs of commercialization model—owned by CDOT—shows that only the CHSST meets operational costs of 10¢ per passenger mile and at 15¢ per mile produces revenues of $150M per year.  CDOT investigates the economic revenue stream of tolling, but not commercialization of other modes, particularly when these models are available to you in house—why?
  
  
• Bias toward highway solutions is apparent throughout the document, as has been pointed out in other testimony.
  
  
• Full environmental costs are not included in any of the alternative analyses. 

We can visualize CDOT playing out the scenario begun in this draft PEIS through to a Tier I Record of Decision.  In some future court room, a judge would ask of CDOT:

The law forbids a “post-hoc rationalization of a prior decision;” the law prevents “arbitrary and capricious” assumptions and policy; the law prevents an abuse of power and discretion; the law requires a “hard look;” what part of this body of environmental law did you not understand?

It is our belief that mountain communities, particularly the entities in Clear Creek County, have put forward a reasonable and rational locally-preferred alternative that best meets public health, safety, and welfare considerations over a substantially longer life than is considered in the draft PEIS.  It is this preferred alternative that should become the Record of Decision.

Sincerely,

Edward G. Rapp, P.E.

Clear Creek Watershed Foundation President

cmc/EGR

cc:           Congressman Mark Udall

                US EPA Region 8, attn.: Deborah Lebow

                Federal Highway Administration, attn.: Jean Wallace

                Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, attn.: Water Quality Control Division

                Clear Creek County, attn.: Commissioners

                Upper Clear creek Watershed Association, attn.: Anne Beierle

                Clear Creek Economic Development Corporation, attn.: Peggy Stokstad