East Fort Worth Neighbors Upset Over Proposed Concrete Recycling Plant

There's a new project up for debate in Fort Worth, but to some neighbors there it sounds all-too familiar.

It's something no one wants in their back yard that may wind up on the east side.

It's a concrete recycling plant, turning old concrete into gravel, proposed for a plot of land on East 1st Street, close to where it turns into Randol Mill Road.

But that’s right at the spot where a new bridge went in, the road's being widened and it's just across from a growing Gateway Park.

Many concerned neighbors say it just doesn't belong there.

On the east side of Fort Worth, there’s something just out of reach, a vision for the future where bikers hit the trails at Gateway Park and a newly-widened East 1st Street opens the doors to downtown.

“I see enormous potential, if we take care of it,” said Rita Vinson, President of the Fort Worth League of Neighborhood Associations.

Neighborhood leaders think the proposed concrete recycling facility across the street from Gateway Park threatens that vision.

“It seems a waste, it seems like we’re putting up an obstacle for the kinds of development and improvements I can see and growth, on this east side,” said Fred Fernandez, President of the White Lake Hills Neighborhood Association.

The plant would go in up the road from Chesapeake Energy, but it’s also near several neighborhoods, schools and the park. Fifty trucks a day would enter the 80-acre site from East 1st Street.

Neighbors are worried about traffic, noise and air pollution.

“Nobody’s going to want to come and play next to a plant,” said one Gateway Park visitor, Holley Marshall. “No one’s going to want to bring their little ones, and their dogs, because they’re our family, too. You don’t want to bring your family to that.”

But project managers say they’ll set the plant back 1,000 feet from the road and keep it 3,000 feet from the nearest home. The state will also monitor air quality and noise to match environmental standards.

But neighbors still don't like it.

“It’s just, it’s just an insult,” said Fernandez.

There's a public meeting set for Tuesday night at 6:30 in the nearby Nolan Catholic High School auditorium, where neighbors can hear from the developers and share their concerns.

The project needs approval from the city zoning commission to go ahead.

That meeting is planned for June 8.

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