Hilda Solis, County Supervisor, US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, and Alberto Carvalho, LAUSD Superintendent, greet LAUSD students in the “Beyond the Bell” summer program at Humphreys Avenue Elementary School in Los Angeles on Friday, July 19, 2024. Buttigieg was on hand to turn over a check for 10 million dollars for a new pedestrian walkway near the school as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure law. Buttigieg also told the media his department was handling problems brought on by the Crowd Strike software glitch that has affected many travelers. (Photo by David Crane, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG)
US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg greets LAUSD students in the “Beyond the Bell” summer program at Humphreys Avenue Elementary School in Los Angeles on Friday, July 19, 2024. Buttigieg was on hand to turn over a check for 10 million dollars for a new pedestrian walkway near the school as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure law. Buttigieg also told the media his department was handling problems brought on by the Crowd Strike software glitch that has affected many travelers. (Photo by David Crane, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG)
US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg greets LAUSD students in the “Beyond the Bell” summer program at Humphreys Avenue Elementary School in Los Angeles on Friday, July 19, 2024. Buttigieg was on hand to turn over a check for 10 million dollars for a new pedestrian walkway near the school as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure law. Buttigieg also told the media his department was handling problems brought on by the Crowd Strike software glitch that has affected many travelers. (Photo by David Crane, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG)
Alberto Carvalho, LAUSD Superintendent, right, welcomes Jimmy Gomez, US Representative, Hilda Solis, County Supervisor, US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, and, LAUSD board member Rocio Rivas to “Beyond the Bell” summer program students at Humphreys Avenue Elementary School in Los Angeles on Friday, July 19, 2024. Buttigieg was on hand to turn over a check for 10 million dollars for a new pedestrian walkway near the school as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure law. Buttigieg also told the media his department was handling problems brought on by the Crowd Strike software glitch that has affected many travelers. (Photo by David Crane, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG)
US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg talks with Alberto Carvalho, LAUSD Superintendent, at Humphreys Avenue Elementary School in Los Angeles on Friday, July 19, 2024. Buttigieg was on hand to turn over a check for 10 million dollars for a new pedestrian walkway near the school as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure law. Buttigieg also told the media his department was handling problems brought on by the Crowd Strike software glitch that has affected many travelers. (Photo by David Crane, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG)
US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg speaks at Humphreys Avenue Elementary School in Los Angeles on Friday, July 19, 2024. Buttigieg was on hand to turn over a check for 10 million dollars for a new pedestrian walkway near the school as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure law. Buttigieg also told the media his department was handling problems brought on by the Crowd Strike software glitch that has affected many travelers. (Photo by David Crane, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG)
US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg speaks at Humphreys Avenue Elementary School in Los Angeles on Friday, July 19, 2024. Buttigieg was on hand to turn over a check for 10 million dollars for a new pedestrian walkway near the school as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure law. Buttigieg also told the media his department was handling problems brought on by the Crowd Strike software glitch that has affected many travelers. (Photo by David Crane, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG)
US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg talks with Alberto Carvalho, LAUSD Superintendent, at Humphreys Avenue Elementary School in Los Angeles on Friday, July 19, 2024. Buttigieg was on hand to turn over a check for 10 million dollars for a new pedestrian walkway near the school as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure law. Buttigieg also told the media his department was handling problems brought on by the Crowd Strike software glitch that has affected many travelers. (Photo by David Crane, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG)
US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg greets LAUSD students in the “Beyond the Bell” summer program at Humphreys Avenue Elementary School in Los Angeles on Friday, July 19, 2024. Buttigieg was on hand to turn over a check for 10 million dollars for a new pedestrian walkway near the school as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure law. Buttigieg also told the media his department was handling problems brought on by the Crowd Strike software glitch that has affected many travelers. (Photo by David Crane, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG)
US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg with students in the “Beyond the Bell” summer program at Humphreys Avenue Elementary School in Los Angeles on Friday, July 19, 2024. Buttigieg was on hand to turn over a check for 10 million dollars for a new pedestrian walkway near the school as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure law. Buttigieg also told the media his department was handling problems brought on by the Crowd Strike software glitch that has affected many travelers. (Photo by David Crane, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG)
US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg speaks at Humphreys Avenue Elementary School in Los Angeles on Friday, July 19, 2024. Buttigieg was on hand to turn over a check for 10 million dollars for a new pedestrian walkway near the school as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure law. Buttigieg also told the media his department was handling problems brought on by the Crowd Strike software glitch that has affected many travelers. (Photo by David Crane, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG)
US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg speaks at Humphreys Avenue Elementary School in Los Angeles on Friday, July 19, 2024. Buttigieg was on hand to turn over a check for 10 million dollars for a new pedestrian walkway near the school as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure law. Buttigieg also told the media his department was handling problems brought on by the Crowd Strike software glitch that has affected many travelers. (Photo by David Crane, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG)
US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg speaks at Humphreys Avenue Elementary School in Los Angeles on Friday, July 19, 2024. Buttigieg was on hand to turn over a check for 10 million dollars for a new pedestrian walkway near the school as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure law. Buttigieg also told the media his department was handling problems brought on by the Crowd Strike software glitch that has affected many travelers. (Photo by David Crane, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG)
The current bridge leading to Humphreys Avenue Elementary School in Los Angeles. US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg turned over a check for 10 million dollars for a new pedestrian walkway near the school as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure law. Buttigieg also told the media his department was handling problems brought on by the Crowd Strike software glitch that has affected many travelers. (Photo by David Crane, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG)
Migrants arrive at the Border Patrol Station on Wednesday, Aug. 11, 2021 in San Ysidro, CA. The bus is unloaded and women children and men are detained in a fenced area. (Alejandro Tamayo / The San Diego Union-Tribune)
U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg paid a visit to Humphreys Avenue Elementary School in East Los Angeles Friday, to celebrate a $10 million grant from the Biden/Harris administration toward the construction of a pedestrian and bicycle crossing over the 710 Freeway.
