George Hesselberg's column in today's Wisconsin State Journal (local section) reports
on the reason for the move of the annual fundraiser bicycle ride for the UW-Madison's
Children's Hospital this year from the Arboretum to Fitchburg. It terribly ironic
because a good share of the automobile traffic on Seminole Highway in Madison these
days undoubtedly originates or terminates in Fitchburg.
Mike Neuman
---------- Forwarded Message ----------
I agree that it's not the Arboretum's fault that the Gear Up Madison spring event this
summer had to be moved. Safety should always come first in any event of this nature.
The reason the event location was no longer any good is because automobile traffic on
Seminole Highway - as on most City of Madison arterial streets - has grown to
dangerously high levels due to too much commuting to Madison by Dane County and its
surrounding counties' suburban resident population. The left turn onto Seminole
Highway out of the Arboretum is merely a symptom of a much larger problem in Dane and
the surrounding counties --too much single occupancy motor vehicle driving.
Until Dane County and the state get serious about encouraging less auto driving by
everyone, problems like excess traffic on Seminole Highway, not enough parking in
Madison, suburban sprawl in Dane County and elsewhere, and more air pollution in and
around Madison are bound to get worse and worse.
See my attached comments on the Verona Road and Southwest Beltline plan for additional
information. The problem is not just because of population growth either, since
traffic levels have tripled the rate of population growth in Dane County since 1990.
Michael Neuman
4334 Waite Circle
Madison, WI
(608) 238-6866
--------- Forwarded Letter ---------
June 6, 2004
Ms. Rose Phetteplace District Director
ATTN: Mr. John Steiner, Project Manager
District #1 Office
Wisconsin Department of Transportation
2101 Wright Street
Madison, WI 53704
RE: Verona Road/West Beltline Draft Environmental Impact
Statement (DEIS)
Dear Ms. Phetteplace:
The following comments add to the public testimony I gave at the May 17,
2004 public hearing on the Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) on the Verona
Road/West Beltline project.
I am a resident of Madison and reside just off Midvale Boulevard in
Madison. I believe the environment will be adversely impacted in my
neighborhood as a result of this project, because of the increasing motor vehicle
traffic this project will accommodate and bring into the City of Madison.
I have worked over 20 years for a state natural resources agency in
reviewing environmental impact statements on major civil works projects,
and I hold degrees from the University of Wisconsin - Madison: Economics
(BA); Agricultural Economics (MA); Water Resources Management (MS). I
believe these experiences make me well qualified to comment on the
adequacy of the DEIS in disclosing the environmental impacts of the
Verona Road/West Beltline project.
I consider the DEIS on the Verona Road/West Beltline project to be
severely deficient, particularly as the project affects air quality. The
DEIS does not fully disclose the impact that completion of this project
will create upon air quality, human health conditions and public safety
in the vicinity of the project, and in other areas of Madison and south
central Wisconsin as well, after the project is in use.
The Verona Freeway segment of this project will expand the capacity of
the highway system to accommodate more than twice as many vehicles as it
now serves, increasing the motor vehicle carrying capacity of Verona Road by 130-140%!
The project will add more lanes of traffic on Verona Road between Nakoma Road and
County Highway PD (about 1 mi.), allowing for increasing pollution from vehicles using
this area. It will also add more lanes of traffic and an expanded number of
interchanges on the West beltline highway, between the interchanges at Mineral Point
Road and Verona Road, for a distance of approximately 3 miles.
The DEIS on the freeway and beltline expansion alternatives addresses
only the impacts of the additional emissions on carbon monoxide levels.
It does not disclose the effects of the project (full capacity use of the project) on
other air quality parameter of importance to public health, such as nitrous oxide,
particulates and carbon dioxide. The DEIS should address the impacts of full capacity
use of the project on air quality, human health factors and the safety of people and
children living in the vicinity of the project. This assessment should be made under
varying atmospheric conditions, including periods of high temperature, high humidity
and stagnant air - conditions likely to occur more frequently and for longer periods
of time in the future as a result of global warming.
Automobile congestion is likely to get worse in Madison with this
project, since the highway expansions will encourage even more people to
commute to Madison by automobile. Until the Wisconsin DOT and the county find a way
to discourage excessive driving from west of Madison, such as finding ways or programs
to reduce the single occupancy driving (SOV), this project should not proceed further.
My person surveys show that, presently, only one out of nine motor vehicles driving
into Madison on Midvale Boulevard during 6:00 AM to 7:00 AM on weekdays have more than
just the driver present in the vehicle.
Driving alone to work has become increasingly more common in Wisconsin
and the Midwest, and I�m sure this case holds true for Dane County and
its bordering counties. It is a very inefficient use of fuel and an extra burden on
highways. It�s a problem the WisDOT seems to have little
interest in curbing.
The percentage of people driving alone to work in Wisconsin rose by 18
percentage points from 1980 to 2000, from 62% to 80% of the work force.
During the same time period, the combined percentage of people who chose
more fuel efficient means of getting to work -- carpooling, using public
transportation, bicycling or walking to work -- declined from 32% to 16%. Wisconsin�s
80% SOV rate is higher than both the national average rate of 76% and the average for
the Midwest states (78%), second only to
Michigan�s rate of having 83% of their work force driving solo to and
from work everyday in an automobile. [Source: Wisconsin Blue Book,
2003-2004].
