San Jacinto Rail project draws fire from citizens, officals

by Erika McDonald

A stormy public comment period for the San Jacinto Rail project will come to a close this month. With environmentalists, the Latino communities of Houston’s East End and elected officials up in arms, the city faces yet another development project that pits business interests against quality-of-life concerns.

The $80 million project proposed by Burlington National Santa Fe and four chemical companies would link a new rail line from the Bayport industrial complex to tracks that run parallel to state Highway 3, lowering shipping costs for the consortium. The proposal calls for at least two trains per day, each carrying up to 66 carloads of chemicals, to pass along the north side of residential neighborhoods in Clear Lake before veering around Ellington Field.

Two public hearings on the project’s Draft Environmental Impact Statement in January drew hundreds of opponents. The DEIS completed by the Surface Transportation Board, the permitting agency for the project, reported ‘negligible’ environmental impacts. However since its release in December, the DEIS has been blasted by environmentalists and local officials alleging inaccuracies and omissions.

The proposed San Jacinto Rail route goes through undeveloped land west of Armand Bayou and adjoining residential development in Clear Lake City. It would pass within one mile of Milby and Cesar Chavez high schools and dozens of elementary schools. Galveston Bay Conservation and Preservation Association’s land-use consultant Peter Brown said that the decision to build the rail line through this undeveloped land would generate secondary development of industrial and commercial land uses. Such sprawl would constitute a major shift in land use and would change the character of this part of southeast Harris County.

GBCPA members also complained the statement failed to address the issue of wetlands loss. According to their analysis, development of the rail line would compromise one of the last prairie pothole wetland systems in the county. GBCPA is asking for a more complete analysis of alternative routes.

Another issue surfacing in the San Jacinto Rail debate is environmental racism. Rick Dovalina, a League of United Latin American Citizens national board member, said the civil rights group will work with rail opponents to file a lawsuit against the project alleging racial discrimination.

According to a 1994 executive order, all federal agencies must assess whether a proposal’s adverse environmental effects fall disproportionately on minority communities.

Attorney Jim Blackburn charged the San Jacinto Rail Partners with deliberately falsifying Census information when mapping their route proposal in order to obscure the overwhelmingly Latino character of the neighborhood.

Blackburn said nearly 30,000 Latinos who live within a quarter-mile of the route were counted as white in the racial data the consortium provided. He said 11,120 residents within that distance of the line were children.

According to Blackburn’s analysis, 71 percent of the residents within a quarter-mile of the proposed operating route are Latino and 32 percent are children.

David Harpole, manager of public affairs for Lyondell, one of the Partners, said arguments that the project would adversely affect disadvantaged economic groups and Latinos were false.

“The (DEIS) includes a determination that the project has no adverse impact on any population,” he said. “Efforts to make race an issue are reprehensible.”
The Partners say they need the rail in order to challenge what they call a monopoly. The plants contend that they are being gouged by Union Pacific, which acquired a lucrative monopoly in Bayport after merging with Southern Pacific during the 1996 deregulation of the industry.

According to Dovalina, if the partners’ intention was to promote competition, they should file an anti-trust suit against Union Pacific, not build another track.
A coalition led by U.S. Rep. Gene Green and state Rep. Rick Noriega, Democrats who both represent the East End, also opposes the proposed line. The Houston City Council earlier this year passed a strongly worded resolution condemning the plan; so have South Houston city officials, whose community would be bisected by the proposed route. The Pasadena City Council passed a similar resolution.

Many local elected officials voiced concern for the environmental health and safety of the neighborhood already overburdened by train traffic.

Each day, at least 150 loaded cars go out of Bayport and 150 empty cars come in on a Union Pacific track that hugs the Ship Channel along Texas 225 through Pasadena and Deer Park. About half of the traffic continues through an industrial area that skirts the East End; the other half is pushed right through the neighborhood.

Houston City-Council Member Shelley Sekula-Gibbs said that in addition to threatening homes and schools, the proposed route also posed a danger to a nearby wastewater treatment facility.

She said that if the water station were contaminated, it would affect more than 2 million residents, an issue not addressed in the DEIS. “It’s a bad idea to expose an entire city to contamination for the sake of competition.”

Other local officials who decried the project include U.S. Rep. Nick Lampson, Houston City Council Members Addie Wiseman, Carroll Robinson and Carol Alvarado and the mayors of Houston, Pasadena, Taylor Lake Village, South Houston and Shoreacres.

Despite mounting opposition, the Surface Transportation Board has conditionally approved construction of the 13-mile rail line, pending the close of public comment on Feb. 21.

Comments should be addressed to the Surface Transportation Board, 1925 K Street NW, Washington, D.C. 20423. Envelopes should be marked: Attention Dana White, Section of Environmental Analysis, Environmental Filing FD No. 34079.

Proposed San Jacinto Rail route. Photo courtesy San Jacinto Rail Partners.