A judge’s ruling in favor of Long Beach and other litigants in a pivotal lawsuit challenging a $500 million rail-yard project at the Port of Los Angeles puts the project on an indefinite pause and may give Long Beach officials considerable leverage in negotiating greater environmental protections for any future project design.
The case centered on BNSF Railways’ plan to build a 185-acre rail yard, called Southern California International Gateway, on land in the Wilmington area of Los Angeles. Los Angeles’ City Council approved the project, which is also known as SCIG, in May 2013 and several parties filed lawsuits against the project shortly thereafter.
Long Beach officials contended in their lawsuit that Los Angeles and BNSF failed to provide a complete analysis of the SCIG’s potential environmental impacts, which would have been disproportionately borne by people living in West Long Beach.
Los Angeles and BNSF officials argued that the rail yard, approved in 2013, would curb truck traffic and pollution by removing the 1.3 million annual truck trips that would have been made on the 710 Freeway to BNSF’s Hobart Yard in Commerce 24 miles away.
