Title: Neighbors for Smart Rail v. Exposition Metro Line Constr. Auth.
Citation: N/A
Docket Number: S202828
State: California
Issuer: California Supreme Court
Date: August 5, 2013

1 
Filed 8/5/13 
 
 
 
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 
 
NEIGHBORS FOR SMART RAIL, 
) 
 
 
) 
 
Plaintiff and Appellant, 
) 
 
 
) 
S202828 
 
v. 
) 
 
 
) 
Ct.App. 2/8 B232655 
EXPOSITION METRO LINE  
) 
CONSTRUCTION AUTHORITY et al., 
) 
 
) 
Los Angeles County 
 
Defendants and Respondents; ) 
Super. Ct. No. BS125233 
 
 
) 
LOS ANGELES COUNTY 
) 
METROPOLITAN TRANSPORTATION ) 
AUTHORITY et al., 
) 
 
 
) 
 
Real Parties in Interest. 
)  
 
____________________________________) 
 
This case presents a challenge under the California Environmental Quality 
Act (CEQA; Pub. Resources Code, § 21000 et seq.)1 to the approval by defendant 
Exposition Metro Line Construction Authority (Expo Authority) of a project to 
construct a light-rail line running from Culver City to Santa Monica.  Once 
completed, the transit line is to be operated by real party in interest Los Angeles 
County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA). 
                                              
1  
All statutory references are to the Public Resources Code unless otherwise 
specified. 
 
2 
Plaintiff Neighbors for Smart Rail (Neighbors) contends the Expo 
Authority‟s environmental impact report (the EIR) for the project is deficient in 
two respects:  (1) by exclusively employing an analytic baseline of conditions in 
the year 2030 to assess likely impacts on traffic congestion and air quality, the EIR 
fails to disclose the effects the project will have on existing environmental 
conditions in the project area; and (2) the EIR fails to incorporate mandatory and 
enforceable mitigation measures for potentially significant spillover parking 
effects in the neighborhoods of certain planned rail stations. 
We agree with Neighbors on its first claim, but not on its second.  (1) While 
an agency has the discretion under some circumstances to omit environmental 
analysis of impacts on existing conditions and instead use only a baseline of 
projected future conditions, existing conditions “will normally constitute the 
baseline physical conditions by which a lead agency determines whether an impact 
is significant.”  (Cal. Code Regs., tit. 14, § 15125, subd. (a).)  A departure from 
this norm can be justified by substantial evidence that an analysis based on 
existing conditions would tend to be misleading or without informational value to 
EIR users.  Here, however, the Expo Authority fails to demonstrate the existence 
of such evidence in the administrative record.  (2) The EIR‟s mitigation measure 
for spillover parking effects satisfied CEQA‟s requirements by including 
enforceable mandates for actions by MTA and the Expo Authority, as well as 
planned actions to be implemented by the municipalities responsible for parking 
regulations on streets near the planned rail stations.  (§ 21081, subd. (a); Cal. Code 
Regs., tit. 14, § 15091.)   
Although we conclude the EIR fails to satisfy CEQA‟s requirements in the 
first respect claimed, we also conclude the agency‟s abuse of discretion was 
nonprejudicial.  Under the particular facts of this case, the agency‟s examination 
of certain environmental impacts only on projected year 2030 conditions, and not 
 
3 
on existing environmental conditions, did not deprive the agency or the public of 
substantial relevant information on those impacts.  (Environmental Protection 
Information Center v. California Dept. of Forestry & Fire Protection (2008) 44 
Cal.4th 459, 485-486.)  We will therefore affirm the judgment of the Court of 
Appeal, which affirmed the superior court‟s denial of Neighbors‟s petition for writ 
of mandate. 
FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND 
Formally known as phase 2 of the Exposition Corridor Transit Project 
(Expo Phase 2), the project at issue consists of a light-rail transit line running from 
a station in Culver City (the western terminus of phase 1, which connects to 
downtown Los Angeles), through the Westside area of the City of Los Angeles, to 
a terminus in Santa Monica.  The project‟s purpose is to provide high-capacity 
transit service between the Westside area of Los Angeles and Santa Monica, 
thereby accommodating population and employment growth in the area, 
improving mobility for the large population of transit-dependent Westside 
residents, providing an alternative to the area‟s congested roadways, and 
enhancing access to downtown Los Angeles, Culver City, Santa Monica, and other 
destinations in the corridor. 
The Expo Authority issued a notice of preparation of an EIR for Expo 
Phase 2 in February 2007, circulated a draft EIR for public comment in January 
2009, and published its final EIR in December 2009.  In February 2010, it certified 
the EIR‟s compliance with CEQA, selected the transit mode and route 
recommended in the EIR, and approved the Expo Phase 2 project.   
Neighbors petitioned the superior court for a writ of mandate, alleging the 
Expo Authority‟s approval of Expo Phase 2 violated CEQA in several respects.  
The superior court denied the petition in full, and the Court of Appeal affirmed, 
rejecting all of Neighbors‟s CEQA claims on the merits.  We granted Neighbors‟s 
 
4 
petition for review, which raised only two issues:  the propriety of the Expo 
Authority‟s exclusive use of a future conditions baseline for assessment of the 
project impacts on traffic and air quality, and the adequacy of the mitigation 
measure the Expo Authority adopted for possible impacts on street parking near 
planned transit stations.  We resolve those two issues below. 
DISCUSSION 
I.  Use of Future Conditions as a Baseline for Analysis of Project 
Impacts2 
The fundamental goal of an EIR is to inform decision makers and the 
public of any significant adverse effects a project is likely to have on the physical 
environment.  (§ 21061; Vineyard Area Citizens for Responsible Growth, Inc. v. 
City of Rancho Cordova (2007) 40 Cal.4th 412, 428.)  To make such an 
assessment, an EIR must delineate environmental conditions prevailing absent the 
project, defining a “baseline” against which predicted effects can be described and 
quantified.  (Communities for a Better Environment v. South Coast Air Quality 
Management Dist. (2010) 48 Cal.4th 310, 315 (Communities for a Better 
Environment).)  The question posed here is whether that baseline may consist 
solely of conditions projected to exist absent the project at a date in the distant 
future or whether the EIR must include an analysis of the project‟s significant 
impacts on measured conditions existing at the time the environmental analysis is 
performed. 
The Expo Authority‟s chosen analytic method and its stated reasons for that 
choice will be described in detail below; suffice it here to say the agency first 
                                              
2  
With the exception of part II.B.5., post, which addresses prejudice, the 
analysis in this part (as well as that in pt. II., post) expresses the view of a majority 
of the court.  (See conc. & dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at pp. 1-3, 5.) 
 
5 
projected the traffic and air quality conditions that would exist in the project area 
in the year 2030, then estimated the effect that operation of the Expo Phase 2 
transit line would have on those conditions at that future time.  With regard to 
traffic delays due to the rail line crossing streets at grade, the EIR found some 
adverse effects were likely in 2030, but none rising to a level deemed significant.  
With regard to air quality, no adverse effects were projected to occur; the project 
was expected to have a generally beneficial impact on air quality by slightly 
reducing automobile travel in the study area in comparison with conditions 
otherwise expected in 2030.   
Neighbors contends the Expo Authority proceeded contrary to CEQA‟s 
commands, thus abusing its discretion as a matter of law (§ 21168.5), in its choice 
of a baseline for analysis of traffic and air quality impacts.  The Expo Authority 
and the MTA contend agencies have discretion to choose future conditions 
baselines if their choice is supported by substantial evidence, as the Expo 
Authority‟s choice assertedly was here.3  We first ask whether an agency‟s 
discretion ever extends to use of a future conditions baseline to the exclusion of 
one reflecting conditions at the time of the environmental analysis.  Concluding 
that existing conditions is the normal baseline under CEQA, but that factual 
circumstances can justify an agency departing from that norm when necessary to 
prevent misinforming or misleading the public and decision makers, we then ask 
                                              
3  
The Expo Authority also contends Neighbors failed to exhaust the future 
conditions baseline issue in the administrative forum.  The Court of Appeal held 
the issue exhausted, and the Expo Authority did not raise the exhaustion issue in 
its answer to Neighbors‟s petition for review.  As the exhaustion question was not 
raised in the petition for review or answer, and is not fairly included in the merits 
of the baseline issue on which we granted review, we decline to address it here.  
(See Cal. Rules of Court, rule 8.520(b)(3).) 
 
6 
whether the administrative record here contains substantial evidence of such 
circumstances. 
A.  Use of Future Conditions Baselines Generally 
For the proposition that the baseline for an EIR‟s significant impacts 
analysis must reflect existing conditions, Neighbors relies heavily on section 
15125, subdivision (a) of the CEQA Guidelines,4 which provides:  “An EIR must 
include a description of the physical environmental conditions in the vicinity of 
the project, as they exist at the time the notice of preparation is published, or if no 
notice of preparation is published, at the time environmental analysis is 
commenced, from both a local and regional perspective.  This environmental 
setting will normally constitute the baseline physical conditions by which a lead 
agency determines whether an impact is significant.”  (Cal. Code Regs., tit. 14, 
§ 15125, subd. (a) (Guidelines section 15125(a)), italics added.)   
In Communities for a Better Environment, we relied on Guidelines section 
15125(a) and CEQA case law for the principle that the baseline for an agency‟s 
primary environmental analysis under CEQA must ordinarily be the actually 
existing physical conditions rather than hypothetical conditions that could have 
existed under applicable permits or regulations.  (Communities for a Better 
                                              
4  
The CEQA Guidelines, promulgated by the state‟s Natural Resources 
Agency, are authorized by section 21083 and found in title 14 of the California 
Code of Regulations, section 15000 et seq.  By statutory mandate, the Guidelines 
provide “criteria for public agencies to follow in determining whether or not a 
proposed project may have a „significant effect on the environment.‟ ”  (§ 21083, 
subd. (b).)  In interpreting CEQA, we accord the Guidelines great weight except 
where they are clearly unauthorized or erroneous.  (Communities for a Better 
Environment, supra, 48 Cal.4th at p. 319, fn. 4; Vineyard Area Citizens for 
Responsible Growth, Inc. v. City of Rancho Cordova, supra, 40 Cal.4th at p. 428, 
fn. 5.) 
 
7 
Environment, supra, 48 Cal.4th at pp. 320-322.)  Applying this principle, we held 
the air pollution effects of a project to expand a petroleum refinery were to be 
measured against the existing emission levels rather than against the levels that 
would have existed had all the refinery‟s boilers operated simultaneously at their 
maximum permitted capacities.  (Id. at pp. 322-327.) 
In a separate part of the Communities for a Better Environment analysis, we 
addressed the problem of defining an existing conditions baseline in circumstances 
where the existing conditions themselves change or fluctuate over time, as the 
refinery‟s operations and emissions assertedly did.  (Communities for a Better 
Environment, supra, 48 Cal.4th at pp. 327-328.)  We concluded that despite the 
CEQA Guidelines‟ reference to “the time the notice of preparation is published, or 
if no notice of preparation is published, . . . the time environmental analysis is 
commenced” (Guidelines, § 15125(a)), “[n]either CEQA nor the CEQA 
Guidelines mandates a uniform, inflexible rule for determination of the existing 
conditions baseline.  Rather, an agency enjoys the discretion to decide, in the first 
instance, exactly how the existing physical conditions without the project can most 
realistically be measured, subject to review, as with all CEQA factual 
determinations, for support by substantial evidence.”  (Communities for a Better 
Environment, at p. 328.) 
Communities for a Better Environment provides guidance here in its 
insistence that CEQA analysis employ a realistic baseline that will give the public 
and decision makers the most accurate picture practically possible of the project‟s 
likely impacts.  (Communities for a Better Environment, supra, 48 Cal.4th at 
pp. 322, 325, 328.)  It did not, however, decide either the propriety of using solely 
a future conditions baseline or the standard of review by which such a choice is to 
be judged.  Our holding that the analysis must measure impacts against actually 
existing conditions was in contrast to the use of hypothetical permitted conditions, 
 
8 
not projected future conditions.  And our holding that agencies enjoy discretion to 
choose a suitable baseline, subject to review for substantial evidence, related to the 
choice of a measurement technique for existing conditions, not to the choice 
between an existing conditions baseline and one employing solely conditions 
projected to prevail in the distant future. 
Justice Baxter therefore errs in citing Communities for a Better 
Environment for the proposition that an agency‟s future baseline choice is valid if 
it is “a realistic measure of the physical conditions without the proposed 
project . . . .”  (Conc. & dis. opn. of Baxter, J., post, at p. 7.)  In Communities for a 
Better Environment, we held an agency‟s discretionary decision on “exactly how 
the existing physical conditions without the project can most realistically be 
measured” is reviewed for substantial evidence supporting the measurement 
method.  (48 Cal.4th at p. 328, italics added.)  We did not hold or imply agencies 
enjoy equivalent discretion under CEQA and the CEQA Guidelines to omit all 
analysis of the project‟s impacts on existing conditions and measure impacts only 
against conditions projected to prevail 20 or 30 years in the future, so long as their 
projections are realistic.   
Nor does the concurring and dissenting opinion‟s citation to Cherry Valley 
Pass Acres & Neighbors v. City of Beaumont (2010) 190 Cal.App.4th 316 aid its 
argument.  (Conc. & dis. opn. of Baxter, J., post, at p. 6.)  The cited decision 
merely applied Communities for a Better Environment to determine that a water 
allocation approximating the property‟s recent historical use constituted a realistic 
measure of existing conditions.  (Cherry Valley Pass Acres & Neighbors v. City of 
Beaumont, supra, 190 Cal.App.4th at pp. 337-338.)  The case has nothing to say 
about an agency‟s decision to omit an existing conditions analysis and employ 
solely a baseline of conditions in the distant future. 
 
