Hog Wild: Hwy. 149 Expansion - Your Tax Money for Urban Sprawl or Safety?

The intersection of Highway 149 and Highway 70, just north of Oroville.

Butte County is no different than most government entities: they are influenced by big business and reticent to correct mistakes. Through twelve years analyzing and promoting the dangers of the intersection at Highways 70 and 149, Butte County Association of Governments (BCAG) and California Department of Transportation (CalTrans) failed to keep the public safe from the dangers there. Simple, inexpensive solutions were ignored in favor of what is viewed by transportation experts as an endless, expensive treadmill: more lanes are rapidly filled and lead to eventual gridlock, air pollution, and the desire for more lanes (does Sacramento come to mind?). In addition, like many local governments, Butte County is building roads and watching what happens next instead of planning for land use, which should precede transportation infrastructure.

Butte County has defaulted its land use authority to BCAG, the organization that garners millions of dollars for transportation planning. While Butte County’s illegal General Plan demonstrates that the Highway 149 area is zoned for grazing land, not urban uses, BCAG prioritized the Highway 149 expansion (a segment of an expressway to Sacramento sought by CalTrans) instead of rapidly fixing one confusing intersection at 149 and Highway 70. The tragedies that have occurred from the decade of delays are the result of a fixation on transportation infrastructure before land use planning, the proverbial cart before the horse.

The current Hwy 149 interchange expansion will pave the way for sprawling tract-home development, already seen marching up Hwy 99 from the south.

This grazing land in this part of Butte County is valued for wetlands that are a treasure to our state and county: vernal pools (Recovery Plan for Vernal Pool Ecosystems of California and Southern Oregon). Though less than 10% of the vernal pool ecosystem remains in California, local governments, like Butte County, have neglected to prioritize protection of the landscape despite the known value for ranchers, water quality, tourism, and wild plant and animal species. The Highway 149 project was permitted by a federal agency with the strong caveat that a Habitat Conservation Plan must accompany it to mitigate for the sprawl, basically, that follows such major infrastructure projects. BCAG and CalTrans have not only failed to adequately protect the public for well over a decade, but now they have reneged on their permit obligations. Despite the honest acknowledgment by Supervisor Curt Josiassen in January 2006, “I know that Supervisor Dolan and Mayor Andoe [of Oroville] and I obviously spent a lot of time talking to those folks and it was very clear that they wanted an HCP of some type with this project,” neither BCAG, CalTrans, or the Butte County Supervisors took it seriously. When that was brought to their attention again, BCAG scrambled for congressional intervention to alter the permit.

The serial irresponsibility that brings us to the present must be challenged. Butte Environmental Council, the California Native Plant Society, and Defenders of Wildlife intend to do just that.

This item originally appeared in the Spring 2006 Environmental News