I raised this issue in the spring of 1999 when I commented on the WisDOT
proposed reconstruction of Highway 12 from Middleton to Sauk City into a
4-lane expressway. WisDOT studies even at that time showed that vehicles used by
commuters in Wisconsin had an average of 1.2 persons per vehicle.
I stated my concerns that the Highway 12 4-lane expansion project would
only encourage more residential sprawl, because it would make commuting
to Madison faster, resulting in an even heavier commuter burden on
Highway 12, the West Beltline and within the City of Madison.
The West Beltline capacity expansion proposed in the Verona Road/West
Beltline plan would add two additional lanes on the West Beltline and
more interchanges between Mineral Point Road and Verona Road. While the
plans call for the proposed Verona Road/Freeway motor vehicle carrying
capacity from the Nakoma Road/Beltline intersection west to County
highway PD to be expanded by 130%-140%; DOT staff could not answer how
many more motor vehicles per day two additional lanes on the West Beltline and several
more interchanges with the West Beltline between Verona Road and the Mineral Point
Road will be able travel on the expanded West Beltline highway.
The project is estimated to cost between $194 and $210 million and take
out 11-12 residential and 26 commercial buildings, in and about the
vicinity of the Allied Drive neighborhood. The Allied Drive area is a
densely populated area of the City of Madison containing mostly low
income residents and numerous minority families having many children.
The World Health Organization reports that 3 million people now die each
year from the effects of air pollution -- three times the 1 million who
die each year in automobile accidents. In the United States, traffic
fatalities total just over 40,000 per year, while air pollution claims
70,000 lives, annually.
The problem of asthma has reached almost epidemic levels in the U.S.
population, growing 160 percent among pre-school children during the 15
year period from 1980 to 1994, and 75 percent in the total population.
The highest incidence of asthma cases is found among low-income and
African-American toddlers, a large share of whom live in urban areas.
[Inside the Greenhouse: The Impacts of CO2 and Climate Change on Public
Health in the Inner City,� a report released by the Harvard Medical
School's Center for Health and the Global Environment.]
The Harvard Medical School study confirms that serious public health
risks are created when children and adults are exposed to even moderate
levels of urban air pollution, especially when that exposure takes place
during warm temperatures and high humidity, a condition that will become
more frequent as global warming continues. These serious side effects of increased
traffic enabled by the project are likely to grow rapidly and tragically in the
future, as both the warming and traffic volumes using the new expressway increase.
Unhealthy levels of nitrogen oxides, particulates and carbon dioxide
commonly result from heavy motor vehicle traffic on highways. The
pollutants are outputs of the combustion of gasoline and diesel fuel in
automobiles, SUVs and trucks. The more automobiles, SUVs and trucks
being driven in an area, the more likely it will be that the area will
have unhealthy, polluted air quality.
Medical health studies have increasingly shown that particulates from
motor vehicle emissions are linked with increasing rates of cancer,
stroke and heat attack in populations residing in close proximity to
heavy traveled roads. When people inhale particulates at concentrations
commonly found in urban areas, their arteries become more constricted,
thus reducing blood flow and oxygen supply to the heart. This is why air
pollution aggravates heart conditions and can bring on stroke.
Unlike some pollutants that have threshold levels below which no health
effects are seen, ozone (a product of fossil fuel combustion, warm
temperatures and sunlight) and particulates have negative health effects
even at very low levels. Thus, there is no "safe" level of such
pollutants in the air, and for children who spend a good part of their
summer days outdoors being active and breathing hard, the risk of injury
is magnified.
What's new about the Harvard study is that it shows carbon dioxide (CO2)
concentration levels in the air are significantly higher (almost twice as high) within
cities that experience high levels of motor vehicle traffic. The large quantities of
fossil fuel burned in motor vehicles and other sources in cities cause a "dome" of
higher CO2 concentrations that creates both warmer temperatures AND increasing air
pollution, and links them both to increasing respiratory health risks of getting
asthma and also suffering more frequent asthma attacks. Researchers had formerly
thought that the carbon dioxide dispersed into the open air; however, they have now
discovered that the CO2 stays in the area that it was emitted in for the most part,
altering the climate and air quality of the immediate area of impact.
The dramatically increased motor vehicle travel the Verona Road Freeway
will be able to carry if the freeway and West Beltline expansion project
is build will unquestionably affect human health and the safety of living in the
Allied Drive neighborhood on Madison's south side. Considering that many of the
individuals and families living this area are less likely to drive because of low
incomes, it is ironic that they are the one�s who will likely be impacted the most by
worsening air quality caused by the project.
The DEIS fails to address alternatives that reduce the projected demand
for motor vehicle travel in south central Wisconsin. In a letter to
WisDOT Secretary Charles Thompson, commenting on the State Highway Plan
on May 13, 1999, the DNR Secretary George Meyer recommended the WisDOT
evaluate 3 demand reduction alternatives in the plan as alternatives to
expanding the capacity of the state highway system. Those alternatives
included a plan that would provide financial incentives ("rebates") for
people to drive less, as an alternative to adding massive and expensive
highway capacity improvements that encourage more fossil fuel burning
motor vehicles. However, the public was denied the opportunity to comment on those
alternatives in the State of Wisconsin Highways 2020 planning process.
In conclusion, it is recommended that the WisDOT develop one or more
transportation demand reduction (TDR) alternatives to evaluate in the EIS for the
Verona Road/West Beltline project, and those alternatives assume a comparable amount
of funding that the highway expansion alternatives would receive.
Sincerely,
Michael T. Neuman
(Signed on 6/6/04, MTN)
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