9 
The Courts of Appeal, however, have since addressed the future conditions 
baseline question directly in Sunnyvale West Neighborhood Assn. v. City of 
Sunnyvale City Council (2010) 190 Cal.App.4th 1351 (Sunnyvale West), Madera 
Oversight Coalition, Inc. v. County of Madera (2011) 199 Cal.App.4th 48, and 
Pfeiffer v. City of Sunnyvale City Council (2011) 200 Cal.App.4th 1552 (Pfeiffer), 
as well as in the present litigation. 
In Sunnyvale West, the appellate court held inadequate an EIR‟s analysis of 
a road extension project‟s traffic impacts because it used projected conditions in 
the year 2020 as its only baseline, even though EIR preparation began in 2007 and 
the project was approved in 2008.  (Sunnyvale West, supra, 190 Cal.App.4th at pp. 
1358, 1360, 1370.)  While acknowledging that Guidelines section 15125(a) and 
our decision in Communities for a Better Environment provided agencies 
discretion on how best to measure existing conditions, the court concluded 
“nothing in the law authorizes environmental impacts to be evaluated only against 
predicted conditions more than a decade after EIR certification and project 
approval.”  (Sunnyvale West, at p. 1380.)  The use of a single future conditions 
baseline was per se a violation of CEQA; it was not a discretionary choice that 
could be justified by substantial evidence.  (Sunnyvale West, at p. 1383.) 
The Sunnyvale West court observed that, although in its view the baseline 
for analysis of a project‟s direct impacts must be existing conditions, “discussions 
of the foreseeable changes and expected future conditions . . . may be necessary to 
an intelligent understanding of a project‟s impacts over time and full compliance 
with CEQA.”  (Sunnyvale West, supra, 190 Cal.App.4th at p. 1381.)  In particular, 
the effects of the project under predicted future conditions, themselves projected in 
part on the assumption that other approved or planned projects will proceed, are 
appropriately considered in an EIR‟s analysis of cumulative impacts (see Cal. 
Code Regs., tit. 14, § 15130) or in a discussion comparing the project to the “no 
 
10 
project alternative” (id., § 15126.6, subd. (e)).  (Sunnyvale West, at pp. 1381-
1382.)  So long as the EIR evaluated the project‟s significant impacts on existing 
conditions, the court saw “no problem” with also examining the effect on 
projected future conditions “where helpful to an intelligent understanding of the 
project‟s environmental impacts.”  (Id. at p. 1382.) 
The court in Madera Oversight Coalition, Inc. v. County of Madera, 
considering the adequacy of an EIR‟s discussion of a mixed-use property 
development‟s traffic impacts, followed Sunnyvale West on the baseline question.  
Without extensive additional statutory analysis, the court adopted from Sunnyvale 
West the rule that agencies “do not have the discretion to adopt a baseline that uses 
conditions predicted to occur on a date subsequent to the certification of the EIR.”  
(Madera Oversight Coalition, Inc. v. County of Madera, supra, 199 Cal.App.4th at 
p. 90.)   
In Pfeiffer, a different panel of the same court that decided Sunnyvale West 
reviewed the EIR for a medical center‟s expansion project.  The EIR‟s analysis of 
traffic impacts compared, for various road segments and intersections in the 
project‟s vicinity, existing traffic conditions with various growth and project 
scenarios.  (Pfeiffer, supra, 200 Cal.App.4th at p. 1571.)  Holding the plaintiffs 
had not shown this analysis inadequate under CEQA, Pfeiffer distinguished 
Sunnyvale West as involving the use of only a future conditions baseline, whereas 
in Pfeiffer “the traffic baselines included in the EIR were not limited to projected 
traffic conditions in the year 2020, but also included existing conditions and the 
traffic growth anticipated from approved but not yet constructed developments.”  
(Pfeiffer, at p. 1573.) 
The appellate court in the present case flatly disagreed with the Sunnyvale 
West analysis.  Noting that Guidelines section 15125(a) states the EIR‟s 
description of existing environmental conditions “ „normally‟ ” serves as the 
 
11 
baseline for analysis of project impacts, the court reasoned that “[t]o state the 
norm is to recognize the possibility of departure from the norm” and concluded the 
Sunnyvale West court erred in finding in the law an absolute rule against use of 
projected future conditions as the baseline.  In the lower court‟s view, future 
conditions are properly used as a baseline if the projections on which they are 
based are reliable and their use “provide[s] information that is relevant and permits 
informed decisionmaking.”   
We conclude CEQA and the Guidelines dictate a rule less restrictive than 
Sunnyvale West‟s but more restrictive than that articulated by the Court of Appeal 
below.  Projected future conditions may be used as the sole baseline for impacts 
analysis if their use in place of measured existing conditions—a departure from 
the norm stated in Guidelines section 15125(a)—is justified by unusual aspects of 
the project or the surrounding conditions.  That the future conditions analysis 
would be informative is insufficient, but an agency does have discretion to 
completely omit an analysis of impacts on existing conditions when inclusion of 
such an analysis would detract from an EIR‟s effectiveness as an informational 
document, either because an analysis based on existing conditions would be 
uninformative or because it would be misleading to decision makers and the 
public. 
Before addressing the use of a future conditions baseline, we pause to 
clarify some potentially confusing aspects of the standard analysis, in which the 
project‟s impacts are assessed against existing environmental conditions.  First, 
although most projects for which an EIR is prepared do not yet exist or are not yet 
in operation at the time the EIR is written, it is common for an EIR‟s impacts 
analysis to assume, counterfactually, that the project exists and is in full operation 
at the time the environmental analysis is conducted.  (See, e.g., Gilroy Citizens for 
Responsible Planning v. City of Gilroy (2006) 140 Cal.App.4th 911, 916-917, 933 
 
12 
[EIR analyzed impacts on city‟s existing central business district of developing 
proposed outlying retail center]; Association of Irritated Residents v. County of 
Madera (2003) 107 Cal.App.4th 1383, 1389, 1393-1394 [EIR analyzed impacts on 
wildlife of replacing existing farm fields with proposed dairy operation]; cf. 
1 Kostka & Zischke, Practice Under the Cal. Environmental Quality Act 
(Cont.Ed.Bar 2d ed. 2008) Significant Environmental Effects, § 13.21, p. 635 (rev. 
3.13) [EIR must analyze significant effects of entire project, including phases to be 
implemented later].)  In such an analysis, the EIR attempts to predict the impacts a 
project would have on the existing environment if approved and implemented.  
CEQA‟s wording reflects the fact that projects generally are not yet operating 
when an EIR is prepared:  an EIR must be prepared for any project “that may 
have” a significant environmental effect (§ 21100, subd. (a)); the report‟s purpose 
is to inform the public and decision makers as to the effects a proposed project “is 
likely to have” on the environment (§ 21061); and the “environment” referred to is 
the set of physical conditions in the area “which will be affected” by the project 
(§ 21060.5).  
Second, we note that in appropriate circumstances an existing conditions 
analysis may take account of environmental conditions that will exist when the 
project begins operations; the agency is not strictly limited to those prevailing 
during the period of EIR preparation.  An agency may, where appropriate, adjust 
its existing conditions baseline to account for a major change in environmental 
conditions that is expected to occur before project implementation.  In so adjusting 
its existing conditions baseline, an agency exercises its discretion on how best to 
define such a baseline under the circumstance of rapidly changing environmental 
conditions.  (Communities for a Better Environment, supra, 48 Cal.4th at p. 328.)  
As we explained in our earlier decision, CEQA imposes no “uniform, inflexible 
rule for determination of the existing conditions baseline,” instead leaving to a 
 
13 
sound exercise of agency discretion the exact method of measuring the existing 
environmental conditions upon which the project will operate.  (Ibid.)  Interpreting 
the statute and regulations in accord with the central purpose of an EIR—“to 
provide public agencies and the public in general with detailed information about 
the effect which a proposed project is likely to have on the environment” 
(§ 21061)—we find nothing precluding an agency from employing, under 
appropriate factual circumstances, a baseline of conditions expected to obtain at 
the time the proposed project would go into operation. 
For example, in an EIR for a new office building, the analysis of impacts on 
sunlight and views in the surrounding neighborhood might reasonably take 
account of a larger tower already under construction on an adjacent site at the time 
of EIR preparation.  For a large-scale transportation project like that at issue here, 
to the extent changing background conditions during the project‟s lengthy 
approval and construction period are expected to affect the project‟s likely 
impacts, the agency has discretion to consider those changing background 
conditions in formulating its analytical baseline.  Contrary to Justice Baxter‟s view 
(conc. & dis. opn. of Baxter, J., post, at p. 15), such a date-of-implementation 
baseline does not share the principal problem presented by a baseline of conditions 
expected to prevail in the more distant future following years of project operation 
— it does not omit impacts expected to occur during the project‟s early period of 
operation. 
Is it ever appropriate for an EIR‟s significant impacts analysis to use 
conditions predicted to prevail in the more distant future, well beyond the date the 
project is expected to begin operation, to the exclusion of an existing conditions 
baseline?  We conclude agencies do have such discretion.  The key, again, is the 
EIR‟s role as an informational document.  To the extent a departure from the 
“norm[]” of an existing conditions baseline (Guidelines, § 15125(a)) promotes 
 
14 
public participation and more informed decisionmaking by providing a more 
accurate picture of a proposed project‟s likely impacts, CEQA permits the 
departure.  Thus an agency may forego analysis of a project‟s impacts on existing 
environmental conditions if such an analysis would be uninformative or 
misleading to decision makers and the public.5 
Parenthetically, we stress that the burden of justification articulated above 
applies when an agency substitutes a future conditions analysis for one based on 
existing conditions, omitting the latter, and not to an agency‟s decision to examine 
project impacts on both existing and future conditions.  As the Sunnyvale West 
court observed, a project‟s effects on future conditions are appropriately 
considered in an EIR‟s discussion of cumulative effects and in discussion of the no 
project alternative.  (Sunnyvale West, supra, 190 Cal.App.4th at pp. 1381-1382.)6  
                                              
5 
Amicus curiae South Coast Air Quality Management District provides a 
hypothetical example of factual conditions in which use of an existing conditions 
baseline would arguably mask potentially significant project impacts that would be 
revealed by using a future conditions baseline.  In this illustration, an existing 
industrial facility currently emits an air pollutant in the amount of 1,000 pounds 
per day.  By the year 2020, if no new project is undertaken at the facility, 
emissions of the pollutant are projected to fall to 500 pounds per day due to 
enforcement of regulations already adopted and to turnover in the facility‟s vehicle 
fleet.  The operator proposes to use the facility for a new project that will emit 750 
pounds per day of the pollutant upon implementation and through at least 2020.  
An analysis comparing the project‟s emissions to existing emissions would 
conclude the project would reduce pollution and thus have no significant adverse 
impact, while an analysis using a baseline of projected year 2020 conditions would 
show the project is likely to increase emissions by 250 pounds per day, a 
(presumably significant) 50 percent increase over baseline conditions. 
6  
A cumulative impacts analysis focuses on the effects of the proposed 
project together with other projects causing related impacts and may rely on 
projections of future conditions that are expected to contribute to a cumulative 
adverse effect (Cal. Code Regs., tit. 14, § 15130, subds. (a)(1), (b)), while analysis 
of the no project alternative includes a discussion of “what would be reasonably 
 
