L.A. keeps building near freeways, even though living there makes people sick
For more than a decade, California air quality officials have warned against building homes within 500 feet of freeways.
And with good reason: People there suffer higher rates of asthma, heart attacks, strokes, lung cancer and pre-term births. Recent research has added more health risks to the list, including childhood obesity, autism and dementia.
Yet Southern California civic officials have flouted those warnings, allowing a surge in home building near traffic pollution, according to a Los Angeles Times analysis of U.S. Census data, building permits and other government records.
In Los Angeles alone officials have approved thousands of new homes within 1,000 feet of a freeway — even as it advised developers that this distance poses health concerns.
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