When graded on environmental issues, Southern California is
barely pulling a 2.0.
According to this year’s Environmental Report Card,
published annually by the UCLA Institute of the Environment, the
progress made in resolving four serious environmental problems is
far from completion, not to mention cum laude.
Every year, the institute brings together faculty of many
differing disciplines to assess major environmental issues and the
performance of public agencies in dealing with them.
The first of these issues has made Los Angeles infamous and
created a nightmare of the 405 freeway.
Characteristically, heavy traffic has designated Southern
California as the most congested and polluted region in the
country. In 2004, Los Angeles has far more unhealthy air quality
days than New York and Chicago combined.
And the problems of traffic and congestion in Southern
California have no pleasant solutions.
One such solution discussed by the report card would be the
introduction of congestion charges during peak rush hours.
“People don’t pay for the full cost of their
driving,” said Randall Crane, a professor in the School of
Public Policy and Social Research and author of an article within
the report, which examines traffic.
“We pay for gas and insurance, but we don’t pay for
the congestion that we impose on people,” he added.
The congestion on Southern California highways is not primarily
caused by poor road planning or inadequate road capacity, but by
the behavior and habits of the regions’ residents, the report
card stated.
“L.A. is not badly planned,” Crane said.
“People might think it is, but the problem is we just have a
lot of people with a lot of things to do and the car is well suited
to that.”
One-third of the traffic in Los Angeles consists of commute
travel required for school or work ““ the other cars are
waiting bumper to bumper for other reasons.
“You don’t have a choice of when to go to work and
when to go to class, but you do have a choice on when you go
shopping,” Crane said.
A congestion charge would help greatly in decreasing unnecessary
traffic during peak hours, as has already been demonstrated in
cities like London and Hong Kong.
The toll could vary based upon the time of travel and congestion
conditions, and it could also be automated by subscribing to a
credit card account.
The most difficult obstacle to this approach, Crane
acknowledges, would be winning over the favor of the driving
masses.
“It would be very unpopular and for that reason
politicians have been very reluctant to support this,” he
said. “But nevertheless, this would be a good thing for
everyone and it’s the responsibilities of politicians and
other leaders to educate people about that.”
As the population of Los Angeles increases steadily over the
next decade, congestion will likely get worse before it gets
better. Crane predicts the problem will force policy-makers to
consider the option of introducing a toll.
Clearing the freeways will also decrease the time Southern
Californians are exposed to air pollutants, according to the second
article of the report card, authored by Arthur Winer, a UCLA
professor of environmental health sciences.
But the broad spectrum of harmful pollutants extends far beyond
the exhaust pipe of vehicles. A UCLA study found that the average
individual’s personal breathing air is more toxic than
average indoor air. This is due to indoor activities centered
around pollutant sources such as cleaning supplies and paints.
On the freeway, passengers in cars can decrease their exposure
to diesel exhaust emitted by buses and trucks by minimizing driving
time behind such vehicles, particularly those emitting visible
smoke.
The third issue the report card addressed, on the other hand,
has remained one that is relatively unseen.
Carole Goldberg, a law professor specializing in federal
American Indian law and tribal legal systems, addressed the issue
of illegal dumping of trash and toxic waste on American Indian
reservations.
The dumping is being done by outside individuals on hidden areas
within the reservation, or by a tribe member who illegally leases
the land as a dump site.
“Many of these reservations are in the path of increased
development, so they’re becoming sprawling and unsightly
sites of every kind of dangerous waste imaginable,” Goldberg
said.
Construction and demolition debris litter the dump sites,
household hazardous wastes poison the environment, and discarded
tires pile up as potential breeding grounds for mosquitoes.
American Indian reservations have been targeted for illegal
dumping due to their relatively isolated and secluded geography,
the report card stated.
The other component of the problem is the obscurity of the laws
governing reservation lands and the lack of resources for
enforcement.
As a result of obscure gaps in the legal systems of federal,
state and tribal governments dealing with the issue of solid waste
disposal, the problem has remained largely unaddressed.
“(This problem) has been festering because until recently,
the tribes have not had much political clout,” Goldberg said.
“That’s changing because of gaming and other forms of
economic development that are taking place on
reservations.”
Unless laws governing reservation authority are clarified, the
illegal dumping could affect individuals both within and outside
the American Indian community. Hazardous wastes could potentially
endanger the water supply, and fumes from landfill fires are not
observant of reservation boundaries, Goldberg said.
The final problem addressed by the report card is that of storm
water regulation.
One of the unavoidable consequences of urban development is the
sprawl of concrete and asphalt. These man-made surfaces prevent the
re-absorbance of runoff from rain and irrigation, and provide
concrete conduits for trash and debris to be carried with it.
“Each one of us and each business has to be aware that
when something gets put onto the ground that doesn’t get
picked up, it will eventually make its way into a storm
drain,” said Sean Hecht, the director of the UCLA
Environmental Law Center.
The weeks following the first rains of the season are marked by
the water quality as debris accumulated over months is washed out
into the ocean, Hecht said.
Many local governments of Southern California have been
developing a new infrastructure and plan to lessen the pollution of
runoff. They may find the means to enact those plans through the
recently passed Measure O, which will dedicate $500 million in
bonds to projects that will protect water sources and clean up
storm water.
“It’s not the kind of problem that impacts all of us
on a day to day basis, but at the same time it will decrease our
quality our life if we don’t deal with these problems,”
Hecht said.