BNSF SoCal yard project headed to state Supreme Court

Written by Railway Age Staff
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Rendering of BNSF's Southern California International Gateway. Credit: Port of Los Angeles

New York isn’t the only place with a problem getting a Gateway rail project built.

The California Supreme Court will hear an appeal in the case of BNSF Railway’s proposed $500-million Southern California International Gateway rail yard, an intermodal project decades in the making.

The SCIG will create a railhead for container traffic in Wilmington just four miles from the Port of Los Angeles, rather than boxes having to be drayed 24 miles on local roads and the 710 freeway to downtown rail facilities. BNSF has said SCIG will allow 1.5 million more containers to move by more efficient and environmentally preferred rail through the Alameda Corridor each year, reducing truck traffic congestion in Southern California, while also creating jobs.

But the city of Long Beach, air pollution regulators, environmentalists and neighbors objected, contending in 2013 lawsuits that the 185-acre yard would actually make air quality worse. They want further work done on the environmental reports needed for approval, which the city of Los Angeles granted in 2013.

Long Beach and other parties that sued to stop the yard want to take their case to the state Supreme Court, which in the past has taken a close look at California’s strict environmental laws.

The facility is expected to host 5,500 trucks and eight trains a day in round-the-clock operations.

The project seemed to grind to a halt in 2016 when a Superior Court judge ordered Los Angeles to set aside its environmental analysis and proposed 50-year lease. But a California appellate court in January overruled that decision and gave both sides a partial victory.

The three-judge panel found the environmental reporting required under the California Environmental Quality Act was met by BNSF except for how air pollution concentrations were determined. That could force the railroad to revise its analysis, but freed BNSF of expensive pollution offset requirements.

Both the port and BNSF said they were pleased with the latest ruling, without offering further comment.

Opponents are taking issue with claims by the port and BNSF that SCIG would take trucks off the 710 freeway, a route they currently travel to the railroad’s intermodal yard in Hobart. They argue that a second yard would actually add more capacity and more diesel-powered, polluting trucks on the freeway. They want the Supreme Court to reconsider the appeals court decision, as well as how traffic and noise are assessed.

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