(footnote continued on next page) 
 
15 
But nothing in CEQA law precludes an agency, as well, from considering both 
types of baseline—existing and future conditions—in its primary analysis of the 
project‟s significant adverse effects.  (Pfeiffer, supra, 200 Cal.App.4th at p. 1573; 
Woodward Park Homeowners Assn., Inc. v. City of Fresno (2007) 150 
Cal.App.4th 683, 707.)  The need for justification arises when an agency chooses 
to evaluate only the impacts on future conditions, foregoing the existing conditions 
analysis called for under the CEQA Guidelines. 
The need to justify omission of an existing conditions analysis derives in 
part from the CEQA Guidelines, which clearly establish that the norm for an EIR 
is analysis against a baseline of existing conditions.  In addition to Guidelines 
section 15125(a), which expressly so provides, the Guidelines provide that an EIR 
“should normally limit its examination to changes in the existing physical 
conditions in the affected area,” considering both direct and indirect effects and 
“giving due consideration to both the short-term and long-term effects” of the 
project.  (Cal. Code Regs., tit. 14, § 15126.2, subd. (a), italics added.)  Moreover, 
the Guidelines explain that “[t]he no project alternative analysis is not the baseline 
for determining whether the proposed project‟s environmental impacts may be 
significant, unless it is identical to the existing environmental setting analysis 
which does establish that baseline (see Section 15125).”  (Cal. Code Regs., tit. 14, 
§ 15126.6, subd. (e)(1).)  While the latter regulation does not absolutely prohibit 
the use of a future conditions baseline where appropriate, it makes clear that 
normally the baseline for determining a project‟s significant adverse impacts is not 
                                                                                                                                                              
(footnote continued from previous page) 
expected to occur in the foreseeable future if the project were not approved, based 
on current plans and consistent with available infrastructure and community 
services” (Cal. Code Regs., tit. 14, § 15126.6, subd. (e)(2)). 
 
16 
the same as the no project alternative, which takes into account future changes in 
the environment reasonably expected to occur if the project is not approved.  (Id., 
subd. (e)(2), (3)(C).) 
The CEQA Guidelines establish the default of an existing conditions 
baseline even for projects expected to be in operation for many years or decades.  
That a project will have a long operational life, by itself, does not justify an 
agency‟s failing to assess its impacts on existing environmental conditions.  For 
such projects as for others, existing conditions constitute the norm from which a 
departure must be justified—not only because the CEQA Guidelines so state, but 
because using existing conditions serves CEQA‟s goals in important ways. 
Even when a project is intended and expected to improve conditions in the 
long term—20 or 30 years after an EIR is prepared—decision makers and 
members of the public are entitled under CEQA to know the short- and medium-
term environmental costs of achieving that desirable improvement.  These costs 
include not only the impacts involved in constructing the project but also those the 
project will create during its initial years of operation.  Though we might 
rationally choose to endure short- or medium-term hardship for a long-term, 
permanent benefit, deciding to make that trade-off requires some knowledge about 
the severity and duration of the near-term hardship.  An EIR stating that in 20 or 
30 years the project will improve the environment, but neglecting, without 
justification, to provide any evaluation of the project‟s impacts in the meantime, 
does not “giv[e] due consideration to both the short-term and long-term effects” of 
the project (Cal. Code Regs., tit. 14, § 15126.2, subd. (a)) and does not serve 
CEQA‟s informational purpose well.  The omission of an existing conditions 
analysis must be justified, even if the project is designed to alleviate adverse 
environmental conditions over the long term. 
 
17 
In addition, existing environmental conditions have the advantage that they 
can generally be directly measured and need not be projected through a predictive 
model.  However sophisticated and well-designed a model is, its product carries 
the inherent uncertainty of every long-term prediction, uncertainty that tends to 
increase with the period of projection.  For example, if future population in the 
project area is projected using an annual growth multiplier, a small error in that 
multiplier will itself be multiplied and compounded as the projection is pushed 
further into the future.  The public and decision makers are entitled to the most 
accurate information on project impacts practically possible, and the choice of a 
baseline must reflect that goal. 
Finally, use of existing conditions as a baseline makes the analysis more 
accessible to decision makers and especially to members of the public, who may 
be familiar with the existing environment but not technically equipped to assess a 
projection into the distant future.  As an amicus curiae observes, “[a]nyone can 
review an EIR‟s discussion of current environmental conditions and determine 
whether [it] comports with that person‟s knowledge and experience of the world.”  
But “[i]n a hypothetical future world, the environment is what the statisticians say 
it is.”  Quantitative and technical descriptions of environmental conditions have a 
place in CEQA analysis, but an agency must not create unwarranted barriers to 
public understanding of the EIR by unnecessarily substituting a baseline of 
projected future conditions for one based on actual existing conditions.  (See 
Laurel Heights Improvement Assn. v. Regents of University of California (1988) 
47 Cal.3d 376, 392 [EIR allows the public to “know the basis on which its 
responsible officials either approve or reject environmentally significant action,” 
thereby promoting “informed self-government”].) 
Justice Baxter‟s concurring and dissenting opinion proposes a significantly 
more lax rule, similar to that espoused by the Court of Appeal below, under which 
 
18 
a future conditions baseline may be employed, in lieu of one based on existing 
environmental conditions, so long as it is “a realistic measure of the physical 
conditions without the proposed project” projected at the agency‟s chosen future 
date.  (Conc. & dis. opn. of Baxter, J, post, at p. 7.)  As discussed earlier, such a 
rule cannot be derived from Communities for a Better Environment or the other 
authority cited for it.  Moreover, it would drain Guidelines section 15125(a)‟s last 
sentence (providing that existing environmental conditions “will normally 
constitute the baseline physical conditions by which a lead agency determines 
whether an impact is significant”) of virtually all prescriptive effect.  Perhaps most 
important, it would sanction the unwarranted omission of information on years or 
decades of a project‟s environmental impacts and open the door to gamesmanship 
in the choice of baselines. 
Under the rule proposed in Justice Baxter‟s opinion, agencies evaluating 
projects intended to exist and operate for many decades could seemingly choose a 
baseline of conditions from any period of the project‟s expected operations, 15, 30 
or 60 years in the future, so long as the agency‟s projections were supported by 
reasonably reliable data and predictive modeling.  Existing environmental 
conditions would constitute the “normal[]” baseline for an EIR (Guidelines 
§ 15125(a))—except for any case where the agency chose a different baseline.  
Agencies would be empowered routinely to omit discussion of short- and medium-
term operational effects, preparing EIRs that told the public and decision makers 
only what impacts could be expected decades down the road.  An agency that 
wished to hide significant adverse impacts expected to occur in the project‟s initial 
years of operation could choose to analyze the project‟s environmental effects 
only at some more distant period, when changes in background conditions might 
mask or swamp the adverse effects seen in the shorter term.  That no intentional 
hiding of likely impacts appears in this case does not negate the potential for 
 
19 
manipulation of the baseline under a rule that provides agencies unbounded 
discretion in the choice. 
Contrary to Justice Baxter‟s claim, our holding here does not impose any 
“wasteful” or “additional” substantive requirement on agencies.  (Conc. & dis. 
opn. of Baxter, J., post, at p. 18.)  We hold only that agencies normally must do 
what Guidelines section 15125(a) expressly requires — compare the project‟s 
impacts to existing environmental conditions, as that term is broadly understood, 
to determine their significance.  The question we would have an agency ask in 
choosing a baseline is not, “Would an existing conditions analysis add information 
to a future conditions analysis?”  It is, “Do we have a reason to omit the existing 
conditions analysis and substitute one based on future conditions?”  Of course, 
where an agency concludes an analysis of impacts on future conditions is also 
needed in any portion of the EIR, it may include such an analysis.  But any 
duplication of effort therein involved is not a product of this decision. 
For all these reasons, we hold that while an agency preparing an EIR does 
have discretion to omit an analysis of the project‟s significant impacts on existing 
environmental conditions and substitute a baseline consisting of environmental 
conditions projected to exist in the future, the agency must justify its decision by 
showing an existing conditions analysis would be misleading or without 
informational value.  Sunnyvale West Neighborhood Assn. v. City of Sunnyvale 
City Council, supra, 190 Cal.App.4th 1351, and Madera Oversight Coalition, Inc. 
v. County of Madera, supra, 199 Cal.App.4th 48, are disapproved insofar as they 
hold an agency may never employ predicted future conditions as the sole baseline 
for analysis of a project‟s environmental impacts. 
Because the standard articulated here involves a primarily factual 
assessment, the agency‟s determination is reviewed only for substantial evidence 
supporting it.  (Vineyard Area Citizens for Responsible Growth, Inc. v. City of 
 
20 
Rancho Cordova, supra, 40 Cal.4th at p. 435.)  If substantial evidence supports an 
agency‟s determination that an existing conditions impacts analysis would provide 
little or no relevant information or would be misleading as to the project‟s true 
impacts, a reviewing court may not substitute its own judgment on this point for 
that of the agency.  (Ibid.) 
B.  The Expo Authority’s Use of a Year 2030 Baseline 
1.  Traffic congestion analysis 
As proposed in the EIR, the Expo Phase 2 project will cross several streets 
at grade rather than with bridges or tunnels.  To analyze the resulting impacts on 
traffic congestion, the Expo Authority used the following method:   
(1) For numerous street intersections in the vicinity, the agency directly 
observed existing congestion in 2007-2008, measuring it as the average delay in 
travel through each intersection during the morning and afternoon peak travel 
periods.  The delay was expressed in terms of “Level of Service” (LOS), ranging 
from LOS A (free flow) to LOS F (extreme congestion).7 
(2) Using MTA‟s traffic projection model, which incorporates regional 
growth projections from the Southern California Association of Governments, the 
Expo Authority predicted the LOS for each intersection in the year 2030 if the 
Expo Phase 2 project is not built (and assuming no other transit improvements 
along the project corridor). 
                                              
7  
For signalized intersections, delay at LOS A is less than or equal to 10 
seconds, at LOS B it is between 10 and 20 seconds, at LOS C it is between 20 and 
35 seconds, at LOS D it is between 35 and 55 seconds, at LOS E it is between 55 
and 80 seconds, and at LOS F it is greater than 80 seconds.  The LOS thresholds 
are lower for unsignalized intersections. 
 
21 
(3) For each intersection studied, the Expo Authority then predicted the 
LOS in the year 2030 if the Expo Phase 2 project is built and operated.  These 
projections took into account automobile trip reductions expected to result from 
the project and additional peak hour trips to drop off or pick up passengers at 
stations, as well as the impact of stoppages at grade crossings as each train passes.   
(4) For each intersection, the predicted year 2030 LOS with the project was 
compared to the predicted year 2030 LOS without the project and the significance 
of any impact assessed.  An adverse impact on delay was considered significant if 
the project was projected to cause service to deteriorate from LOS A, B, C, or D to 
LOS E or F or, for those intersections projected to be at LOS E or F in 2030 
without the project, if the project would increase delay by four seconds or more.   
Using this method, the EIR projects some additional local traffic congestion 
in 2030 due to the project, but none rising above the significance thresholds just 
described.  For example, at the intersection of Stewart Street and Olympic 
Boulevard, vehicles in the year 2030 are expected to experience a morning peak 
period delay of 34.2 seconds absent the project and 49.0 seconds with the project, 
but this 14.8-second increase in delay is not considered significant because it only 
moves the intersection from LOS C to LOS D, and not into the unsatisfactory 
categories of LOS E and F.  At 20th Street and Olympic Boulevard, the project is 
expected to cause an additional 0.8 seconds of delay, considered insignificant 
because it does not change the projected LOS, which is expected to be 
unsatisfactory (LOS E) in 2030 even without the project, and falls below the four-
second significance threshold.  Several other intersections fit these patterns of 
insignificant adverse impact, while at many other intersections the project is 
projected to reduce traffic delay in 2030, due in part to intersection improvements 
proposed in conjunction with the transit line.   
 
