Quarry owner again seeks to expand operations north of Fredericton
CBC
A construction company that ran into opposition when it tried to expand its Fredericton-area quarry eight years ago is trying again.
For almost a decade, Mira Construction Ltd. has operated a large quarry between Royal and Claudie roads just north of the Fredericton city limits near the community of Estey's Bridge.
Now the company is asking for rezoning of two parcels of land, or more than 12½ hectares, near the quarry.
This would mean changing the zoning from golf course and single/two-family residential to gravel pit.
The proposed change was presented this week to the Central York Rural Community council by the Capital Region Service Commission, which has jurisdiction over the region's planning and development process.
Mira has tried before to get those properties rezoned, and considered taking another crack at the zoning in 2021, according to documents provided by the municipality of Central York, where the quarry resides.
Just before the 2014 election, before the creation of Central York as a rural municipality, the Progressive Conservative government of David Alward approved the quarry, but there was no environmental impact assessment of the project.
In 2017, a proposal to open a second quarry drew much opposition from residents and was rejected by Brian Gallant's Liberal government.
And in 2019, Mira Construction's quarry operations became a hot topic again. A People's Alliance MLA trying to get something done about quarry truck traffic threatened to vote against the budget estimates of the Environment Department, undermining his party's alliance with the PC minority government of Blaine Higgs.
CBC obtained the commission's presentation on the latest expansion request, which has drawn seven written comments against and three in favour.
As was the case when the company sought to expand quarrying in 2017, local residents have concerns.
Stanislav Tilchonov has lived in Estey's Bridge for 12 years, remembers what it was like before the quarry started.
"I was a little bit different," he said. "It was quiet, it was nice you could see all the beauty and the trees."
But with the quarry, heavy truck traffic and noise from blasts are hard to miss, he said.
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