What are they really looking for with the drawn out environmental impact study?

Question

Doesn't it cause more damage by delaying the process of putting the rails down?

Answer 1

Almost everything but normal private housing in Australia has to have one. They are looking for impacts on both flora and fauna, and even stopped a wind power site for 2 years because a rare parrot MIGHT fly in the area. It was eventually discovered that it didn't.

Answer 2

Most new construction in the US requires an EIS.  It may delay the environmental benefits of the rail, but it will make sure there are no other adverse effects.

Answer 3

Sure it does, but it also silences all later opposition.   It's pretty much a must-have document for a municipality who doesn't want to get sued later.  The EIR discloses how people will be affected, I think the idea is to prevent anyone from saying later "Nobody expected it to have this effect".  

Private corporations (e.g. freight railroads) have a somewhat fading ability to skip that and say "We're a railroad in interstate commerce and can't be regulated by the states, so we get to skip over EIRs."  However the federal regulatory agency, the STB, has been tolerant of states wanting to assert EIR rights.

What I have never understood is why an EIR must be drawn out. I don't think there are any natural delays in it, just that there's a large body of data and it takes time to sort it all out.

Often the EIR says "Yup, these people will be affected all right, and here's how.  Tough buffaloes!"

Answer 4

Rich-

The EIS is just a way for the BUNNY HUGGERS to create revenue and a need for themselves in our system.  These studies hold up progress which needs to be made regarless of the spotted owls and the red-legged tree frog.

Basically its bureaucratic red tape that is a waste of everyone's time.  

My point??

Sierra Club!

Have a really good look at industry north of Sacramento in the People's Demokratik Republik of Kalifornia.  I watched the tree lovers single handedly kill the industry in Northern California.  

What Industry?

Lumber.  

Towns like Chico, Redding, Oroville, Anderson, and Red Bluff who depended on the lumber industry were killed off on the 60's and 70's because folks like the Sierra Club and Green Pieces, had the need to "Save the Trees".  Instead, what they did was put several hundred thousand American Workers out of work.  

Gee thanks!  Jerks!

Those same dope, smoking, hippie, burnouts from that same era are now in your local legislatures creating these problems.  

The only way to circumvent their c**p, is to circulate a petition stating the community needs to have this service.  

Because if the type of work I do, they create more problems than they do solutions.

Here is a great example of something we are currently fighting here in California.  The Bunny Huggers want to have several of our dams here dynamited to "Revive" the down stream habitats for the fish.

Here is the problem.  USGS, (Unted States Geological Survey), has just completed a major report on the dams that were proposed for demolition.  

Let me ask you a question?

What happened in California in the year 1849?

Does a man by the name of John Sutter ring any bells?

GOLD!

Any idea how Placer Gold was collected?

Heard of a device called a Riffle Box?

Heard of a toxic mineral called Mercury?

Let me do a little California History for you.

In 1849 as you know Gold was discovered here in California.  As the miners rushed out to California they soon descovered there was a faster way to get the gold out of the hills and mountains.  This was called Hydraulic Mining.  They used a device called a Monitor which looked like a huge fire hose nozzle and squirted massive volumes of water at a hillside that was known to contain Placer Gold.  Hence, Placer County in California.

This Placer Gold, (which is merely gold that forms in soft aggrigate material), is washed through a device called a Riffle Box.  The Riffle Box as its name implies has ridges built into it designed to adgitate the aggrigates and drop a material called Black Sand.  This Black Sand is pure Iron and like the Gold it settles to the bottom of the ladders in the Riffle Box.  

This is where the Mercury comes into play.  The miners then shut off the water supply, and once the water clears, they pour the Mercury into the ladder sections.  This then floats off the Iron, (Black Sand) and the Gold is left behind.  The Gold is then collected, and melted into "puddles", (these were merely molten gold poured on to cold cast iron skillets to make a flat coin shaped puddle), hence puddles.

Well then the Riffle Boxes were re-opened and the process repeated.

So where did all of that Mercury go?

How about right here.

Lake Shasta

Lake Oroville

Hetch Hetchy Reservior

Engilebright Reservior

That just names a very few of them.

So where is that Mercury sitting?

Under tons of sediment in our reserviors.  The greatest concentrations are at the foot of the dams on the lake side of these dams.  

You want to know why our lakes and streams are not more polluted and dangerous?

Because the TONS of Mercury are being retained and contained deep within this sediment, sealed away from doing any harm to fish and wildlife.  

So what the Bunny Huggers learned, is the dams have actually saved our current environment from being even more damaged by the Mercury.

Anyhow, the point of this history lesson, is if you need to have a service, and your town would better benefit from its service, then its up to folks like you to step up to the plate and do the foot work to get services like this pushed through your legislature.

My personal feeling about these situations is this.  You are either a part of the solution or a part of the problem.  If you are inactive or unwilling to put forth any effort, you become part of the problem.  

However, it sound like you are willing to take a stand, by your question, so I would say you are a part of the solution.

Good Luck!

Answer 5

one word:

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$