22 
2.  Air pollution analysis 
Based on projections of an increase in vehicle miles traveled in the region, 
the EIR predicts an increase in air pollution emissions by 2030 if the Expo Phase 2 
project is not built.  The project would result in fewer vehicle miles traveled, in 
comparison to the no-build alternative, and hence in fewer emissions in 2030.  By 
reducing vehicle travel and the resulting emissions below those otherwise 
expected, project implementation “would have a beneficial impact on regional 
pollutant levels over the life of the project . . . .” 
3.  Explanation of baseline choice 
In the introduction to the EIR‟s factual findings, the Expo Authority 
explains that it found use of a future conditions baseline for traffic and air quality 
impacts analysis necessary “so that the public and the decision makers may 
understand the future impacts on traffic and air quality of approving and not 
approving the project.”  The EIR continues:  “The evaluation of future traffic and 
air quality conditions utilizes adopted official demographic and [sic] projections 
for the project area and region.  Past experience with the adopted demographic 
projections indicate that it is reasonable to assume that the population of the 
project area and the region will continue to increase over the life of the project.  
The projected population increases will, in turn, result in increased traffic 
congestion and increased air emissions from mobile sources in the project area and 
in the region.  [¶] For most of the environmental topics in the [EIR] and in these 
Findings, the Authority finds that existing environmental conditions are the 
appropriate baseline condition for the purpose of determining whether an impact is 
significant.  However, the Authority finds that the existing physical environmental 
conditions (current population and traffic levels) do not provide a reasonable 
baseline for the purpose of determining whether traffic and air quality impacts of 
the Project are significant.  The Authority is electing to utilize the future baseline 
 
23 
conditions for the purposes of determining the significance of impacts to traffic 
and air quality.”   
Further explanation of the baseline choice is provided in a later section on 
the EIR‟s methods for determining impacts:  “A transportation project includes 
significant capital infrastructure and is intended to meet long-term needs.  As a 
result, the permanent effects of those transportation projects are, and should be, 
evaluated based on a longer-term perspective that takes increases in population 
and programmed changes to the transportation system into account.  Since the 
project is addressing both existing and long-term transportation shortfalls, that 
longer-term perspective should include reasonably foreseeable other 
improvements.  [¶] For this project the long-term permanent impacts are evaluated 
against what is [sic] expected to be existing conditions in 2030.  This assumes the 
planned growth (jobs and employment) and related funded transportation 
improvements as proposed in the [Southern California Association of 
Governments Regional Transportation Plan].  In addition, short-term impacts 
associated with the construction period (2011 to 2015) of the project have also 
been evaluated.  [¶] . . . Because population and traffic are anticipated to increase 
over the life of the project, this approach provides the public and decision makers 
with a realistic evaluation of the significance of air quality and traffic impacts over 
the life of the project.” 
The Expo Authority‟s explanation of its baseline choice in its briefing 
places similar reliance on the inevitability of population and traffic growth in the 
project area:  “It is undisputed that the population, employment and concomitant 
traffic congestion will continue to increase through 2030 on the west side.  
[Citation.]  It is absurd to suggest that the Authority use 2007 population, 
employment and traffic to determine the Project‟s operational impacts when the 
2007 conditions will no longer exist when the Project is fully operational.”   
 
24 
4.  Propriety of baseline choice 
We discern no substantial evidence supporting the Expo Authority‟s 
decision to omit an analysis of the project‟s traffic and air quality impacts on 
existing environmental conditions.  Although the agency did not expressly find an 
existing conditions analysis would have been misleading or without informational 
value, its finding that for analysis of traffic congestion and air pollution impacts 
“existing physical environmental conditions . . . do not provide a reasonable 
baseline” may be construed as so asserting.  Unfortunately, nothing in the record 
supports that determination, and without such evidence the Expo Authority cannot 
justify its decision to completely omit an analysis of the project‟s impacts on 
existing traffic congestion and air quality. 
The Expo Authority observes that “2007 conditions will no longer exist 
when the Project is fully operational.”  As discussed earlier, CEQA allows an 
agency to adjust its existing conditions baseline to account for an important 
change that will occur between the time an EIR is prepared and the time of project 
implementation.  (See pt. I.A., ante.)  But the Expo Authority did not measure 
traffic congestion and air pollution impacts against existing environmental 
conditions when the project begins operations.  The agency used no existing 
conditions baseline, adjusted or unadjusted, for analysis of these impacts, instead 
employing only a baseline of projected 2030 conditions. 
That the Expo Phase 2 project is “intended to meet long-term needs” for 
public transportation is an insufficient justification.  By focusing solely on the 
project‟s operational impacts in the distant future, the EIR neglects to inform the 
public and decision makers explicitly of any operational impacts that could occur 
in the project‟s first 15 years of operation.  (The only short-term impacts on traffic 
and air quality analyzed were those resulting from the project‟s construction.)  The 
absence of such “due consideration to both the short-term and long-term effects” 
 
25 
of the project (Cal. Code Regs., tit. 14, § 15126.2, subd. (a)) threatens to deprive 
the EIR‟s users of the opportunity to weigh the project‟s environmental costs and 
benefits in an informed manner. 
Similarly, that project area population, traffic, and emissions of air 
pollutants are expected to continue increasing through and beyond 2030 does not 
justify the agency‟s failure to analyze operational impacts under earlier conditions.  
The expectation of change may make it important for the agency to also examine 
impacts under future conditions (whether in the significant impacts analysis, the 
cumulative impacts analysis, or the discussion of the no project alternative), but it 
does not constitute substantial evidence supporting a determination that an existing 
conditions analysis would be uninformative or misleading.   
Nor does the fact ridership is not expected to reach maximum levels 
immediately upon the transit line‟s opening constitute substantial evidence 
justifying the failure to examine impacts on existing conditions.8  The level of 
ridership on the proposed transit line is a characteristic of the project in operation, 
not a characteristic of the environmental baseline against which project impacts 
are measured.  As noted earlier, an existing conditions analysis often assumes the 
                                              
8 
The record does not indicate full ridership will first be achieved in 2030.  
The passage cited in the Expo Authority‟s brief, found in the EIR‟s discussion of 
parking impacts and mitigation along Colorado Avenue, reads as follows:  “On 
opening day, 71 to 92 percent of the 2030 parking demand would be provided 
depending on the Preferred Alternative selected.  This would be reasonably 
consistent with opening day ridership, which is estimated at approximately 77 
percent of the year 2030 forecasts.”  While this makes clear ridership on opening 
day is expected to be below its ultimate maximum, it does not purport to predict 
how fast ridership will increase or when it will reach its full level, other than 
assuming that level will be reached by or before the year 2030.  From common 
experience, one might expect fewer than 15 years will be needed for commuters to 
start using a new transit line. 
 
26 
project exists and is in full operation at the time the environmental analysis is 
conducted, measuring the likely impacts against a baseline of conditions existing 
at the time of environmental analysis.  Thus the Expo Authority did not need to 
employ a baseline of predicted 2030 background conditions in order to measure 
the impacts of full ridership; those likely impacts could have been predicted 
against an existing conditions baseline.  Justice Baxter‟s concurring and dissenting 
opinion, in suggesting the year 2030 baseline was chosen as representative of full 
ridership, ignores the fact that ridership is not a baseline condition but a 
characteristic of the project‟s operations.  (Conc. & dis. opn. of Baxter, J., post, at 
p. 11.)  In any event, neither the EIR, nor the Expo Authority‟s briefs, nor Justice 
Baxter‟s opinion explain whether ridership levels would affect the project‟s 
impacts on traffic congestion and air pollution, and if so, whether the effect would 
be positive or negative; the likelihood of changing ridership levels thus cannot be 
considered substantial evidence an existing conditions analysis—whatever 
ridership level it assumed—would be useless or misleading. 
In its brief, the Expo Authority states it “chose 2030 because when it issued 
the [notice of preparation of the EIR] in 2007, 2030 was the planning horizon for 
transportation projects in the adopted [Southern California Association of 
Governments] Regional Transportation Plan,” and asserts that federal law requires 
the use of this long-term perspective in planning for federally funded 
transportation projects.  To the extent the agency is arguing that a technique used 
for planning under another statutory scheme necessarily satisfies CEQA‟s 
requirements for analysis of a project‟s impacts, we disagree.  Except where 
CEQA or the CEQA Guidelines tie CEQA analysis to planning done for a 
different purpose (see, e.g., § 21081.2, subd. (a) [CEQA findings on traffic 
impacts not required for certain residential infill projects that are in compliance 
with other municipal plans and ordinances]), an EIR must be judged on its 
 
27 
fulfillment of CEQA‟s mandates, not those of other statutes.  And while we try to 
interpret CEQA in a manner consistent with other planning schemes (see Vineyard 
Area Citizens for Responsible Growth, Inc. v. City of Rancho Cordova, supra, 40 
Cal.4th at pp. 432-434), no issue of conflict or incompatibility arises here.  
Nothing prevents an agency preparing an EIR from analyzing the impacts of a 
project against an existing conditions baseline even if the agency has also planned 
under other statutes for the project‟s long-term operation.  Moreover, the use of 
multiple baselines for direct impacts analysis does not violate CEQA (see Pfeiffer, 
supra, 200 Cal.App.4th at p. 1573; Woodward Park Homeowners Assn., Inc. v. 
City of Fresno, supra, 150 Cal.App.4th at p. 707), and even when the EIR uses 
solely an existing conditions baseline for direct impacts analysis, available 
information about the longer term impacts of the project, together with other 
foreseeable developments, is appropriately incorporated into the EIR under the 
rubric of a cumulative impacts analysis (Cal. Code Regs., tit. 14, § 15130).  There 
is thus no necessary connection between use of a year 2030 horizon for 
transportation planning generally and the agency‟s choice of conditions in that 
year as the sole baseline for project impacts analysis under CEQA. 
In summary, the administrative record does not offer substantial evidence 
to support the Expo Authority‟s decision to limit its analysis of project impacts on 
traffic congestion and air quality to predicted impacts in the year 2030, to the 
exclusion of likely impacts on conditions existing when the EIR was prepared or 
when the project begins operation. 
5.  Prejudice  
An omission in an EIR‟s significant impacts analysis is deemed prejudicial 
if it deprived the public and decision makers of substantial relevant information 
about the project‟s likely adverse impacts.  Although an agency‟s failure to 
 
28 
disclose information called for by CEQA may be prejudicial “regardless of 
whether a different outcome would have resulted if the public agency had 
complied” with the law (§ 21005, subd. (a)), under CEQA “there is no 
presumption that error is prejudicial” (id., subd. (b)).  Insubstantial or merely 
technical omissions are not grounds for relief.  (Environmental Protection 
Information Center v. California Dept. of Forestry & Fire Protection, supra, 44 
Cal.4th at pp. 485-486.)  “A prejudicial abuse of discretion occurs if the failure to 
include relevant information precludes informed decisionmaking and informed 
public participation, thereby thwarting the statutory goals of the EIR process.”  
(Kings County Farm Bureau v. City of Hanford (1990) 221 Cal.App.3d 692, 712.)   
With regard to the analysis of Expo Phase 2‟s traffic congestion impacts, 
we conclude the EIR‟s use exclusively of a future conditions baseline had no such 
prejudicial effect.  Although the EIR failed to analyze the project‟s impacts on 
existing traffic congestion, it did include an extensive analysis of year 2030 
congestion effects, finding no significant adverse impacts.  That detailed analysis 
demonstrates the lack of grounds to suppose the same analysis performed against 
existing traffic conditions would have produced any substantially different 
information. 
The EIR revealed that project impacts on congestion at intersections along 
the chosen rail route are expected in most cases to be favorable in 2030, that most 
of the adverse impacts expected are small, and that even the few relatively large 
adverse impacts expected would not, if applied to existing conditions, result in 
significant changes in delay status.9  Although Neighbors has argued that 
                                              
9  
For the majority of the more than 100 intersection/peak period 
combinations studied, the project‟s expected impact in 2030 is favorable or 
nonexistent.  Where the predicted impact is adverse, it is generally minor, 
 
(footnote continued on next page) 
 
29 
intersections expected to reach unsatisfactory status by 2030 without the project 
might do so earlier because of project impacts, the EIR showed that those 
intersections would experience favorable, or in one instance adverse but very 
minor, impacts in 2030 due to the project.10  Design changes reducing delay are 
built into the project at many intersections, and the expected gradual increase in 
traffic generally could not reasonably be thought likely to result in substantially 
larger project impacts on congestion under existing conditions than under 2030 
conditions.11  In these particular factual circumstances, the EIR‟s omission did not 
                                                                                                                                                              
