José Miguel Acosta Córdova | Little Village Environmental Justice Organization/Univ. of Illinois at Urbana Champaign

Social Media Handle: JMAC__88

Presentation Description

Chicago is the largest intermodal shipping center, and most important inland port city in North America with up to $3 trillion in goods moving through the Northeastern Illinois region every year. Warehouses, distribution centers, intermodal rail yards, and all other freight facilities operating in the region attract significant commercial and industrial trucks daily. Chicago is home to all 6 Class I railroads– the only location in the Western hemisphere where they all converge, making it the nation's premier rail hub. There are 19 intermodal rail yards, by far the most in the country, and about 25% of all freight trains and 50% of all intermodal trains in the U.S. pass through the city. All truck-attracting industrial areas in metropolitan Chicago add to about 1.1 billion sq ft, the largest such market in the country. (CMAP, On To 2050). On urban interstate highways alone, trucks account for about 1 in 7 vehicles, with some highways in Chicago carrying over 30,000 trucks each day. Trucks have a significant toll on local public health and quality of life.

However, the majority of truck-intensive facilities are in low-income areas and communities of color, and both the City of Chicago and surrounding municipalities have failed to consider the negative externalities of these facilities when approving new projects. High amounts of traffic from diesel trucks has been a concern for workers and communities in Chicago’s industrial corridors for decades, especially in Chicago’s South and West sides which have by far the largest industrial corridors in the city. Local EJ organizations have been advocating for improved truck traffic data for years, but the city has been slow to respond. The Little Village Environmental Justice Organization (LVEJO), the largest EJ organization not only in Chicago but in the Midwest, recently completed a year-long study in which they captured 24-hour truck counts at 35 key locations across the city, the first such project of its kind. This presentation will highlight the truck counts, the website that was created to house the data, the implications for local policy makers, and the need for the adoption of zero-emission vehicles.

Speaker Biography

José leads the Transportation & Mobility Justice program at the Little Village Environmental Justice Organization (LVEJO), which works on issues related to freight, EJ, and mobility justice at the local, state, and national levels. He is also the co-chair of the Transportation Equity Network (TEN) in Chicago, which is made up of over 30 organizations throughout the metropolitan area that work on issues related to Mobility Justice. He is also currently a Ph.D. candidate in Geography & GIS at the University of Illinois, and his dissertation is focused on the negative impacts of freight on EJ communities in Chicago, how freight has transformed since the deindustrialization period, as well as the role of low-wage labor in the growth of the warehousing boom in the Chicago metropolitan area. He was raised by social justice activists, and has been around the EJ movement since he was 3 years old. He completed his Master’s degree in Urban Planning and Policy, at the College of Urban Planning and Public Affairs, at UIC. He also holds a Bachelor of Arts in Urban and Public Affairs from UIC. He is the author of the Latino Neighborhoods Report: Issues and Prospects for Chicago, which he authored during his second year of graduate school while working as a Research Assistant at the Institute for Research on Race and Public Policy (IRRPP). The report received widespread media and was produced for Metropolitan Family Services. It contains demographic information on twelve neighborhoods in Chicago where Latinos are the largest racial/ethnic group, along with an overview of Latinos in Chicago.

Co-presenters

Presentation File