ALAMEDA COUNTY – Environmental groups filed suit today to challenge the Yolo I-80 highway expansion project. Citing a flawed environmental impact report that understates the true impacts to traffic, climate and air quality, the groups petitioned the courts to require Caltrans to redo the analysis of the project and fully mitigate its environmental impacts.
The project to expand I-80 from Davis to Sacramento through the Yolo Bypass Wildlife Area would increase greenhouse gas pollution and harm sensitive wildlife.
NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council), representing the Planning and Conservation League, along with the Center for Biological Diversity, raised several issues in its complaint.
First, Caltrans improperly chopped this project into two pieces to use funding in illegitimate ways and obscure environmental impacts, as documented by a Caltrans…