(footnote continued from previous page) 
exceeding 10 seconds in only seven instances.  And of the 10 currently satisfactory 
intersections (those in LOS status A through D) on which the rail project is 
expected to have the greatest adverse impacts in 2030, including the seven on 
which the projected 2030 impact exceeds 10 seconds, none are currently close 
enough to LOS E so that the 2030 impact, if applied to existing conditions, would 
put the intersection into unsatisfactory status.  Only two currently satisfactory 
intersections are within 10 seconds of the LOS E threshold, and the project is 
projected to affect delay favorably at both.   
10  
Five intersection/peak period combinations along the proposed transit line 
meet the criteria of being currently in a satisfactory LOS and projected to turn 
unsatisfactory by 2030 in the project‟s absence.  For four of the five, the project‟s 
2030 impact on congestion is expected to be favorable, reducing delay in amounts 
ranging from 1.1 seconds to 30.1 seconds.  The single projected adverse impact in 
this group is very small, 0.8 seconds.  And since the existing morning peak delay 
at that intersection (20th Street and Olympic Boulevard) is 42.6 seconds, the 
adverse project impact under existing conditions would have to be 12.4 seconds, 
or more than 15 times the adverse impact in 2030, to put the intersection over the 
55-second threshold into LOS E.  To posit such an extreme difference in impacts 
would be unsupported speculation. 
11  
The record shows that, baseline conditions aside, the project‟s operations 
may differ somewhat on opening day from later periods, in that ridership on the 
transit line is expected initially to be only 77 percent of its eventual level.  As 
noted earlier, however, an existing conditions impacts analysis ordinarily assumes, 
counterfactually, that the project is in full operation.  And even if an existing 
conditions analysis assumed 77 percent ridership, no substantial difference in 
impacts would be likely.  The rail project‟s favorable effect on project area traffic 
 
(footnote continued on next page) 
 
30 
“preclude[] informed decisionmaking and informed public participation.”  (Kings 
County Farm Bureau v. City of Hanford, supra, 221 Cal.App.3d at p. 712.) 
We reach the same conclusion as to the analysis of air quality impacts.  
Based on the prediction that operation of the Expo Phase 2 project would reduce 
the vehicle miles traveled in the project area and hence reduce emissions of 
pollutants, the EIR concluded project implementation “would have a beneficial 
impact on regional pollutant levels over the life of the project . . . .”  But the 
project will begin reducing vehicle miles travelled as soon as it starts operating, as 
some of those who would otherwise drive decide to take the new train.  Under the 
EIR‟s logic, to which Neighbors raises no objection other than the choice of a 
baseline, the project‟s impact on air quality will thus be beneficial throughout its 
operation, not only in 2030.  The EIR‟s formal use of a year 2030 baseline for this 
analysis was thus an insubstantial, technical error that cannot be considered 
prejudicial.  (Environmental Protection Information Center v. California Dept. of 
Forestry & Fire Protection, supra, 44 Cal.4th at pp. 486-488.)   
To comply fully with CEQA‟s informational mandate, the Expo Authority 
should have analyzed the project‟s effects on existing traffic congestion and air 
quality conditions.  Under the specific circumstances of this case, however, its 
failure to do so did not deprive agency decision makers or the public of substantial 
information relevant to approving the project, and is therefore not a ground for 
setting that decision aside. 
                                                                                                                                                              
(footnote continued from previous page) 
is projected to be modest even at full ridership:  a reduction of 0.38 percent in 
vehicle miles traveled in 2030.  Even if the 77 percent initial ridership implies that 
initially the project will reduce vehicle miles traveled only by 0.29 percent, there 
are no grounds to believe such an extremely minor difference (0.09 percent) could 
substantially alter the project impacts on existing congestion at the individual 
intersections studied. 
 
31 
II.  Adequacy of Mitigation Measure for Spillover Parking Effects 
As proposed in the EIR, the Expo Phase 2 project does not include 
construction of parking facilities at several stations.  The EIR recognizes that some 
transit patrons will nevertheless attempt to park near these stations, and near-
station streets where parking is neither time limited nor restricted to those with 
residential permits “could be impacted by spillover parking.”  To mitigate this 
potential impact, the EIR proposed, and the agency adopted, a series of measures.  
On-street parking in areas where spillover effects are anticipated will be monitored 
before and for six months after the opening of the transit line.  If a parking 
shortage results, MTA will help the responsible local jurisdiction establish an 
appropriate permit parking program, for which MTA will pay the signage and 
administrative costs.  If a permit program is inappropriate for the area, MTA “will 
work with the local jurisdictions” to decide on another option, such as time-
restricted, metered, or shared parking arrangements.  By means of this mitigation 
measure, the EIR concludes, any adverse spillover parking effect will be rendered 
less than significant. 
Neighbors contends this mitigation measure is insufficiently enforceable 
because it depends on the cooperation of municipal agencies having jurisdiction 
over parking in the vicinity of the stations.  CEQA, however, allows an agency to 
approve or carry out a project with potential adverse impacts if binding mitigation 
measures have been “required in, or incorporated into” the project or if “[t]hose 
changes or alterations are within the responsibility and jurisdiction of another 
public agency and have been, or can and should be, adopted by that other agency.”  
(§ 21081, subd. (a); see Cal. Code Regs., tit. 14, § 15091, subd. (b) [findings to 
this effect “shall be supported by substantial evidence in the record”].)  The Expo 
Authority made both findings as to its spillover parking mitigation measure, and 
both findings are supported by substantial evidence.   
 
32 
Under the adopted mitigation measure, MTA is required to monitor parking 
in the potentially affected neighborhoods, to pay for a residential permit parking 
program where station spillover has resulted in a street parking shortage, and to 
assist in developing other measures where a residential permit program is 
inappropriate.  But as MTA cannot institute street parking restrictions without the 
cooperation of the local municipalities, some part of the mitigation, to the extent it 
is needed, will indeed be the responsibility of other public agencies, which “can 
and should” (§ 21081, subd. (a)(2)) adopt parking programs and restrictions to 
alleviate pressure from commuters using the new transit line. 
Neighbors relies on Federation of Hillside & Canyon Associations v. City 
of Los Angeles (2000) 83 Cal.App.4th 1252, 1260-1262, in which the appellate 
court found a city‟s proposed measures to mitigate the transportation impacts of a 
general plan framework were inadequate.  The transportation plan involved in that 
case, however, was designed to mitigate the effects of massive population and 
employment growth planned for the city and would have required $12 billion from 
various sources, of which the city‟s own portion far exceeded its available funds.  
(Id. at p. 1256.)  The city thus “acknowledged in the [mitigation plan] that there 
was great uncertainty as to whether the mitigation measures would ever be funded 
or implemented” (id. at p. 1261), leading the court to find no substantial evidence  
that enforceable mitigation measures had been incorporated into or were required 
by the project.   
The circumstances in Federation of Hillside & Canyon Associations are not 
comparable to those here, where the mitigation measure at issue involves only the 
monitoring of parking near several transit stations and, if a shortage develops, the 
cooperative implementation of one or more relatively low-cost solutions.  While 
the Expo Authority and MTA cannot guarantee local governments will cooperate 
to implement permit parking programs or other parking restrictions, the record 
 
33 
supports the conclusion these municipalities “can and should” (§ 21081, subd. 
(a)(2)) do so.  Neighbors‟s speculation a municipality might not agree to a permit 
parking program—which MTA would pay for and which would benefit the 
municipality‟s own residents—is not sufficient to show the agency violated CEQA 
by adopting this mitigation measure.  (See City of Marina v. Board of Trustees of 
California State University (2006) 39 Cal.4th 341, 364-365 [the finding that 
mitigation through sharing the cost of necessary improvements with the 
responsible agency is infeasible was not justified by speculation that the agency 
might not agree to undertake the improvements].) 
DISPOSITION 
The judgment of the Court of Appeal is affirmed. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
WERDEGAR, J. 
WE CONCUR: 
 
KENNARD, J. 
CORRIGAN, J.
 
1 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
CONCURRING AND DISSENTING OPINION BY BAXTER, J. 
 
 
Enacted by the Legislature in 1970, the California Environmental Quality 
Act (CEQA; Pub. Resources Code,1 § 21000 et seq.) aims to enhance the 
environmental quality of the state and promote long-term protection of the 
environment.  (§ 21001.)  To achieve these objectives, CEQA establishes a 
comprehensive review process for analyzing the potential environmental impacts 
of a proposed project and assessing how such impacts might be mitigated.  
Inasmuch as the review process can be quite lengthy and involved, the Legislature 
has declared it our state policy that the public agencies responsible for carrying out 
the process must do so “in the most efficient, expeditious manner,” so as to 
conserve the available financial, governmental, and other resources for application 
toward mitigation efforts.  (§ 21003, subd. (f).)  It is also the Legislature‟s intent 
that courts “shall not” interpret the statutory and regulatory requirements of CEQA 
“in a manner which imposes procedural or substantive requirements beyond those 
explicitly stated in [CEQA] or in the state guidelines.”  (§ 21083.1.) 
                                              
1  
All further statutory references are to this code unless otherwise indicated. 
 
2 
The majority‟s analysis of the baseline issue fails to honor these legislative 
prerogatives.2  The upshot of that analysis is this:  An environmental impact report 
(EIR) may omit an analysis of a proposed project‟s impacts on existing conditions 
only when its inclusion “would detract from [the] EIR‟s effectiveness as an 
informational document.”  (Lead opn., ante, at p. 11.)  The majority‟s categorical 
rule means that, notwithstanding the particular nature and circumstances of a 
proposed project, a lead agency abuses its discretion when it evaluates 
environmental impacts with a baseline of projected future conditions in lieu of an 
existing conditions baseline, even though selection of the former is reasonable 
under the circumstances and substantial evidence supports the analysis.  In short, 
even if an EIR‟s analysis of impacts using a future conditions baseline, standing 
alone, would provide a realistic measure of a project‟s impacts that allows for 
informed decisionmaking and public participation, the majority mandates that the 
EIR also undertake and include an existing conditions analysis, so long as such an 
analysis would not in fact diminish the effectiveness of the document.  (Lead opn., 
ante, at p. 11.) 
Although it is easy to see the wastefulness of requiring an existing 
conditions analysis when a future conditions analysis provides a realistic 
assessment of a project‟s significant adverse effects, there are several legal reasons 
why the majority‟s holding is in error.  Most notably, the majority‟s restrictions on 
agency discretion find no support in CEQA or in the regulations promulgated 
thereunder.  (See pt. II.A., post.)  In addition, the restrictions are contrary to our 
                                              
2  
I use the term “majority” to refer to those portions of the lead opinion‟s 
analysis in which Justice Liu concurs.  (See conc. & dis. opn. of Liu, J., post, at 
pp. 1-3, 5.) 
 
3 
decisions recognizing an agency‟s discretion in selecting a baseline and case law 
requiring deferential review of agency decisions.  (See ibid.) 
Apart from these legal defects, the majority‟s analysis is objectionable for 
the further reason that it adds a significant level of complexity and uncertainty to 
an already arduous environmental review process.  To begin with, the stated 
restrictions are ambiguous and create opportunities for litigation over their 
applicability.  Moreover, the ease of alleging an abuse of discretion under the 
majority‟s analysis is likely to prompt challenges whenever an existing conditions 
baseline is omitted, causing delays that may add significantly to a project‟s costs 
or derail it altogether.  (See pt. II.B., post.)  The mere threat of such challenges 
may prompt lead agencies to engage in existing conditions analyses as a matter of 
course, even if such exercises would not materially improve public disclosure or 
informed decisionmaking, and this despite the declared state policy requiring that 
the review process be conducted efficiently and expeditiously in order to conserve 
financial and governmental resources.  (See ibid.)  That the majority needlessly 
complicates and protracts the CEQA review process is most unfortunate, for both 
the public and the environment. 
In sum, I concur in the ultimate affirmance of the Court of Appeal 
judgment, which upheld certification of the EIR for the proposed light rail project 
at issue (Expo Phase 2).  I also concur in the majority‟s rejection of the spillover 
parking contentions of plaintiff Neighbors for Smart Rail (Neighbors).  But I 
dissent from the majority‟s analysis of the baseline issue and its conclusion that 
the lead agency (Expo Authority) abused its discretion in approving the EIR‟s use 
of an analytic baseline of traffic and air quality conditions projected to exist in the 
year 2030 (the 2030 baseline), in lieu of a baseline of the conditions existing in 
2007 when the notice of preparation of the EIR was published. 
 
