After hitting a wall of public resistance with its initial document in 2013, the Alaska Department of Transportation is nearly ready to release its revised environmental assessment for the Haines Highway improvement project.
The $125 million project, funded largely by federal money, would widen the roadway, straighten curves and address slide issues from Mile 3.5 to 25.3. It also would replace the Wells Bridge.
The revised environmental assessment (EA) should be available by Oct. 6, said DOT communications officer Jeremy Woodrow.
The new document incorporates public comment made on the original EA, and makes “significant revisions” to address criticisms of the design, he said.
“There was a lot of concern about some of the design proposals for the project, by not only local organizations and the public, but also by other environmental agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency and U.S. Fish and Wildlife,” he said.
Concern about negative impacts to fisheries stemmed primarily from the project’s intended use of 23.6 acres of fill in wetlands and 8.3 acres of fill in the Chilkat River and its tributaries. DOT’s failure to identify bald eagle roosting and feeding trees in the agency’s EA also aroused the ire of residents and caused them to demand an environmental impact statement (EIS), a more comprehensive document.
The agency still isn’t interested in pursuing an EIS, Woodrow said.
“We are sticking with an EA. The department’s perspective as well as the Federal Highway Administration’s is that the work we are doing doesn’t really rise to the level of (needing) an EIS,” Woodrow said. “We are making modifications to an existing highway, not reconstructing or rerouting a highway.”
About 50 residents turned out in August 2013 for a public hearing on the original EA, with many speaking against the EA and seeking a more thorough analysis of the project’s impacts to fish and wildlife.
The revised EA includes a new study of bald eagles and their habitat along the project’s route, he said. “That was one of the things that was asked upon by different groups,” he said.
Woodrow said a lot of the revisions have to do with avoiding fill in some areas, or planning to improve fish habitat elsewhere along the route to compensate for filled waterways.
DOT will hold public hearings in Klukwan and Haines on Oct. 28. The Klukwan hearing is from 10 a.m. to noon at the ANS Hall. The Haines hearing is at the high school from 5:30 to 8 p.m.
A hard copy of the revised EA will be available at the library. A copy will also be available online.
DOT will take public comment on the revised document, incorporate it, and send it to the Federal Highway Administration for review. The highway administration then issues a finding, hopefully of “no significant impact,” Woodrow said.