Crowd protests cancer risk from planned truck roadway

More than 100 people gathered at Banning’s Landing Community Center in Wilmington on Tuesday night to express their concerns about a proposed truck expressway that will increase cancer risks in a neighborhood that for years has felt overwhelmed by massive port expansion projects.

The Alameda Corridor Transportation Authority has offered to install -- free of charge -- high-efficiency air filtration systems in eight modest homes on East Robidoux Street that computer models indicate would face cancer risks above the South Coast Air Quality Management District’s “significant cancer risk” threshold of 10 people per million.

But opponents questioned the data used to support the Transportation Authority’s promises of a regional benefit in the Wilmington area due to trucks being diverted onto the $687-million Schuyler Heim Bridge and State Route 47 Expressway Project.

“We’re challenging their numbers,” said Jesse Marquez, executive director of the Coalition for a Safe Environment and a lifelong Wilmington resident. “We believe the health risks are significantly worse than what they are saying.

“They say only eight houses are at significant risk, but there are about 86 houses within 700 feet of the same proposed source of toxic diesel truck emissions,” he said.

The meeting was held so that project engineers could explain the health effects that would be generated by replacement of the unsafe Heim Bridge spanning the Cerritos Channel and construction of the proposed four-lane, 1.7-mile-long elevated expressway that would move about 20,000 trucks a day from Terminal Island to warehousing facilities and distribution centers in the South Bay area.

The engineers had their work cut out for them. Over the weekend, opponents went door-to-door in neighborhoods on the east side of the 10-square-mile community, about 20 miles south of Los Angeles, and distributed more than 1,000 fliers -- in English and Spanish -- urging residents to fight the project designed to accommodate future growth at the nation’s largest port complex.

Of particular concern is the projected “significant cancer risk” from diesel emissions -- a known carcinogen -- in two hot spots: the houses on the north side of East Robidoux Street and a lone house in Carson, a few miles away, said John Doherty, chief executive of the Transportation Authority. Health risks elsewhere, including homes next door to the targeted residences, would be below the significance risk level, Doherty said.

In any case, it remained unclear whether Transportation Authority officials would pay homeowners in the impact zones to run their air filtration systems day and night, and maintain them year-round. “Beyond that, this is going to strip property values in the area overnight,” said David Pettit, a senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council.

USC health professor Andrea Hricko called into question traffic volume projections used to support Transportation Authority claims that the project will enhance mobility on local freeways by diverting 5% to 8% of their port-related big rigs.

For example, she said, the data shows that the volume of trucks at nearby Elizabeth Hudson School would nearly double by 2030 compared to 2003 if the project is not built, and also nearly double if it is built.

“Can someone please provide an explanation,” she asked, “of how this demonstrates a reduction in traffic volumes and cancer risk in the project areas as a benefit of building the SR-47 Expressway?”

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louis.sahagun@latimes.com