4 
As a major infrastructure project designed specifically to address projected 
long-term increases in traffic congestion and air pollution, Expo Phase 2‟s very 
operation will, over time, achieve environmental objectives and efficiencies in 
complete alignment with CEQA‟s goals of enhancing and protecting the 
environment in this state.  The majority does not disagree that the traffic and air 
quality conditions in 2007 will no longer exist when Expo Phase 2 is fully 
operational.  But despite Expo Authority‟s reliance on this reality as a justification 
for omitting an impacts analysis based on the 2007 conditions, the majority 
proceeds to fault the agency for failing to analyze the conditions projected to exist 
eight years after that date, when Expo Phase 2 is scheduled to begin operations in 
2015.  (See lead opn., ante, at pp. 24, 27.)  The unfairness of today‟s decision is 
stunning:  the majority finds an abuse of discretion based on the lead agency‟s 
failure to use a baseline that is nowhere mentioned in the CEQA statutes, 
regulations, or case law, and that no agency or member of the public ever 
advocated in the administrative review process below. 
Unlike the majority, I conclude, consistent with the statutory and decisional 
law governing review in CEQA proceedings, that the record amply supports Expo 
Authority‟s use of the 2030 baseline in place of an existing conditions baseline.  
(See pt. I., post.)  The record also confirms that substantial evidence supports the 
2030 baseline as a realistic baseline for measuring the project‟s operational 
impacts on traffic and air quality conditions.  (Ibid.) 
I. 
The basic purpose of an EIR is “to provide public agencies and the public 
in general with detailed information about the effect which a proposed project is 
likely to have on the environment; to list ways in which the significant effects of 
such a project might be minimized; and to indicate alternatives to such a project.”  
(§ 21061; see also § 21002.1, subd. (a).)  CEQA defines a “significant effect on 
 
5 
the environment” as meaning “a substantial, or potentially substantial, adverse 
change in the environment.”  (§ 21068.) 
In order to provide meaningful information to the decision makers and the 
public, an EIR must clearly and accurately identify the effects of the proposed 
project as distinguished from nonproject effects.  To determine if a project is likely 
to have a significant effect on the environment, the lead agency “must use some 
measure of the environment‟s state absent the project.”  (Communities for a Better 
Environment v. South Coast Air Quality Management Dist. (2010) 48 Cal.4th 310, 
315 (Communities for a Better Environment).)  The “environment” means the 
physical conditions existing within the area “which will be affected by a proposed 
project.”  (§ 21060.5.) 
As relevant here, “[a]n EIR must include a description of the physical 
environmental conditions in the vicinity of the project, as they exist at the time the 
notice of preparation is published, or if no notice of preparation is published, at the 
time environmental analysis is commenced, from both a local and regional 
perspective.  This environmental setting will normally constitute the baseline 
physical conditions by which a lead agency determines whether an impact is 
significant.”  (Cal. Code Regs., tit. 14, § 15125, subd. (a), italics added;3 see also 
Guidelines, § 15126.2, subd. (a).)  In using the word “normally,” Guidelines 
section 15125, subdivision (a) (Guidelines section 15125(a)), “necessarily 
contemplates” that physical conditions at a point in time other than the two 
specified may constitute the appropriate baseline or environmental setting.  
                                              
3  
Henceforth, all references to “Guidelines” are to the CEQA Guidelines in 
title 14 of the California Code of Regulations. 
 
 
6 
(Cherry Valley Pass Acres & Neighbors v. City of Beaumont (2010) 190 
Cal.App.4th 316, 336 (Cherry Valley).) 
In Communities for a Better Environment, we emphasized that “ „the date 
for establishing a baseline cannot be a rigid one.  Environmental conditions may 
vary from year to year and in some cases it is necessary to consider conditions 
over a range of time periods.‟ ”  (Communities for a Better Environment, supra, 48 
Cal.4th at pp. 327-328.)  An agency‟s selection of a baseline is, fundamentally, a 
factual determination of how to realistically measure the physical conditions 
without the proposed project.  (Id. at p. 328; see Cherry Valley, supra, 
190 Cal.App.4th at pp. 336-337.)  Although Communities for a Better 
Environment did not approve the use of projected future conditions as the sole 
baseline for evaluating environmental impacts, neither did it prohibit such use or 
otherwise impose restrictions on an agency‟s discretion to omit an existing 
conditions baseline.4  This should be obvious from the fact that the decision is the 
only support the majority cites for its purported holding that an agency may base 
an EIR‟s impacts analysis exclusively on the conditions “expected to obtain” — 
i.e., projected to obtain — when a proposed project begins operating.  (Lead opn., 
ante, at pp. 12-13, italics added; see pt. II.B., post.)  The important takeaway from 
Communities for a Better Environment is our recognition that, while flexibility in 
establishing a baseline must be allowed, the selected baseline must result in a 
reliable evaluation of a project‟s impacts. 
                                              
4  
As the majority acknowledges, to the extent Court of Appeal decisions have 
held or suggested that sole use of a projected future conditions baseline is 
forbidden, they are wrong.  (E.g., Pfeiffer v. City of Sunnyvale City Council (2011) 
200 Cal.App.4th 1552; Madera Oversight Coalition, Inc. v. County of Madera 
(2011) 199 Cal.App.4th 48; Sunnyvale West Neighborhood Assn. v. City of 
Sunnyvale City Council (2010) 190 Cal.App.4th 1351.) 
 
7 
Generally, an abuse of discretion is established under CEQA “if the agency 
has not proceeded in a manner required by law or if the determination or decision 
is not supported by substantial evidence.”  (§ 21168.5.)  Because the language of 
Guidelines section 15125(a) clearly contemplates that an agency may depart from 
the norm of an existing conditions analysis, the proper inquiry is whether the 
agency acted reasonably given the nature and circumstances of the project, and 
whether substantial evidence supports its selected alternative baseline as a realistic 
measure of the physical conditions without the proposed project that provides an 
impacts analysis allowing for informed decisionmaking and public participation.  
(§ 21168.5; see Communities for a Better Environment, supra, 48 Cal.4th at 
pp. 315, 322.)  A reviewing court will “indulge all reasonable inferences from the 
evidence that would support the agency‟s determinations and resolve all conflicts 
in the evidence in favor of the agency‟s decision.”  (Save Our Peninsula 
Committee v. Monterey County Bd. of Supervisors (2001) 87 Cal.App.4th 99, 117 
(Save Our Peninsula).) 
“[A]s with all CEQA factual determinations,” the selection of a baseline is 
a discretionary determination reviewed “for support by substantial evidence.”  
(Communities for a Better Environment, supra, 48 Cal.4th at p. 328; see Fat v. 
County of Sacramento (2002) 97 Cal.App.4th 1270, 1278 [decision not to deviate 
from the norm also reviewed for substantial evidence].)  Substantial evidence 
supporting a predicted baseline may consist of reasonable assumptions and expert 
evaluations that are supported by facts.  (§ 21080, subd. (e)(1); Guidelines, 
§ 15384, subd. (b); see Eureka Citizens for Responsible Government v. City of 
Eureka (2007) 147 Cal.App.4th 357, 371-372; Save Our Peninsula, supra, 
87 Cal.App.4th at p. 120.)  The requirement that an agency‟s decision be 
supported by substantial evidence helps to ensure that a particular baseline will not 
 
8 
be selected unless there is evidence of a solid and credible nature warranting its 
use. 
During the lengthy administrative review process here, plaintiff Neighbors 
complained the EIR should have used a baseline of projected conditions in the 
year 2035 to allow for a proper evaluation of traffic congestion and air quality 
impacts.  In filing this lawsuit, however, Neighbors switched tactics and now 
claims the EIR is deficient in failing to use the regulatory baseline norm of the 
physical conditions existing “at the time the notice of preparation is published” 
(Guidelines, § 15125(a)), namely, a 2007 baseline.  No deficiency appears. 
The EIR explicitly states that Expo Phase 2 is designed, inter alia, to 
“provide high-capacity transit service,” to “[a]ccommodate existing population 
and employment growth and transit-supportive land use densities,” to “[p]rovide 
an effective transit alternative to the current and expected increase in roadway 
congestion in the corridor,” and to “[r]ealize environmental benefits associated 
with increased transit usage, such as improved air quality and energy efficiencies.”  
Thus, unlike projects that are industrial or commercial in nature, Expo Phase 2 
was conceived specifically to alleviate traffic congestion and improve air quality 
in full alignment with CEQA‟s objectives to enhance environmental quality and 
promote long-term protection of the environment.  (See § 21001; Mountain Lion 
Foundation v. Fish & Game Com. (1997) 16 Cal.4th 105, 112.) 
As pertinent here, the EIR presented and relied upon state-of-the-art 
forecasting models that accounted for existing traffic conditions, approved 
population and employment growth projections, and resulting changes in traffic.  
These models project, among other things, that between 2005 and 2030, daily 
vehicle miles traveled within the study area will increase by 27 percent (31 percent 
to 32 percent during peak hours), and daily vehicle hours will increase by 74 
percent (93 percent to 105 percent during peak hours).  In light of this and other 
 
9 
data, including the forecast that the transit system‟s opening day ridership in 2015 
will be only 77 percent of the ridership in 2030, Expo Authority approved the 
EIR‟s exclusive use of a 2030 baseline to evaluate the traffic and air quality 
impacts that would be associated with the system‟s usage at that time.5 
Significantly, no one here disputes the validity of the forecasting models 
and data used to project the physical conditions in 2030 or the accuracy of the 
EIR‟s analysis of the transit system‟s operational impacts using the 2030 baseline.  
As the EIR reflects, it evaluated the system‟s impacts on traffic utilizing an 
independently developed forecasting model6 that has been subjected to extensive 
peer review and certified by the Federal Transit Administration for use in 
environmental documents.  Notably, the model was updated and refined 
specifically for use in the EIR, in close coordination with that federal agency. 
Likewise, there is no evidence that the 2030 baseline was selected to 
manipulate the analysis of traffic congestion and air quality impacts.  As even 
                                              
5  
Consistent with CEQA requirements, Expo Authority reviewed the EIR at 
issue and approved its evaluation of Expo Phase 2‟s potential impacts and possible 
alternatives with an existing conditions baseline on all other environmental topics, 
including the impacts during the projected four-year construction period (2011-
2015).  (Guidelines, § 15125(a).)  These topics included visual quality (aesthetics), 
biological resources (vegetation and wildlife), cultural resources (including 
archaeological and historical resources), paleontological resources, geology, soils, 
and seismicity, hydrology and water quality, land use and planning, noise and 
vibration, parks and community facilities, safety and security (including delay of 
emergency service vehicles when waiting for light rail vehicles to cross an 
intersection), socioeconomics (including potential displacement and relocation of 
housing, residents, and businesses), and energy resources.  Expo Authority also 
reviewed the potential hazardous materials or conditions that could be 
encountered, given the existing conditions. 
 
6  
The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transit Authority developed the 
model with data inputs from a regional travel demand model developed by the 
Southern California Association of Governments. 
 
10 
Justice Werdegar acknowledges, use of the 2030 baseline resulted in an 
“extensive” and “detailed” analysis that demonstrates no grounds “to suppose the 
same analysis performed against existing traffic [and air quality] conditions would 
have produced any substantially different information.”  (Lead opn., ante, at p. 
28.) 
Indulging all reasonable inferences from the evidence that support Expo 
Authority‟s determinations and resolving all evidentiary conflicts in favor of its 
decision (Save Our Peninsula Committee, supra, 87 Cal.App.4th at p. 117), and 
for the reasons below, I conclude the agency did not abuse its discretion in 
forgoing an existing conditions baseline in favor of a 2030 baseline to measure 
Expo Phase 2‟s operational impacts. 
Expo Phase 2 was specifically designed to alleviate expected increases in 
“roadway congestion” and to “realize environmental benefits . . . such as improved 
air quality” based on a 2030 transit planning horizon.  Accordingly, Expo 
Authority could reasonably decide that an evaluation of the environmental 
conditions with and without the transit system in the year 2030, when the system 
will actually be operating, will allow for a meaningful understanding of its 
operational impacts on traffic and air quality.  Certainly, the fact that state-of-the-
art forecasting models predict substantial increases in the percentages of daily 
vehicle miles and vehicle hours from 2005 to 2030 provides ample basis for the 
agency‟s decision to dispense with an analysis based on 2007 traffic conditions 
which will no longer exist when the system is in operation.  Given the 
uncontroverted expert projections showing that traffic conditions and congestion 
at the studied intersections will be worse in 2030 than in 2005 (and in 2007), it 
stands to reason that analyzing the system‟s operational impacts under the more 
congested conditions of 2030 is not only realistic, but yields a more 
environmentally rigorous measure of such impacts than an analysis based on the 
 
