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By Carl Peter
Ripaldi, REA II
URS Corporation, Los
Angeles, Calif.
Background:
The Alameda Corridor
Transportation Project (ACTP) is a consolidated railroad link
between the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach (the Ports)
and the regional and national rail systems linking the
nation. The ACTP is a 32 kilometer (20 mile) rail corridor,
centered along Alameda Street, extending from downtown Los
Angeles to the Ports, constructed with the intended purpose of
providing express freight rail service to the Ports. Such
service is currently being provided by the Union
Pacific/Southern Pacific (UP/SP) and Burlington Northern Santa
Fe Corporation (BNSF) railroads. The ACTP has been in
development for over 14 years. In 1985 an Alameda Corridor
Task Force was formed which in turn led to the creation of a
joint powers organization called the Alameda Corridor
Transportation Authority (ACTA) in 1989. A joint
Environmental Impacts Report/ Environmental Impact Statement (EIR/EIS)
was prepared for the project. The Final EIS was issued in
February 1996, and a record of decision was issued in May,
1996.
The initial design work and EIS/EIR
preparation commenced in 1991. A program management contract
for work on the Alameda Corridor was issued to a joint venture
team of four firms in the Los Angeles area. The Alameda
Corridor Engineering Team (ACET) is a joint venture of these
four engineering companies providing design engineering,
environmental compliance, and construction management services
for the project.
Need for the
Project
The Ports together form the
third largest port complex in the world, and the two largest
in the United States. Today, 25% of all U.S. waterborne
international trade passes through the Ports of Long Beach and
Los Angeles before reaching its markets. This represents more
than $116 billion in trade each year. With the expansion of
the Pacific Rim marketplace, this trade is anticipated to
double by the year 2010. Where currently approximately 34
trains a day traverse the Alameda Corridor carrying goods to
and from the ports, over 100 trains per day are anticipated by
the year 2010. This would result in massive traffic jams and
gridlock along the entire 20 mile length of the Corridor if no
improvements were constructed.
The Alameda Corridor will dramatically improve
railroad and highway access to the Ports by consolidating over
90 miles of rail with 200 at-grade roadway crossings into a
single, 20-mile high-capacity and fully grade separated rail
corridor linking the Ports with the national railroad system
originating near downtown Los Angeles. The project will also
widen and improve the truck route paralleling the rail
facility to expedite truck traffic. The Alameda Corridor will
also mitigate the adverse impacts of additional growth
including highway traffic congestion, air pollution, vehicle
delays at grade crossings, and noise in residential areas.
From a national perspective,
the Alameda Corridor provides the efficient and cost-effective
transportation capacity necessary for the United State to
capitalize on the economic growth of the Pacific Rim. The
cost of the Alameda Corridor is currently estimated at $2.43
billion.
Commencement of rail service
along the Alameda Corridor is on schedule for April 2002.
History:
Trains have traveled along
Alameda Street between downtown Los Angeles and the Ports for
over 130 years. Phineas Banning developed the first wharf in
the San Pedro Harbor in 1854. He soon realized that if he
wanted to generate trade through his wharf that he needed to
provide direct rail service. In 1869, Banning completed the
first railroad line along Alameda Street linking the Port with
downtown Los Angeles. Commerce developed and flourished in
the Ports as the Los Angeles area grew.
In 1871, Congress appropriated
funds to create a deep harbor in San Pedro Bay. Southern
Pacific Railroad gained ownership of the railroad lines in
1872. In future years substantial development of the Ports
spurned on economic development along Alameda Street forming
an industrial corridor along its entire length.
The discovery of oil along the
southern end of the Corridor spurned on the development of
refineries and petrochemical plants in the areas just south of
the present location of the San Diego freeway.
Design of
the Corridor:
The Alameda Corridor
Transportation Project is divided into three segments: the
North End, Mid-Corridor Trench Section, and South End. A
description of the projects and contamination issues
associated with each of these sections follows.
The North
End:
The design of the North End
includes railroad improvements and grade separations which
will speed up the flow of railroad traffic and motor vehicle
traffic through a heavily industrialized and congested section
of Los Angeles just south of the Santa Monica Freeway (I-10).
The North End encompasses an area of approximately one square
mile of industrial development. In this area trains heading
north along Alameda Street connect with the transcontinental
lines of the UP/SP and BNSF railroads as well as commuter rail
traffic from Amtrak and Metrolink trains. There are 10
projects located within this North Area of the Corridor.
