Under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), the California Public
Utilities Commission (CPUC) is the designated state lead agency for the
El Paso Global Networks California Telecommunications System Project. This
communication system consists of a 337-mile fiber optic cable route and associated
facilities that would be installed via trenching, plowing, boring, and bridge
attachments in street and highway rights-of-way. The project requires laying fiber
optic cable in trenches dug in these rights-of-way and will include construction of
six small regeneration/optical amplification stations spaced at intervals along the
route. Entering California at Blythe, the route passes through Riverside,
San Bernardino and Los Angeles Counties, and through lands owned by the federal
government, ending in downtown Los Angeles.
On June 27, 2002, the CPUC approved a Final Initial Study/Mitigated
Negative Declaration (IS/MND) pursuant to CEQA on the El Paso Global
Networks California Telecommunications System Project. A final IS/MND
describes a project and its potential impacts on the environment, and
concludes that any significant impacts that may result from the project
can be either eliminated, or reduced to a level that is not significant,
by the adoption and implementation of specified mitigation measures.
