ARTHUR – Teeswater Concrete is looking to expand it’s operations to Wellington County with a new facility in Arthur.
Consultants working on the site plan and preparations appeared before Wellington North council Monday to request a zoning change to the proposed location at Macaulay Street and Eliza Street. It would allow for a ready-mix plant to be put on a parcel of land severed from the lot owned by Clark Brother’s Contracting.
Planning consultant Ron Davidson explained to council any ready-mix concrete plant in Ontario requires environmental compliance approval from the Ministry of the Environment to ensure it does not create noise and dust issues.
“This involves the operator retaining the services of an engineering consultant to conduct site specific testing of the plant and the ongoing monitoring and recording of operations to ensure that the plant is operating within the terms and conditions set out in the environmental approvals,” said Davidson.
Slavi Grozev is a noise expert with RWDI Consulting and Engineering. He told council the plant must follow noise, pollution control guidelines laid out by the Ministry of the Environment and assured council that the noise heard from neighbouring properties would not exceed a normal conversation.
“We modelled the impacts at the nearest existing residence, this is what the Ministry of the Environment is concerned with,” explained Grozev. “We modelled that the impacts will be about 49 decibels and the permitted limit by the Ministry of the Environment is 50.”
Sarah Pellat is an air quality expert with RWDI. She explained they used computer modelling based off the Teeswater Concrete plant in Hanover and expects air pollution will not be an issue.
“The plans for the Arthur site are to be more enclosed compared to the Hanover site so we expect dust levels to be lower,” said Pellat. “The overall approach would be similar to what we did for Hanover but would take in account specific site plans and operational plans for the Arthur facility.”
Council received one letter objecting to the proposal from Cachet Homes who have a housing development in the area. In a letter from the company’s lawyer, they raised concerns about the impact of future development, arguing the proposal is premature, no compatibility studies or traffic studies have been done. Council will be voting on the zoning amendment at a future meeting.
