One of the big concerns that many of us have, as we hear about these mining permits, is mining trucks on our roads.
The roads in Buffalo County are narrow, winding, and they go up and down steep hills. Imagining large numbers of heavy semi-trucks traversing them every day – competing with local traffic – is scary.
Mike drove and videoed our road (State Highway 88) where it goes over the ridge into the next valley. It’s hard to get a sense of the steep grade in the video, but it does show the curves, and the steep drop at the edge.
This road has almost no shoulders, no guard rails, a steep grade, and a steep drop all along one side, starting at the top and going nearly all the way to the bottom. It’s a favorite road of motorcyclists, but one or two usually die every year going over the edge and down that steep slope.
Here’s a tour – courtesty of Mike O’Connor and Google Maps – of the same road over that hill (including the memorial to one of the crash victims).
When the companies apply for permits, they agree to a specified haul route, a maximum number of loads they will haul per day, and the hours they will haul (this may be different from the hours the mine is operating).
The haul routes – so far – have been restricted to state roads. We have 3 state roads that run through the county, so all the mine trucks will have to use these 3 roads to get to a processing plant or to the railroad. Mike made a map showing the routes:
One recent permit that was approved included the following conditions:
Haul hours: 24 hours, Monday through Friday (The plant itself is allowed to operate 365 days a year, 24 hours a day.)
95 loads hauled out per day – that means 190 truck trips per day (one trip out, one trip back for each load)
Each load may be 25 tons
This means that for one mine, there will be one giant truck along the haul route every 8 minutes – Monday through Friday – all day, all night.
If there are two mines using that route, that means one truck every 4 minutes. Four mines, there would be one truck every 2 minutes.
Here are videos of sand trucks hauling along one route near Bloomer, Wisconsin. This is a time lapse – 40 minutes shortened into 1.25 minutes, so the trucks are driving safely, at responsible speeds, but there are a lot of them. Video is by filmmaker Jim Tittle – he is putting together a film about the frac sand mining boom in Minnesota and Wisconsin that will be called The Price of Sand.
More trucks – showing safety issues – especially a problem on narrow roads. (by Jim Tittle)
How will our everyday traffic fare when it has to share the roads with this many huge trucks? School buses? Small private cars? Slow moving tractors, combines, and hay wagons? Motorcycles? I can’t even imagine being a walker or a bicyclist on one of these haul routes.
Another issue related to the trucks is the condition of the roads. Many heavy trucks, day after day, will put a lot of wear on these roads. None of our roads are in very good condition even now – state and local budget cuts have taken their toll. Who will pay for road maintenance? If the companies promise to do that, how do we know they will keep their promises? They have an incentive to keep them in reasonable shape while they’re still using them, but who will make sure they stick around at the end of the life of the mine to be sure they’re in good shape when they’re finished?