Secretary Buttigieg joined L.A. County Supervisor Hilda Solis, Rep. Jimmy Gomez, D-Los Angeles, and L.A. County Metro CEO Stephanie Wiggins along with children from Humphreys Avenue to discuss the importance of the newly approved 710 Freeway crossing, particularly in East L.A., a region that has been divided by freeways.
The freeway crossing, which surrounds Humphreys Avenue, aims to make walking and biking to school safer for children.
“Infrastructure doesn’t have to divide communities,” Gomez stated. “This is about acknowledging the trauma that was created by all of these freeways that cut [through] here.”
Construction along the 710 Freeway has historically displaced surrounding communities in the East L.A. region, and its extension did the same for areas around Pasadena.
Nearly 60 years ago, the 710 Freeway “stub,” or an unfinished area of the freeway, Caltrans displaced roughly 4,000 residents using eminent domain to clear out the land for further construction. The plan 710 extension, which never fully materialized, was re-adressed after Caltrans relinquished land back to Pasadena in 2022 to redevelop the area where communities were displaced.
Gomez highlighted the joint efforts by the federal, city, and county government, as well as LA Metro, in supporting the construction of the freeway crossing, celebrating a new era of approaching local infrastructure investments.
The Reconnecting Communities Grant is part of the Biden-Harris Administration’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Deal, which has since invested $46.5 billion in California through a five-year plan laid out by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. Projects awarded these grants are part of the U.S. Department of Transportation’s goal to “repair the harm caused by infrastructure choices of the past.”
Solis, whose district includes the area, celebrated the plan.
“I believe what the Biden and Harris administration has done is set new goals and a precedent that I have not seen — just read about in books,” Solis stated. “These are the gifts and benefits that are now coming to fruition to us in the form of our children and our families.”
Nearly 19% of East L.A. is covered in freeways, compared to 4% of all of L.A., noted Wiggins.
The crossing represents a larger step toward environmental justice in East L.A, which Solis believes has been torn apart by freeways, officials said.
“Children don’t have to walk across the bridge that’s spewing bad emissions — that harms the growth, development, and wellbeing of our youngsters.” Solis argued.
Buttigieg, who visited the Port of Long Beach on Thursday to celebrate “America’s Green Gateway” project, praised the 710 Freeway Crossing as “contending with history.”
Buttigieg noted the historical disadvantages that freeways have posed to surrounding communities, including increased exposure to polluted air and higher rates of respiratory diseases. However, Buttigieg explained, the point is “not an exercise in blame or guilt”, but rather, “that we can do something about it, even if nobody in a position of responsibility today is responsible for creating some of these challenges and harms.”
As the Secretary of Transportation, Buttigieg is responsible for overseeing much of the implementation of Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Deal, which he said is working to “modernize America’s transportation systems at a scale we haven’t seen since the Eisenhower years.”
“To build and rebuild our transportation systems, we’re making sure that all communities benefit from the projects we are funding — and that includes bridging the divides of the past,” he said.
The 710 Freeway Humphreys Avenue Crossing is one of seven infrastructure projects in L.A. County receiving a federal grant under the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Reconnecting Communities & Neighborhoods Grant Program. The program is part of a larger effort to restore communities negatively affected by past infrastructure projects.
“Everyone today is responsible for what we do next,” Buttigieg said.
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