11 
outdated and less congested conditions existing in 2007.  Selecting the 2030 
planning horizon as representative of operational conditions is logical for the 
additional reason that, despite the system‟s anticipated opening date of 2015, 
ridership at that point is projected to be at only 77 percent of the capacity 
anticipated in 2030. 
Moreover, as the validity of the forecasting models and the accuracy of the 
projected future conditions are not even in dispute, there can be no question that 
substantial evidence supported Expo Authority‟s predicted baseline.  (Guidelines, 
§ 15384, subd. (b); see Eureka Citizens for Responsible Government v. City of 
Eureka, supra, 147 Cal.App.4th at pp. 371-372; Save Our Peninsula, supra, 87 
Cal.App.4th at p. 120.)  Indeed, Justice Werdegar‟s prejudice analysis confirms 
that the EIR‟s assessment of Expo Phase 2‟s impacts, using the 2030 baseline, 
fulfilled the essential purpose of an EIR to provide the decision makers and the 
public in general with “detailed information about the effect which [the] proposed 
project is likely to have on the environment.”  (§ 21061; see also § 21002.1, subd. 
(a).) 
II. 
Instead of applying a straightforward abuse of discretion analysis, the 
majority holds:  “Projected future conditions may be used as the sole baseline for 
impacts analysis if their use in place of measured existing conditions — a 
departure from the norm stated in Guidelines section 15125(a) — is justified by 
unusual aspects of the project or the surrounding conditions.  That the future 
conditions analysis would be informative is insufficient, but an agency does have 
discretion to completely omit an analysis of impacts on existing conditions when 
inclusion of such an analysis would detract from an EIR’s effectiveness as an 
informational document, either because an analysis based on existing conditions 
would be uninformative or because it would be misleading to decision makers and 
 
12 
the public.”  (Lead opn., ante, at p. 11, italics added.)  Applying these rigid 
limitations, the majority concludes Expo Authority abused its discretion in 
approving the EIR‟s sole use of a 2030 baseline to measure Expo Phase 2‟s 
impacts on traffic and air quality. 
As explained below, the majority‟s analysis suffers from several significant 
flaws. 
A. The Majority’s Restrictions Find No Support in CEQA and are 
Contrary to Principles Governing Review of Agency Decisions 
First and foremost, the stated restrictions find no support in CEQA or its 
Guidelines.  Apart from emphasizing Guideline language stating that existing 
physical conditions will “normally” constitute the baseline for an impacts analysis 
(Guidelines, § 15125(a)) and that a lead agency should “normally” limit its 
examination to changes in the existing physical conditions (Guidelines, § 15126.2, 
subd. (a)), the majority offers no statutory or regulatory basis, and no evidence of 
legislative intent, reflecting that an agency has no discretion to omit an existing 
conditions analysis unless such an analysis is so utterly devoid of value that it is 
uninformative or misleading.  Without more, it is a stretch to construe the bare 
language of the Guidelines in this manner.  Nor are the Guidelines reasonably 
susceptible of a construction that bars an agency from selecting a projected future 
conditions analysis in lieu of an existing conditions analysis when the former 
(1) reflects a rational selection given the nature and circumstances of the project; 
(2) is realistic and furnishes substantial relevant information about a project‟s 
significant effects; and (3) otherwise allows for informed decisionmaking and 
informed public participation.7 
                                              
7  
The majority‟s citation to Guidelines section 15126.6, which requires an 
EIR to consider and discuss a range of reasonable alternatives to a proposed 
 
(footnote continued on next page) 
 
13 
In addition, the majority‟s restrictions do not align with the principle that an 
agency‟s selection of a baseline involves a discretionary determination of how to 
realistically measure a project‟s impacts.  (See Communities for a Better 
Environment, supra, 48 Cal.4th at pp. 327-328.)  When an agency reasonably 
relies on an alternative baseline, requiring an extra analysis with an existing 
conditions baseline is superfluous and runs counter to the CEQA principle that a 
reviewing court must defer to an agency‟s baseline selection when it is supported 
by the record, even if a different baseline would be equally reasonable — or 
perhaps even more reasonable — than the one selected.  (See Vineyard Area 
Citizens for Responsible Growth, Inc. v. City of Rancho Cordova (2007) 40 
Cal.4th 412, 435; Guidelines, § 15384, subd. (a).) 
The majority‟s abuse of discretion analysis also ignores the basic precepts 
that a certified EIR is presumed adequate and that “the party challenging the EIR 
has the burden of showing otherwise.”  (Santa Clarita Organization for Planning 
the Environment v. County of Los Angeles (2007) 157 Cal.App.4th 149, 158; see 
Save Our Peninsula, supra, 87 Cal.App.4th at p. 117.)  To wit, the majority finds 
the record lacking in substantial evidence justifying Expo Authority‟s decision to 
omit an analysis based on existing traffic congestion and air quality conditions.8  
Neighbors, however, never once contended during the administrative review 
process that the EIR was deficient for failing to use an existing conditions 
                                                                                                                                                              
(footnote continued from previous page) 
project, adds nothing to the analysis.  In the majority‟s own words, the Guideline 
“makes clear that normally the baseline for determining a project‟s significant 
adverse impacts is not the same as the no project alternative.”  (Lead opn., ante, at 
pp. 15-16, first italics added.)] 
 
8  
As explained, I conclude to the contrary.  (See pt. I., ante.) 
 
14 
analysis.  Although Neighbors‟s reply brief refers to other individuals who 
supposedly did so, none of the alleged comments or EIR responses thereto is 
included as part of the stipulated administrative record presented to the trial court 
or to this court.  Hence, while the record‟s perceived inadequacy on this point 
comes as no surprise under the circumstances, what is startling is the majority‟s 
determination that the inadequacy inures to the benefit of the EIR‟s challenger. 
Finally, the majority‟s gloss on Guidelines section 15125(a) is entirely 
unnecessary to advance the environmental goals of CEQA.  This is so because any 
baseline analysis — whether it evaluates the so-called norm of conditions existing 
before project approval or the conditions projected to exist at some future point — 
cannot be illusory and instead must be realistic and supported by substantial 
evidence.  (§ 21168.5; Guidelines, § 15384; see Communities for a Better 
Environment, supra, 48 Cal.4th at p. 322.) 
B. The Majority’s Analysis Creates Uncertainties Regarding CEQA 
Compliance and Will Increase Project Costs and Delays 
The majority‟s analysis also suffers from ambiguity on a number of levels.  
In particular, the majority fails to clarify whether its restrictions apply to all 
departures from the regulatory baseline norm.  By its terms, Guidelines section 
15125(a) designates only two environmental settings as the normal baseline:  “at 
the time the notice of preparation is published, or if no notice of preparation is 
published, at the time environmental analysis is commenced.”  The majority, 
however, identifies an alternative baseline based on a distinct third environmental 
setting — which it calls the “date-of-implementation baseline” — that reflects 
environmental conditions projected to exist “at the time the proposed project 
would go into operation.”  (Lead opn., ante, at p. 13.)  As the majority sees it, an 
agency might use such a baseline to analyze impacts when a project is not 
 
15 
scheduled to begin operations until years after the two events specified in 
Guidelines section 15125(a).9 
Although the majority finds that an agency has discretion to employ a date-
of-implementation baseline, it fails to explicitly state whether or not its restrictions 
on agency discretion apply when such a baseline is selected.  Logically, the 
restrictions should apply because the problems perceived by the majority 
regarding future conditions baselines in general would seem to apply equally to 
date-of-implementation baselines, particularly when a project takes several years 
to implement.  (See lead opn., ante, at pp. 16-17 [criticizing use of predictive 
models to forecast future conditions, even though the validity and accuracy of the 
models used here are not disputed].) 
Moreover, the term “date of implementation” is nowhere mentioned in 
Guidelines section 15125(a), and the majority points to no other CEQA Guideline 
or statute providing a definition.  While the majority offers its own definition of 
the term (the “environmental conditions that will exist when the project begins 
operations”; lead opn., ante, at p. 12), the absence of actual CEQA guidance on 
the issue creates uncertainty as to how much operation or implementation may be 
too much when determining the implementation date. 
                                              
9  
In this case, for example, a so-called date-of-implementation baseline 
would have measured Expo Phase 2‟s predicted impacts on conditions projected to 
exist in 2015, a full eight years after the notice of preparation of an EIR was 
published in 2007.  Although the majority essentially holds that use of a 2015 
baseline would have been a reasonable and proper exercise of discretion (see lead 
opn., ante, at pp. 12-13, 24, 27), there is no indication that view was shared by any 
agency or member of the public participating in the administrative review process.  
And as previously noted, Neighbors complained during the review process that a 
2035 baseline was required to accurately reflect the project‟s operational impacts. 
 
16 
Despite all this ambiguity, the majority appears to contemplate that use of a 
date-of-implementation baseline falls squarely within the existing conditions 
default.  (Lead opn., ante, at pp. 12-13.)  But the language of Guidelines section 
15125(a) is clear in designating only two environmental settings — both of which 
refer to physical conditions existing in the study area prior to a project’s approval 
— as the normal baseline.  Under the guise of construing the physical conditions 
in those two environmental settings as encompassing conditions predicted to exist 
years in the future when a project is scheduled to begin operations, the majority 
accomplishes two things:  while adding language to restrict an agency‟s discretion 
to omit an existing conditions analysis, the majority redefines what the Guideline 
means by “existing conditions,” so as to exempt this particular category of future 
conditions analysis from those restrictions.  But that is not all — the majority 
further suggests that a date-of-implementation analysis is properly understood as 
including an analysis based on yet another distinct environmental setting not 
mentioned in Guidelines section 15125(a), i.e., “impacts expected to occur during 
the project‟s early period of operation.”  (Lead opn., ante, at p. 13.)  Although the 
judicial maneuvering on this point is creative, this court has no power to rewrite 
the Guideline so as to make it conform to a presumed intention that is not 
expressed.  (See Vogel v. County of Los Angeles (1967) 68 Cal.2d 18, 26.) 
In any event, there is no need to rewrite Guidelines section 15125(a) to 
provide for ordinary discretionary use of a date-of-implementation baseline in lieu 
of an existing conditions baseline.  Rather, consistent with the Guideline‟s express 
contemplation that an existing conditions analysis is the norm but not mandatory, 
we should simply adhere to precedent recognizing that an agency enjoys discretion 
to select an alternative baseline that is reasonably suited to the nature of the project 
under environmental review and the totality of the circumstances under which the 
project is expected to occur.  (See Save Our Peninsula, supra, 87 Cal.App.4th at 
 
17 
pp. 125-126 [where environmental conditions vary over time it may be necessary 
to consider conditions over a range of time periods; in some cases, conditions 
closer to the date of project approval, which may be years after environmental 
review is commenced, may be more relevant to the impacts determination]; see 
also Communities for a Better Environment, supra, 48 Cal.4th at pp. 327-328 
[quoting Save Our Peninsula].)  Moreover, as with any analysis of impacts on 
projected future physical conditions, a date-of-implementation analysis must be 
realistic and supported by substantial evidence. 
Another issue is that the majority‟s restrictions on the exercise of agency 
discretion appear rather difficult to meet.  It is unclear how an agency might show 
that an existing conditions analysis would be “uninformative” or “misleading,” 
without actually conducting such an analysis.  (Lead opn., ante, at p. 11.)  It is also 
unclear just how “unusual” the aspects of a project or the surrounding conditions 
must be in order for a departure from the baseline norm to be “justified.”  (Ibid.)  
Indeed, even though both the trial court and the Court of Appeal found substantial 
evidence supporting Expo Authority‟s use of a 2030 baseline instead of a 2007 
baseline (as do I), the majority‟s finding to the contrary demonstrates how 
rigorous the burden is intended to be. 
Finally, because the majority so narrowly circumscribes an agency‟s 
discretion to depart from the regulatory baseline norm, the burdens and delay 
associated with preparing and defending EIRs are likely to increase.  That is, even 
though CEQA expressly permits use of an alternative baseline in lieu of an 
existing conditions baseline, and even though use of an alternative baseline, 
standing alone, would allow for informed decisionmaking and public participation, 
the EIR must also include an analysis of the project‟s impacts on existing 
conditions unless its inclusion actually diminishes the EIR‟s effectiveness as an 
informational document.  The majority‟s imposition of this extra analytical 
 
18 
requirement is wasteful and directly at odds with the dual legislative commands 
that courts shall not interpret CEQA or the Guidelines in a manner that imposes 
additional substantive requirements (§ 21083.1), and that agencies must not 
engage in unnecessary and costly administrative processes that do not materially 
improve public disclosure or informed decisionmaking (§ 21003, subd. (f)). 
III. 
In sum, it cannot be disputed that a lead agency‟s “determination of the 
proper baseline for a project can be difficult and controversial, particularly when 
the physical conditions in the vicinity of the project are subject to fluctuations” or 
other significant changes.  (Cherry Valley, supra, 190 Cal.App.4th at p. 337.)  For 
all the reasons above, I conclude that an agency retains discretion to omit an 
analysis of a project‟s likely impacts with an existing conditions baseline, so long 
as the selected alternative of a projected future conditions baseline is supported by 
substantial evidence and results in a realistic impacts analysis that allows for 
informed decisionmaking and public participation. 
I further conclude that, given the nature and the circumstances of the light 
rail project at issue, Expo Authority reasonably selected a 2030 baseline in lieu of 
an existing conditions baseline for measuring the project‟s operational impacts on 
traffic congestion and air quality.  Finally, in light of the undisputed validity of the 
forecasting models used to predict the future traffic and air quality conditions, I 
also conclude that substantial evidence supports the 2030 baseline as a realistic 
baseline for analyzing the project‟s impacts. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
BAXTER, J. 
WE CONCUR: 
CANTIL-SAKAUYE, C.J. 
CHIN, J. 
 
