Submission Number: UBR-DEIS-00290 -- Oral Comment at Public Meeting 

Received: 11/18/2020 12:00:00 PM
Commenter: Katie Pappas
Organization: 
State: 

Agency: STB
Initiative: Uinta Basin Railway EIS
Attachments: No Attachments
Submission Text
Hi, this is Katie.

[pause]

Okay.· My name is Katie·Pappas, and I live in Salt Lake City.· I have three main·concerns about this project, two of them are not related·to the Draft EIS, but I've not seen another forum to·bring them up so I will mention them.· · · · · · ·The Draft EIS concludes there would be·significant negative impacts to water resources,·wildlife, vegetation, land use, recreation, air·emissions, and biological resources and cultural·resources.· · · · · · ·These seem like insurmountable effects, and I·believe that they, alone, should stop the project dead in·its tracks.· · · · · · ·And my second concern is that CIB money is -- this money is supposed to go back to communities to·alleviate the impacts of oil and gas development and not·support private development.· Rural communities are·suffering.· I read yesterday that some have lost their·only medical facilities during the pandemic.· The money·should be used for services and creating sustainable,·long-term jobs, not supporting boom and bust industries.

And then my third concern is climate change. We are in a climate crisis that will require all of our cooperation to address.· We should be working toward more sustainable energy sources, not accelerating the use of dirty fossil fuels like waxy crude.· In Utah, these types of projects continue to be proposed, despite evidence that they are killing us. · · · · · · The projected costs of these projects never factor in the impacts of climate change, which run in the billions of dollars and cause untold human suffering.· · · · · · So I hope you'll take all three of those things into consideration.· Thank you.