CHRIS RUVO – Read original post here.
Concern and controversy continue to swirl around resumed operations at a long-dormant quarry in East Rockhill.
On Tuesday, the township’s board of supervisors voted to approve lowering the speed limit on a stretch of North Rockhill Road to 25 mph.
The local governing board made the decision out of concern over the information that anywhere from 50 to 150 trucks a day from Rockhill Quarry, located on North Rockhill Road, will be using the road to haul load. Supervisors want to ensure those trucks are traveling at speeds that don’t pose a threat to other drivers and pedestrians.
“The ordinance is a safety measure due to anticipated additional traffic on the road from Rockhill Quarry,” said Township Manager Marianne Morano, noting the 25 mph zone stretches from the bridge over the railroad tracks to Old Bethlehem Pike.
Supervisors also approved the legal services of Manko, Gold, Katcher and Fox, an environmental and energy law practice, to assist the township solicitor in the ongoing Rockhill Quarry Zoning Hearing Board hearings. Supervisors allocated a $10,000 retainer to the firm.
In other quarry news, East Rockhill is seeking an injunction that would effectively prevent quarry operator Richard E. Pierson Materials Corp. and site owner Hanson Aggregates Pennsylvania from building or operating an asphalt plant at the site until gaining approval and permits to do so from the township.
The injunction request also asks a judge to rule that the quarry be prevented from making any more land development improvements until it receives approval from East Rockhill.
The township filed for the injunction in the Bucks County Court of Common Pleas. No hearing date had been scheduled as of press time, according to Morano.
The quarry has been the subject of heated, well-attended hearings before the East Rockhill Zoning Hearing Board in recent months. The hearings have focused on Pierson and Hanson’s appeal of a township zoning officer’s decision that found that special exception approval from the Zoning Hearing Board is needed to operate the quarry.
Operations at the quarry have continued during the hearing process. Hearings resume at 6 p.m. June 13, at Pennridge High School.
The quarry had been inactive since the early 1980s, until operations resumed in recent months. Residents are concerned the quarry’s work will lead to everything from road hazards and diminished property values, to intrusive noise, groundwater depletion, pollution of water sources, and more.
Pierson is operating the site in support of its $224 million contract with the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission to reconstruct and widen seven miles of the Northeast Extension from Lansdale to a mile marker west of Sellersville.
The township also doesn’t dispute that it has issued zoning permits or licenses to the quarry in recent years, but says those permits were for an inactive quarry after operations at the site died down in the early 1980s.
In order to get a permit now that the quarry wants to resume operations, it will require a more detailed application and special exception approval from the zoning hearing board, the township says.
In answer to a question at the May 16 session about the previous ones being issued without requiring a special exception, Morano said, “It’s my position they were issued for an inoperable quarry and now to get it operating, they need to follow the current zoning ordinance, which requires special exception.”
Morano also said that in the 21 years she’s worked for the township, she never knew of any active quarrying operations at the site until the attempts to resume quarrying began late last year.
The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, however, classifies a quarry as operational so long as it removes a minimum of 500 tons of materials per year for commercial use, a quarry attorney said.
In answer to questioning, Morano said the DEP has provided documentation that level was met in the years 2000 through 2016.
The zoning hearing board case comes from the quarry’s appeal of Morano’s denial of this year’s permit for the quarry. Also in dispute is the quarry’s contention that it is allowed to have an asphalt plant at the quarry as an accessory use. The township says asphalt plants are allowed in areas zoned for industrial use, which the quarry is not.
The quarry is owned by Hanson Aggregates Pennsylvania. Richard E. Pierson Materials Corp. is leasing it and plans to use stone from it for the widening project of the Northeast Extension of the Pennsylvania Turnpike in Lower Salford, Franconia and Salford townships.
Neighbors of the quarry site have raised concerns including noise, blasting, truck traffic and road safety, and the effects on neighboring wells.
Because of the large crowds, the hearings have been moved to Pennridge High School.
Morano was the first witness to testify and be cross-examined after being called by the applicant. She’s expected to be called back as a witness when the township presents its case, township solicitor Patrick Armstrong said.
The next session will be 6 p.m. Wednesday, June 13, Scott MacNair, the zoning board’s solicitor, said. Township information lists the following two dates for the hearings as Thursdays, July 12 and Aug. 9.
Traffic engineer David Horner will be the next witness, Robert Gundlach Jr., Pierson’s attorney in the case, said.