Judge halts Highway 101 widening project, saying it would harm redwoods

Caltrans has again lost its fight to develop a long-planned highway-widening project near Richardson Grove State Park south of Humboldt County.

U.S. District Judge William Alsup of San Francisco ruled the project would harm ancient redwoods.

"All of these old growth redwoods have lived many times longer than our nation has existed," Alsup said in his ruling on a motion for summary judgment. Bess Bair et al. v. California State Department of Transportation et al., 17-CV6419 (N.D. Cal., Nov. 2, 2017).

This is the third National Environmental Policy Act action taken against Caltrans over the last eight years aimed at blocking roadwork on U.S. Highway 101. The plaintiffs alleged there was inadequate evaluation of the environmental impacts of cutting into or paving over tree roots.

The stretch of the highway winds through a grove of redwoods, some of which are thousands of years old. The current effort to reshape the highway began in 2007 to allow safer passage of large trucks.

No environmental impact statement has been done for the project, which is now in its third version, according to Alsup's ruling Friday. The judge asked both plaintiffs and Caltrans whether Caltrans should be required to do a new environmental assessment or a full environmental impact study. The parties must file supplemental briefs by May 23.

The project has been challenged by Humboldt County residents and conservation groups in state and federal court. In 2012, the federal court issued a temporary injunction blocking the project, citing numerous errors in Caltrans' mapping and measurement of affected old-growth redwoods and use of faulty data. The agency reapproved the project in 2017.

However Caltrans did not analyze the redwoods' fallibility and whether redwoods would be impacted by increased paving in root zones and noise impacts from truck traffic, Alsup's ruling stated.

"Our position is and always has been that Caltrans should do a full environmental impact study," said Stuart G. Gross of Gross & Klein LLP, who represented plaintiffs along with Sharon Duggan of Environmental Protection Information Center, Philip Gregory of Gregory Law Group and Camilo Artiga-Purcell of Artiga-Purcell Law Office.

Caltrans District 1 Director Matt Brady wrote in an email Monday that the agency "is currently reviewing the recent federal NEPA ruling regarding the Richardson Grove project on U.S. Highway 101 in southern Humboldt County and considering options moving forward."

CalTrans counsel could not immediately be reached.