Ground hog day again with Daracon and Umwelt. In February Umwelt and Daracon held a hastily convened Collaborative Assessment Forum (CAF) at Tocal College to present the results of Social Impact Assessment work Umwelt have been performing.
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Daracon and Umwelt re start their State Significant Development Application
Since September last year residents surrounding the site and those who live adjacent to the haulage route within the villages of Martins Creek and Paterson have had the pleasure of rural amenity without blasting, crusher noise, dust nor hundreds of daily unlawful quarry truck movements.
The experience for many impacted residents once quarry operations were brought into compliance with the law has been life changing.
So 12 months on since residents last heard from Daracon many residents (not all though) have been greeted with a glossy brochure “Martins Creek Quarry Update Information Sheet No.2” in the mail. The brochure has been crafted by Daracon and Umwelt spin doctors announcing new project refinements
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Court of Appeal Dismiss Daracon Appeal
The appeal was heard by Justices Basten, Gleeson and Chief Justice Preston, and they upheld the key findings of the primary judge; that Daracon contrary to the current development consent are unlawfully extracting rock other than primarily for railway ballast, quarrying beyond the area to which the consent applied, dispatching a greater percentage of material by road than was allowable.
Land & Environment Court Decision Handed Down
The decision handed down by his Honor Justice Molesworth has confirmed that the operations and current scale of Daracon’s Martins Creek Quarry is largely illegal
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Daracon's Refined Project Announced
If you were one of the lucky few who have received the Daracon flyer in the mail you will have learnt that Daracon has "refined" the Martins Creek Quarry Expansion Project.
They say in their flyer after reviewing all of the submissions, Daracon have chosen to amend the project parameters as follows;
1,100,000 tonne per annum
60 truck movements per hour
280 truck movements per day
Un committed tonnage of product by rail
7am starting time at the quarry for loading of trucks
MCQAG has never advocated for the closure of Martins Creek Quarry, only that any new consents require the facility to operate at a more reasonable scale that enables the quarry to coexist with residents and neighbours around the site and along the haulage route.
The MCQAG committee’s view of the “Refined Project” is that the 7am starting time for load out of trucks and quarry operations is good news for impacted residents however the intensity of the operation proposed on an hourly basis in this refinement match and even exceeds that which was experienced in 2014 and 2015 when life around the facility and along the haulage route (particularly within the activity centre of Paterson) was simply unlivable; with intolerable impacts on our way of life, rural amenity and village character.
The proposed increase in daily truck traffic is a 1166% increase in the currently approved 24 trucks per day from the site and the annual extraction limit proposed is a 300% increase from the currently approved 300,000 tonne per annum scale.
We Recommend You Take the Following Action
Umwelt is commencing stakeholder engagement with affected residents. MCQAG encourages you all to register your interest with Umwelt (via their email social-team@umwelt.com.au) to ensure you get to participate in their consultation process. Importantly MCQAG strongly recommends you;
Register with Umwelt to participate in the consultation process (one on one interviews and collaborative forums) using the email above
When dealing with Umwelt, remain steadfast regarding the issues that effect you and your community, remember the issues and impacts detailed in your submissions have most likely not been addressed with the refined project parameters listed above
Keep records of your discussions with Umwelt
Do not allow Umwelt or Daracon to divide and conquer, We must all remain united together to fight against the scale of the refined project to protect our way of life, rural amenity and village character.
Department of Planning gets the message at community meeting
It was a full house in the Paterson School of Arts Hall last night, standing room only.
After intros from official attendees; Dept Planning, Daracon, EPA, Dungog Shire, Dept Premier & Cabnet and Maitland State MP. Howard Reed Director of Resource Assessment from NSW Department of Planning opened by explaining the process and told the audience that the determination of the project would go through the independent Planning and Assessment Commission (PAC).
He advised he had visited and met with Daracon and quarry staff, Martins Creek residents and other relevant community groups. The meeting was then opened to the floor for community to ask questions and lodge their concerns.
During the evening a gentleman in the audience moved a motion "that the community reject any expansion of Martins Creek Quarry and demand the Government and Dungog Shire Council regulate existing consents" The motion was seconded and then overwhelmingly passed in favor by a show of hands from the audience.
At the end of the evening Howard Reed stated he was now well aware that the community was resolute an forthright in their views and he would have to take that with him back to Sydney.
Here below were just a few of the comments collected from the crowd attesting to the current impacts, the lack of consultation and known future impacts that would occur from an expansion of the facility;