SELC Challenges Flawed Analysis of Toll Highway West of Charlotte

SELC is challenging the government’s defective environmental analysis of the proposed Garden Parkway, a 22-mile toll highway west of Charlotte that would destroy homes and communities, fragment wildlife habitat, increase pollution in Lake Wylie and the Catawba River basin, and bring more dirty air and sprawl to the metro area. To cost an estimated $930 million, only a fraction of which could be recovered by toll revenue, the unpopular project would do virtually nothing to improve congestion on existing roadways, such as I-85.

The environmental review performed by the North Carolina Turnpike Authority and the Federal Highway Administration suffers from many of the same flaws that afflicted their analysis of another Charlotte-area project, the Monroe Bypass, which we successfully challenged in federal court. The case resulted in a landmark ruling that chastised the agencies for failing to be honest about the proposed highway’s impacts, including increased sprawl.