Expanding the I-5 Bridges – How Healthy is it?

Over the past decade, planning and public health professionals have been exploring the connections between how our communities function and how healthy we are. Research from both of these fields shows that it’s not just what we eat and whether we have health care that determines how healthy we are, but things like affordable housing, a clean environment, transportation choices, walkable communities, quality education, living wage jobs, how much we socialize, and more all affect our health too.

With this in mind, the Coalition has been working with more than a dozen stakeholders in health policy from the public and non-profit sectors to explore a new tool for better understanding the health impacts of our planning decisions. The new tool - health impact assessment (HIA) - is starting to be used in communities throughout the country to evaluate the potential health effects of a project or policy before it is built or implemented.

As a first test of this tool in our region, the working group focused on the Columbia River Crossing project. Multnomah County Health Department took the lead on preparing the HIA (full report or executive summary, applying its expertise in public health to objectively analyze the positive and negative health impacts of the proposed freeway expansion project.

The report’s summarized recommendations to the CRC project staff and decision-making agencies were to:

• Maximize use of Light Rail Transit
• Ensure transit alignments that serve low income and minority populations without severing community cohesion
• Focus on roadway and interchange improvements that increase safety
• Ensure safe and accessible bike and pedestrian facilities
• Use tolling to discourage motor vehicle use, particularly single occupancy motor vehicle use
• Support alternatives that do not increase single occupancy vehicles capacity on the roadway, especially during peak periods 

The report also emphasizes that the official Columbia River Crossing Project Draft Environmental Impact Statement lacks critical analysis of project’s health impacts, including the impacts from poor air quality and noise. The EPA also raised this concern in its official comment letter on the project.  CLF and other advocates are hoping that the pilot CRC HIA will raise the visibility of health concerns the CRC  project raises as it continues to unfold over the coming years, as well as other future land use and transportation projects in our community.

To read more about the Health Impact Assessment Workgroup, check out this recent article in Metroscape.