by Wen Tsui

LOS ANGELES, July 24 (Xinhua) -- Recent freeway expansion projects in the United States have reignited discussions about the racist legacy of the country's freeway system. Despite authorities' promises to avoid repeating past mistakes, skepticism remains high among low-income and minority communities over their potential negative impacts on marginalized communities.

In Los Angeles, the Interstate-605 Corridor Improvement Project, first proposed by the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (LA Metro) in 2020, included demolishing up to 380 homes, businesses and other properties in low-income communities to make way for freeway lanes in its initial plan. It faced strong opposition and was shelved in 2022.

Last year, the agency revised the plan, saying the project would have "no residential displacements."

However, at a public event earlier this month, the LA Metro seemed to be backing off its pledge and said that "some partial acquisitions might be needed," according to a report by Streetsblog LA, a website covering news on streets and highways in the Greater Los Angeles area.

The project has also sparked concerns over the housing crisis and environmental injustice. Alex Contreras, who co-founded the Happy City Coalition to fight freeway widening, told the Los Angeles Times, "We need to be focused on how we can bring transportation to where the homes already are."

In Houston, Texas, activists opposing a similar project have met with a setback as the Texas Department of Transportation announced at a public meeting on July 18 that the long-delayed project would kick off in October.

The North Houston Highway Improvement project, with a price tag of 9 billion U.S. dollars, aims to expand Interstate 45 and is likely to continue for nearly two decades. Opponents formed a coalition, including groups advocating racial justice, and equality for low-income and minority communities.

The project would involve the demolition of several public housing units in the city, particularly in the neighborhoods with higher poverty rates and a greater proportion of people of color, according to a report by Air Alliance Houston, part of the coalition.

The report indicated that the freeway expansion plan would further entrench barriers between neighborhoods, and negative impacts could disproportionately fall on low-income communities of color. For example, the design separates high-income, predominantly white neighborhoods on the west side of State Highway 288 from low-income neighborhoods with a majority of people of color on the east side.

Freeway expansions historically have led to the displacement of low-income communities and communities of color in the United States. Recent research highlighted the intentional routing of highways through communities of color over the past decades.

In the 1950s and 1960s, the construction of the interstate highway system in Los Angeles disproportionately affected Black and Latino neighborhoods.

For example, the East Los Angeles Interchange project was built on the ruins of residential streets in Boyle Heights, displacing at least 10,000 people from a predominantly Mexican and multiethnic community.

Sugar Hill, once a thriving Black neighborhood near downtown Los Angeles, was reduced to rubble to make way for Interstate 10.

"Wealthy Beverly Hills was able to stop a highway project proposal in the neighborhood in 1975, while communities of color, like Sugar Hill and Boyle Heights, were torn apart by highways despite years of local opposition," said a report by non-profit organization Climate Nexus.

The U.S. Highway construction in the mid-20th century displaced roughly a million people and left the remaining residents grappling with air pollution and declining economic opportunity, according to the report titled "Why U.S. Highways Perpetuate Racial Injustice."

Communities near freeways often bear a disproportionate burden of air pollution, noise pollution, and other environmental hazards. Economically, freeway construction was intertwined with discriminatory housing practices, such as redlining and racial covenants.

"The U.S. interstate highway system was built on the backs of low-income communities of color across the country, and many of those communities are still suffering from its effects to this day," said the report. Enditem

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