1 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
CONCURRING AND DISSENTING OPINION BY LIU, J. 
 
 
I agree with the entirety of the court‟s well-reasoned opinion except for the 
conclusion that the error in the environmental impact report (EIR) was not 
prejudicial.  On this record, I cannot confidently infer that the EIR‟s failure to 
measure impacts against a baseline of existing conditions did not deprive the 
public of relevant information about the project. 
The court‟s lucid analysis of the California Environmental Quality Act 
(CEQA) and applicable regulations firmly supports its holding that existing 
conditions comprise the normal baseline for measuring environmental impacts and 
that an agency may forego analyzing impacts against a baseline of existing 
conditions only “if such an analysis would be uninformative or misleading to 
decision makers and the public.”  (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 14, fn. omitted.)  Further, 
in light of Communities for a Better Environment v. South Coast Air Quality 
Management Dist. (2010) 48 Cal.4th 310, 328, the court is correct that “an 
existing conditions analysis may take account of environmental conditions that 
will exist when the project begins operations; the agency is not strictly limited to 
those prevailing during the period of EIR preparation.”  (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 12; 
see id. at p. 13 [“[A] date-of-implementation baseline does not share the principal 
problem presented by a baseline of conditions expected to prevail in the more 
 
2 
distant future following years of project operation — it does not omit impacts 
expected to occur during the project‟s early period of operation.”].) 
Here, the Exposition Metro Line Construction Authority (Expo Authority) 
used a baseline of existing conditions to measure most of the predicted effects of 
the light-rail project, but it used a baseline of conditions projected to exist in 2030 
to measure the project‟s expected impacts on traffic congestion and air quality.  It 
is undisputed that the agency properly considered what the long-term impacts of 
the project would be in 2030.  The issue is whether the agency properly considered 
those long-term impacts to the exclusion of any short-term impacts.  In measuring 
traffic and air quality impacts solely against projected conditions in 2030, the EIR 
provided no analysis of such impacts against a baseline of existing conditions, 
including conditions in 2015 when the project is scheduled to begin operations. 
As today‟s opinion explains:  “Even when a project is intended and 
expected to improve conditions in the long term — 20 or 30 years after an EIR is 
prepared — decision makers and members of the public are entitled under CEQA 
to know the short- and medium-term environmental costs of achieving that 
desirable improvement.  These costs include not only the impacts involved in 
constructing the project but also those the project will create during its initial years 
of operation.  Though we might rationally choose to endure short- or medium-term 
hardship for a long-term, permanent benefit, deciding to make that trade-off 
requires some knowledge about the severity and duration of the near-term 
hardship.”  (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 16.) 
Here, there is “no substantial evidence supporting the Expo Authority‟s 
decision to omit an analysis of the project‟s traffic and air quality impacts on 
existing environmental conditions.”  (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 24.)  “By focusing 
solely on the project‟s operational impacts in the distant future, the EIR neglects to 
inform the public and decision makers explicitly of any operational impacts that 
 
3 
could occur in the project‟s first 15 years of operation.”  (Ibid.)  The fact “that 
project area population, traffic, and emissions of air pollutants are expected to 
continue increasing through and beyond 2030 does not justify the agency‟s failure 
to analyze operational impacts under earlier conditions.  The expectation of 
change may make it important for the agency to also examine impacts under 
future conditions . . . , but it does not constitute substantial evidence supporting a 
determination that an existing conditions analysis would be uninformative or 
misleading.”  (Id. at p. 25.) 
After reaching these conclusions, the court holds that the EIR‟s failure to 
measure traffic and air quality impacts against existing conditions was harmless in 
this case.  The court reasons that the EIR‟s extensive analysis of traffic congestion 
against conditions projected to exist in 2030 “demonstrates the lack of grounds to 
suppose the same analysis performed against existing traffic conditions would 
have produced any substantially different information.”  (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 28.)  
But the fact that the project in 2030 is expected to have only a small effect on 
traffic congestion when compared to conditions in 2030 provides no reason to 
think that the project in 2015, at the start of operations, would have no greater 
impact when compared to conditions in 2015. 
The EIR compared measures of congestion in 2030 if the project is built to 
measures of congestion in 2030 if the project is not built.  But the measures of 
congestion in 2030 if the project is not built reflect significant predicted increases 
in congestion due to population growth.  Thus it is not surprising that the project is 
expected to have little impact on congestion in 2030 when measured against the 
heightened congestion expected in 2030.  But that finding sheds no light on the 
extent or magnitude of the project‟s traffic impacts when it begins to operate in 
2015, before the predicted increase in congestion due to population growth from 
2015 to 2030.  Without knowing how significant this transient impact on traffic 
 
4 
congestion might be, how are the public and decision makers to decide whether 
the short-term pain is worth the long-term gain promised by the light-rail project? 
It is not speculative to suggest that examining the project‟s impact on traffic 
congestion in 2015 would yield different results.  When the project begins to 
operate, ridership is expected to be at 77 percent of its eventual level.  During that 
initial period, there may be an influx of cars to areas around the new transit 
stations, as people come to ride the train.  While it is reasonable to assume that the 
worsening of congestion solely due to population growth is a more-or-less linear 
process, it is also reasonable to posit that the increase in congestion if the project is 
built would take the shape of a curve, with an initial steep increase due to an influx 
of cars and riders that later tapers off as the public adjusts to the new system.  At 
the very least, it is not implausible to think that things may get worse before they 
get better.  As Neighbors for Smart Rail contends, focusing solely on impacts in 
2030 may mask earlier effects:  intersections that are projected to worsen to 
critical levels of congestion if the project is not built may reach those levels sooner 
if the project is built.  Or maybe not — but either way, CEQA does not permit the 
agency to simply leave the public guessing. 
The EIR‟s measure of air quality impacts suffers from the same problem.  
The EIR says the project, at full ridership, is expected to reduce vehicle miles 
traveled by 0.38 percent in 2030.  The 0.38 percent figure reflects the differential 
between (a) vehicle miles driven in 2030 if the project is built and (b) vehicle 
miles driven in 2030 if the project is not built.  From this, the court extrapolates 
that “the 77 percent initial ridership implies that initially the project will reduce 
vehicle miles traveled only by 0.29 percent.”  (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 30, fn. 11.)  
The court derives the 0.29 percent figure by comparing (a) vehicle miles driven in 
2015 when the project begins operation with 77 percent ridership and (b) vehicle 
miles driven in 2030 if the project is not built.  The proper comparison, however, 
 
5 
is the differential between (a) vehicle miles driven in 2015 when the project begins 
operation with 77 percent ridership and (b) vehicle miles driven in 2015 if the 
project is not built.  As with traffic congestion, there is reason to believe the 
project might actually increase vehicle miles driven in the short term, as new 
transit stations attract people from near and far to ride the light rail.  Further, 
without some analysis of the issue, we can only guess what portion of light-rail 
riders consists of people who would otherwise drive or ride cars to reach their 
destinations as opposed to new commuters who, but for the project, would not 
have traveled to their destinations at all, by car or otherwise. 
For the reasons above, I respectfully disagree with the court‟s conclusion 
that the EIR‟s failure to measure traffic congestion and air quality impacts against 
a baseline of existing conditions “did not deprive agency decision makers or the 
public of substantial information relevant to approving the project.”  (Maj. opn., 
ante, at p. 30.)  In all other respects, I join the court‟s opinion. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
LIU, J. 
 
 
See last page for addresses and telephone numbers for counsel who argued in Supreme Court. 
 
Name of Opinion Neighbors for Smart Rail v. Exposition Metro Line Construction Authority 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Unpublished Opinion 
Original Appeal 
Original Proceeding 
Review Granted XXX 205 Cal.App.4th 552 
Rehearing Granted 
 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Opinion No. S202828 
Date Filed: August 5, 2013 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Court: Superior 
County: Los Angeles 
Judge: Thomas I. McKnew, Jr. 
 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Counsel: 
 
Elkins Kalt Weintraub Reuben Gartside, John M. Bowman and C. J. Laffer for Plaintiff and Appellant. 
 
Alexander T. Henson for Sunnyvale West Neighborhood Association as Amicus Curiae on behalf of 
Plaintiff and Appellant. 
 
Nossaman, Robert D. Thornton, John J. Flynn III, Robert C. Horton, Lauren C. Valk and Lloyd W. Pellman 
for Defendants and Respondents. 
 
Cole Pedroza, Curtis A. Cole, Kenneth R. Pedroza and Matthew S. Levinson for Associated General 
Contractors of California as Amicus Curiae on behalf of Defendants and Respondents. 
 
Marcia L. Scully, Adam C. Kear; Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, Lisabeth D. Rothman and Amy M. 
Steinfeld for Association of California Water Agencies as Amicus Curiae on behalf of Defendants and 
Respondents. 
 
Andrea Sheridan Ordin and John F. Krattli, County Counsel, Ronald W. Stamm, Principal Deputy County 
Counsel; Remy Moose Manley, Tiffany K. Wright, Sabrina V. Teller and Amanda R. Berlin for Real 
Parties in Interest. 
 
Remy, Thomas, Moose and Manley, Tiffany K. Wright; Woodruff, Spradlin & Smart, Bradley R. Hogin 
and Ricia R. Hager for Southern California Association of Governments, Foothill/Eastern Transportation 
Corridor Agency, San Joaquin Hills Transportation Corridor Agency, Metropolitan Water District of 
Southern California, San Joaquin Council of Governments, Madera County Transportation Commission, 
Riverside County Transportation Commission, Contra Costa Transportation Authority, Metro Gold Line 
Foothill Extension Construction Authority, Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority, Orange County 
Transportation Authority and San Francisco County Transportation Authority as Amici Curiae on behalf of 
Defendants and Respondents and Real Parties in Interest. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Page 2 – counsel continued 
 
Counsel: 
 
Cox, Castle& Nicholson, Michael H. Zischke, Andrew B. Sabey, Rachel R. Jones; Carmen A. Trutanich, 
City Attorney (Los Angeles), Andrew J. Nocas, Timothy McWilliams and Siegmund Shyu, Deputy City 
Attorneys; Marsha Jones Moutrie, City Attorney (Santa Monica), Joseph Lawrence, Deputy City Attorney; 
Carol Schwab, City Attorney (Culver City); John F. Kratli, County Counsel (Los Angeles), Thomas J. 
Faugnan, Assistant County Counsel, and Helen S. Parker, Principal Deputy County Counsel, for League of 
California Cities, California State Association of Counties, City of Los Angeles, County of Los Angeles, 
Culver City and City of Santa Monica as Amici Curiae on behalf of Defendants and Respondents and Real 
Parties in Interest. 
 
Kurt R. Wiese, Barbara B. Baird and Veera Tyagi for South Coast Air Quality Management District as 
Amicus Curiae on behalf of Defendants and Respondents and Real Parties in Interest. 
 
Sedgwick, Anna C. Shimko, Matthew D. Francois and Sigrid R. Waggener for California Building Industry 
as Amicus Curiae on behalf of Defendants and Respondents and Real Parties in Interest. 
 
Shute, Mihaly & Weinberger, Robert S. Perlmutter and Maya Kuttan for Sierra Club and Center for 
Biological Diversity as Amicus Curiae. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Counsel who argued in Supreme Court (not intended for publication with opinion): 
 
John M. Bowman 
Elkins Kalt Weintraub Reuben Gartside 
2049 Century Park East, Suite 2700 
Los Angeles, CA  90067 
(310) 746-4400 
 
Robert D. Thornton 
Nossaman 
18101 Von Karman Avenue, Suite 1800 
Irvine, CA  92612 
(949) 833-7800