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AASHTO Maintains Resource on Environmental Laws and Agreements

In This Article:

The American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) operates the Center for Environmental Excellence (CEE) with support from the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA). The center’s website includes a section that can benefit both policy makers and transportation practitioners, with information about programmatic agreements and case law.

The Programmatic Agreements Library includes memorandums of understanding, letters of concurrence, and other kinds of documents. These agreements help agencies streamline their compliance with federal environmental laws. Each entry in the library gives an overview of the agreement information and contains a link to the full agreement. This helps practitioners to identify models that may assist their own work.

The Case Law Updates on the Environment Database includes recent legal decisions regarding environmental reviews and permits for highway and transit projects. In addition to summaries of individual cases, the database also includes a summary “year in review” publication that helps environment practitioners to see how courts have handled some commonly seen issues in litigation related to environmental laws.

Having awareness of agreements and potential case law can help transportation practitioners as they consider moving forward with Planning Environment Linkages (PEL). For more information on PEL, visit FHWA’s website at https://www.environment.fhwa.dot.gov/env_initiatives/pel.aspx.

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