Completion of the construction work involves the acquisition
of over 100 parcels of land for the construction of utility
relocations, street improvements, and grade separations
involving at-grade, below grade and elevated rail and roadway
structures. This includes parcels of contaminated industrial
properties including rail yards, asphalt manufacturing
facilities, former air conditioning manufacturing sites,
foundries, and metals recycling facilities.
The
Mid-Corridor Trench Section:
As the railway exits the
“J-Yard” rail yards south of 25th Street it enters
the Mid-Corridor Trench Section which continues for
approximately 10 miles south to the Artesia Freeway (I-91).
In this section of the Corridor ACTA’s right of way varies
from 30 to 100 feet in width.
The Mid-Corridor Trench is
being constructed the entire length of this section with a
width of approximately 50 feet and a depth of 33 feet. Along
the northernmost section of the trench, its configuration will
be nearly that of a tunnel for more than a mile due to the
narrowness of the right of way through this portion of Alameda
St. The trench accommodates two sets of railroad tracks and a
service road with the possibility of accommodating a third set
of tracks in the future. The construction of the trench
eliminates forty at-grade railroad crossings on which traffic
is disrupted constantly during the day by trains heading north
and south along the Corridor. The trench is being constructed
under a design/build contract awarded toTutor Saliba
Corporation in October 1998.
Groundbreaking for the
Mid-Corridor Trench occurred in December 1998. The projected
cost for this portion of the project is $750 million. At this
time approximately 70 per cent of the trench section has been
completed. Environmental remediation efforts along this
section of the corridor have entailed the removal and disposal
of over 1 million tons of hazardous waste. Hazardous levels
of lead and arsenic were found in the upper two feet of soils
along the entire length of this section.
Major petroleum pipelines and
other utilities run parallel to or traverse the trench in this
section and were relocated under agreements with the oil and
oil-transport companies and the various utilities. Two
significant plumes of fuel hydrocarbon contamination were
encountered in this portion of the Corridor. Volatile
hydrocarbon contaminated soils associated with petroleum
pipeline leaks cost several millions of dollars to clean-up.
Millions of gallons of groundwater generated during dewatering
operations, with elevated levels of naturally occurring metals
and salt contamination have had to be treated before discharge
due to the discharge limitations imposed by the California
Regional Water Quality Control Board (RWQCB). This posed
significant potential delays and major costs to the project.
Negotiations with the RWQCB resulted in a compromise requiring
ACTA to treat the waters with chelating agents while
conducting significant research and reporting results to a
Committee of water quality scientists.
The South
End:
South of the Artesia Freeway,
the Alameda Corridor rises out of the trench to cross over
Compton Creek and continues south through the Refinery
Section. South of Carson, the Corridor continues to Henry Ford
Avenue where it enters the Ports. Construction work along the
South End of the Alameda Corridor involves new bridges, grade
separations, track construction and civil work. In addition
there are several other projects that are being carried out by
the Ports. These Port Access Demonstration Projects are being
completed in a coordinated effort with the construction of the
Alameda Corridor. The South End of the Corridor is heavily
industrialized with major refineries and petro-chemical plants
bordering the rights- of-way. Here the at-grade tracks impact
several refineries: Huntway, Texaco, TOPCO, TOSCO, Ultramar,
and Wilmington. The Long Beach Lead area contains many auto
wrecking yards and other heavy industrial sites that will
require significant clean-up efforts.
Environmental Management
Program:
Environmental Investigations
and Remediation:
Virtually
all properties involved in the project required environmental
assessments and site investigations. This included over
twenty miles of railroad rights of way and the acquisition of
over 400 individual parcels. The environmental investigations
are a necessary precursor to the purchase of properties
utilizing state and federal funds, so that all environmental
liabilities have been identified and factored into the
property transactions before the transactions are finalized.
Following the investigative stages, remediation efforts were
completed on twenty miles of railroad rights of way and
approximately 25% of the acquired parcels. As previously
mentioned the project has cleaned up over 1 million tons of
hazardous waste and treated many millions of gallons of
contaminated groundwater.
In order to
accomplish this enormous task, ACTA established “on-call”
contracts with two environmental engineering firms and four
“on-call” environmental remediation services contractors. The
contracts were competitively bid and negotiated to include
unit prices and baseline schedules for all anticipated
services. In this manner, investigations for packages of
various parcels could be awarded knowing the anticipated costs
and necessary time to complete the investigations. Work was
assigned geographically with parity in the value of the work
assigned to each contractor. The engineering firms completed
Phase I and Phase II environmental assessments, workplans for
remediation efforts, remediation oversight, and miscellaneous
environmental investigations. The “on-call” remediation
services contractors completed lead-based paint removal,
bridge demolition, asbestos removal, contaminated soils
removal, contaminated groundwater removal, responded to field
emergencies due to accidental spills or encounters with
undisclosed environmental contamination, transport and
disposal of hazardous waste.
