Sig Anderman on the quarries

Sig Anderman, a board member of FPA who has researched the quarries, has this to say about the plan to expand them:

The gravel quarries, as they now operate, let alone expanded, don't belong in a residential area. Started decades ago, with use permits of limited duration, covering limited land area, these quarries have 'had their run.'

The quarries now overwhelm our small town - with up to 700 gravel trucks a day (according to the quarries' count) rolling through town or down Mirabel Road. With noise of crushing, loading and back-up whistles starting at 7 in the morning, six days a week disturbing neighbors for miles, with unsightly equipment and rockpiles intruding on our Scenic Highway. And worst of all, with toxic diesel fumes from quarry trucks poisoning our air for everyone adult and child visiting, living, or working in Forestville.

While we need gravel for construction (the Forestville gravel is used mainly for road beds, as I understand it), most other populated areas in these parts(San Francisco, Marin County) have long since given up quarrying in residential neighborhoods, and turned to imports from less populated areas. That way everyone bears the real 'cost' associated with gravel production, not just the unlucky neighbors of the quarries burdened with the relentless traffic, the intrusive noise, the poisonous diesel fumes, and the unsightly operations.

Anectodes about people 'favoring the quarries' (do they also favor the traffic and the toxic fumes?) are very much at odds with the sentiments expressed at town meeting after town meeting when the topic is invariably raised. At the town meeting held specifically to discuss the quarries, after presentations by both the quarries, and full, open discussion, a show of hands showed four (4)people in favor of expansion and seventy-one (71) opposed. A written survey was distributed at the last town meeting. The results: two (2) in favor of expansion and everyone else opposed.

There are many other sources of road bed gravel - other than the Russian River. Most residential communities have turned to them already. Sooner or later, we will have to as well. Let's do it sooner, rather than later, before all the damage is done.

Please come discuss the issue with Sig and others in our The Quarries discussion.

Comments

[Vesta Copestakes]

I think it's important that when Sig expresses his opinions about the quarries, that he states he is doing so as a Forestville citizen - NOT as a board member of the FPA since that implies that it's an FPA supported stand. Sig is also a member of Forestville Citizens for Sensible Growth, who have taken a firm stand against the quarries. I should think that would suffice as credibility for his personal opinion. I do not believe that the FPA has taken a united stand on this issue.

I, for one, am one of the original FPA interim board members, and I simply don't agree with Sig across the board. I feel very strongly that gravel and gravel products are part of a rural life, from drainage to septic systems and gravel driveways. By using gravel instead of blacktop and concrete, we preserve the natural water filtering system gravel provides and protect our earth from the petrochecmical properties of blacktop and the alkalinity of concrete.

Until the bypass is built, I would support the territorial expansion of the quarries but not the production increase BoDean is requesting. Canyon Rock is not seeking to increase production.

Both quarries use state-of-the art environmental protection systems, as required by law. People who move here to get away from city life need to understand there are certain factors of country life that make sense in an earth and forest environment. Mining rock from the earth is far superior to mining it from our river. Transporting it short distances is far superior to transporting it over long distances using fuel and contributing to air pollution. Until diesel trucks start using vegetable oil fuel on a mass basis, we need to consider these factors.