A new gravel pit is going into the southwest community of West Springs to support the construction of the ring road and some people living in area are worried about the potential health impacts.
The aggregate operation will bring noise and traffic to the area but the biggest concern for residents is the gravel crushing part of the project.
“We’re not supportive of the gravel crushing and that’s what produces the silica, which we have a concern about and that could cause lung diseases,” said Kummy Tharmalingam, area resident. “The gravel crushing produces silica dust and once you inhale it, it’s in your lungs, its permanent and it can cause severe respiratory system issues as well as maybe even cancer.”
Tharmalingam’s property backs onto the site and she is worried about how dust from the crushing facility will affect her family’s health.
“It’s going to just look like a pit, a mining facility basically with construction twelve hours a day, seven days a week for four years and it gets pretty windy out here. ” she said. “So for example my daughter cannot go into the backyard during the summer at all so, and she has asthma so that’s a big concern for me.”
The contractor was offered the option to put a gravel pit in the community when they bid for the project and Alberta Transportation says it can’t be moved elsewhere.
“This is not an option because this was provided as an option to the contractor,” said Rizwan Hussain, Urban Construction Manager with Alberta Transportation. “The contractor has decided to choose this option. The crushing has to happen at this location, however, we’ll have effective measures in place to ensure that we are a good neighbour and there is no negative impact to the environment or the health.”
A community meeting was held in February with the project engineer and the area MLA and city councillor and residents say they asked for the assessment at that time but are still waiting to hear back.
“We’re asking for a health risk assessment to make sure it’s okay to have gravel crushing right behind our backyard,” said Tharmalingam. “They haven’t really done much consultation, correspondence with the community and we just were requesting for a health risk assessment just because we’re concerned about the health impact.”
“That is going to be a big project as well so, and the noise and just the volume as well, you know, the truck traffic and they start early in the morning and so it’s just, it’s just going to add those layers, it’s going to be difficult to live with for the next five to seven years until it’s completed,” said Christine Taitinger area resident.
Alberta Transportation says information was mailed out to residents and that a public open house was held late last year but only about 40 people attended.
Officials say the health assessment has been done and that the public should not be concerned.
“We have done the environmental health assessment to ensure that there is no negative health issues with the public,” said Hussain. “I do not see there’s any reason for the public to be concerned because Alberta Transportation is committed to the safety of the workers and the public and public health is our highest priority and biggest concern. We are going above and beyond to ensure that there is no negative impact because of the crushing operation or our pit operation.“
Hussain says they are a number of measures in place to mitigate the impact of the project on residents.
“The dust suppression plan will be there to ensure that there is no exceedance of this dust or fine particulates that may have a negative effect or impact on the environment or on the residents. We want to make sure that our workers are safe. We want to make sure all the residents are safe so we have come up with an extensive program to avoid any negative impact,” he said. “This includes construction of an earthen berm, which will be four metres high. We’ll have a ten metre buffer between the properties and the berm. There will also be other measures, which will include, we’ll use water to minimize any dust while the crushing operation is ongoing.”
Alberta Transportation says it will monitor the project until it is complete and that it will provide data on assessments on its website.