Regulatory Issues:
Various regulatory agencies
preside over the environmental aspects of the project. These
include: The Federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA),
The California Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC),
The California Regional Water Quality Control Board (RWQCB),
the South Coast Air Quality Control District (AQMD), The Army
Corps of Engineers ACOE), the County Hazardous Materials
Management Division of the Fire Department (HMMD) and local
Fire Departments and city agencies.
All
environmental investigations, construction activities, and
remediation efforts must comply with a myriad of regulations
and are subject to the approvals and oversight by these
agencies. As a result, there was a high probability of
schedule disruptions to comply with individual agency
requirements. In order to avoid such a set of circumstances
and streamline the process, ACTA developed a set of guideline
documents to direct all environmental work on the project, and
sought a “lead agency” role amongst the various regulatory
agencies. The content of the guideline documents was agreed
to by ACTA’s environmental committee consisting of
representatives of the two Ports. Once scopes were agreed to,
the following guideline documents were prepared to cover:
- The Mitigation Monitoring
Program required under the Environmental Impact Statement
and Report fulfilling NEPA and CEQA requirements
- A Master Health and Safety
Plan
- A Master Quality
Assurance/Quality Control Plan and Field QA/QC Plan
- The Site Mitigation Master
Plan
- Chemical Release Reporting
Guidelines and Chemical Release Reporting Field Manual.
- List of Approved Landfill
and Disposal Sites
Mitigation Monitoring Program:
This
document compiled more than 60 mitigation measures required
under Federal (NEPA) and State (CEQA) law as a condition for
the approval of the project. The mitigation measures included
such varied items as compliance with seismic design
requirements, school crossing measures, dust control measures,
notifications to affected businesses, etc. A significant
portion of the mitigation monitoring has involved
archeological monitoring, paleontological and native american
monitoring along the twenty miles of ACTA’s railroad rights of
way. Numerous Native American burial sites were encountered
during excavation activities, necessitating special services
and reporting. The mitigation measures apply to the design,
construction and operational phases of the project.
Master Health and Safety Plan:
The Master
Health and Safety plan addressed general health and safety
issues for environmental contractors, but focused on emergency
spill issues, chemical exposures and other environmentally
related matters associated with the types of contaminants
known to be present within the corridor. This plan was
supplemented with individual site specific Health and Safety
Plans prepared by the individual contractors awarded
particular construction projects.
Master Quality Assurance/Quality Control Plan:
This plan
presented standard procedures for field investigations,
sampling, analytical work and even the formatting of reports,
so that they would have a standard format. The QA/QC plan was
based on standards readily acceptable to the various
regulatory agencies involved in the project. Many of the
procedures included were approved by the Federal EPA, the
American Society of Tests and Measurements (ASTM) and State of
California agencies. All contractors were required to comply
with these procedures.
The Site
Mitigation Master Plan:
This
document presented a comprehensive plan for all site
remediation activities to be carried out in the project. It
addressed all regulatory compliance issues, the establishment
of clean up criteria, hazardous waste characterization
policies and procedures, sampling procedures, disposal
procedures, hazardous waste storage requirements, soil re-use
options, soil treatment options, risk assessments,
transportation and disposal requirements. The RWQCB reviewed
this plan and approved it, authorizing ACTA to proceed with
all site remediation activities through a self-directed
effort; an authorization seldom granted by a regulatory
agency. This authorization has had a substantial beneficial
impact on the costs and schedule for remediation activities in
the project. ACTA completes all investigations and clean ups
under the plan and provides individual reports on each parcel
and construction project to the RWQCB. The RWQCB reviews the
reports for compliance with the plan and issues closure
letters on the parcels.
Chemical Release Reporting Guidelines:
These
guidelines are issued to each contractor at the time of award
to provide them with guidance on what to do if they cause or
encounter an emergency hazardous waste spill during
construction. These guidelines are “cookbook” in nature.
They clearly spell out procedures and chains of command should
an emergency spill occur.
