Court:State must consider population projections in I-93 project

CONCORD, N.H. --In a decision that is likely to stall the project, a federal judge ruled Thursday that state and federal highway officials must consider population growth that would be prompted by widening Interstate 93 in southern New Hampshire as part of their planning.

The ruling was a significant victory for environmentalists who argue that widening the road to four lanes between Manchester and the Massachusetts border would itself cause population growth that will affect the usefulness of the widening, congest secondary roads and cause air pollution.

The Conservation Law Foundation argued that a study that was not considered by officials in their initial planning, and never presented for public comment, estimates that the widening would be responsible for drawing 35,000 new residents, above any unrelated population growth, to towns along the highway by 2020.

The group argued that because of the errors, U.S. District Judge Paul Barbadoro should have required the state to start from scratch in developing its Environmental Impact Statement. It wanted a total reassessment of the decision to exclude commuter rail as an alternative and to reanalyze the environmental effects of the expansion on land use, water quality and wildlife.

Barbadoro disagreed, saying even though planners used outdated population forecasts for their traffic projections, they carefully studied commuter rail before ruling it out, and conducted a "reasonably thorough analysis" of the road's environmental impacts.

But, in an 86-page ruling, he ordered the state and Federal Highway Administration to complete a Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement that specifically considers the population forecast and whether the widening actually would relieve congestion on the highway. The new study also must consider the effects the additional residents would have on secondary roads and air quality.

"Clearly we've got more work to do," said Transportation Department spokesman Bill Boynton. "What that exactly means we are still trying to figure out."

At the Conservation Law Foundation, staff attorney Tom Irwin called the decision significant.

"It highlights how flawed the Department of Transportation's planning has been for this massive proposed highway project," he said.

He said the judge challenged the main justification for the project, that a wider highway would relieve traffic congestion.

"The court decision focuses in on the pivotal point, that the traffic projections that underlie the planning for this project are inaccurate and that those projections are further flawed in that they don't in any way include or account for the additional traffic demand that can be expected from population growth that is induced by the project," Irwin said.

He said the study the judge ordered planners to consider -- called the Delphi Panel study -- included experts in real estate, economics and land use. They concluded that with the widening, by 2020, 35,000 more people would live along the highway corridor than would live there without the widening.

Based on the study, the state allocated $3.5 million to help 26 communities plan for potential growth due to the expansion.

The 20-mile, $700 million, project runs between Salem on the Massachusetts line and the junction of I-93, I-293 and Route 101 in Manchester.

Irwin suggested the new work would take months, at least, and may prompt wider consideration, such as including rail to help cut air pollution.

"This adds to the need for the state agencies to take a balanced approach here to find a transportation solution that will really work," he said.

"We can't build our way out of it just by adding highway lanes," Irwin said.