UNITED STATES
ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY
WASHINGTON, D.C. 20460
OFFIC IAL BUSINESS
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Environmental News
Fitzwater (202) 755-0344
O'Neill (202) 755-0344
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE THURSDAY, JANUARY 10, 1974
EPA RESCINDS PARKING SURCHARGES AND DEFERS PARKING REVIEW
Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Russell E.
Train today announced the withdrawal of all parking surcharge
regulations from the transportation control plans established
to lower urban air pollution levels.
Train said EPA is also delaying the implementation date
for all regulations requiring the air quality impact review of
new parking facilities. The delay, until January 1, 1975, will
also apply to the "indirect source" regulations which are cur-
rently required by court order to be promulgated on or before
January 31, 1974.
Train noted that the Energy Emergency Act now before the
Congress includes provisions forbidding the imposition of
parking surcharges by EPA and defers the effective date of any
review of new parking facilities.
"It is my judgment," Train said, "that the provisions of
the Energy Act respecting transportation controls should be
regarded as firm congressional guidance on that issue."
"The Clean Air Act," he said, "does not authorize the
imposition before mid-1977 of any transportation control
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EPA FORM 1510-1 (REV. 8-72)
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measures which are not "reasonably available1 at the time they
are imposed. In making my determination of what measures are
in fact "reasonably available' under the statute, I do not
believe I may properly ignore such strong expressions of intent
on the part of Congress as those expressed during formulation
of the Energy Act.11
Train said EPA will make a study of the necessity and
desirability of parking surcharges, as called for in the Energy
bill now before Congress, and will report those findings to the
Congress.
Parking surcharges, in different forms, had been required
in Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, Sacramento and the
San Joaquin Valley, California; Boston, Massachusetts; Newark,
New Jersey; and the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area.
Train said EPA is currently studying alternative trans-
portation strategies as substitutes for the parking surcharges.
He also said today's action does not prevent States and
localities from establishing surcharges.
Most of the parking review regulations in the transportation
plans, now delayed until January 1, 1975, were originally/
effective in August or November 197 3.
Today's action will be published in the Federal Register
in a few days.
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