List of Approved Transport, Storage and Disposal Facilities (TSDFs):
There are
lingering liabilities for hazardous waste generators
associated with the disposal of hazardous waste. Also there
are substantial differences in the costs to transport and
dispose of hazardous waste. In order to control the ultimate
costs of transport and disposal and the final placement of
hazardous wastes, ACTA developed a list of approved TSDF
facilities. All permits and certifications held by each
facility were reviewed and approved by ACTA’s risk management
firm. Preferred rates for transport and disposal were
negotiated with each facility. A 5% mark-up was allowed for
each contractor. This speeded up the removal and disposal of
wastes once they were correctly identified and saved the
project many millions of dollars.
In
addition to these guideline documents ACTA maintains a status
report of the more than 400 acquired properties on which
environmental assessments, investigations and remediation have
been completed. This status report is updated every two weeks
to assure that an accurate status of each parcel investigation
is presented to management.
A
log of all hazardous waste activity is also kept. It contains
the manifest number of each shipment, characterization of the
waste, tonnage, the transporter, and the receiving TSDF. This
is maintained in a data base so that it can be sorted as
necessary to locate any shipment of waste from the project.
ACTA is required to keep this data base for three years after
the project is completed.
Staffing:
A
relatively small staff handled the management and
implementation of environmental requirements for the project.
All work was directed by Carl Peter Ripaldi, Environmental
Manager for the Alameda Corridor Transportation Project.
There are three Environmental Engineers on the staff each
assigned to a geographic area of the project; the North End,
Mid-Corridor Trench, and South End. They oversee all site
investigations and clean up activities carried out by ACTA’s
“on- call” environmental engineering and remediation
contractors. The team also includes a Mitigation Manager
responsible for compliance with NEPA and CEQA requirements.
An Administrative Assistant handles all correspondence with
the regulatory agencies, maintenance of a huge library of
environmental reports, the bi-weekly parcel status report and
the log of hazardous waste activity. In addition, consultant
staff support has been obtained through the “on-call”
environmental engineering services contracts on an “as-needed”
basis when the work load gets too heavy on a particular part
of the project.
Lead Agency Agreement:
Under the Porter–Cologne Water Quality Control Act in
California, a business or agency can elect a “lead
environmental agency” to handle all environmental compliance
requirements rather than having to deal with several different
agencies. The Act allows the agency to enter into an
agreement for professional services that are reimbursed. A
“lead agency” agreement was entered into with the RWQCB in
1999 to enable them to oversee all environmental remediation
activities for ACTA. Under this agreement ACTA pays the RWQCB
for staff support dedicated to the project effort. ACTA
provides the RWQCB with status and copies of all assessments,
site investigations, and remediation activities. ACTA
completes all the work under the approved guideline documents
and SMMP. The RWQCB assigns dedicated staff to the review of
ACTA’s submittals, coordination of site activities,
establishment of sampling requirements, expedite necessary
soil and groundwater investigations, coordination of necessary
health risk assessments and the establishment of risk based
clean up goals. The RWQCB issues closure letters and “comfort
letters” on the parcels once all work is completed. In this
manner ACTA avoids involvement of other regulatory agencies
having jurisdiction over ACTA’s environmental activities. The
arrangement has allowed for maximum flexibility in the
application of regulatory requirements. The project has
benefited tremendously without any significant time losses due
to environmental compliance.
Other Regulatory Agency Involvement:
Other regulatory agencies involved in the project included the
State of California Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC),
the Los Angeles County Fire Department Health and Hazardous
Materials Division (HHMD), the City of Los Angeles Fire
Department (LAFD). The roles of these agencies were as
follows:
The
DTSC was mainly involved in the oversight of the investigation
and remediation of:
-
A 22 acre property being acquired by ACTA that belonged to the
State of California. They were also involved in oversight of
remediations work completed at a TSDF being acquired by ACTA
that held DTSC permits for the handling and processing of
hazardous waste.
- The HMMD has
jurisdiction over several railroad properties purchased by
ACTA from the BNSF railroad.
- The LAFD had
jurisdiction over the removal of underground storage tanks
and the associated remediation activities on nine properties
purchased by ACTA.
Summary:
ACTA has been successful in handling complex regulatory
negotiations, environmental investigations and remediation
during the course of construction of this $2.6 billion dollar
mega-project. Early development of environmental guideline
documents, contracting for on-call engineering and remediation
services, establishment of contract unit prices for
investigations, remediation, transport and disposal services,
coupled with the establishment of a lead agency agreement have
all contributed to the success of the program. The structure
and management of the environmental program has been
comprehensive and anticipated the various needs to
successfully complete the construction of the ACTP without
schedule delays. The success of this program demonstrates how
careful planning, effective communications, comprehensive
management, representative participation and skilled
negotiations all contribute to an effective environmental
management program for a mega-project.
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