At the last meeting of the ad hoc Truck Route Committee, Linda Mussmann, county supervisor for the Fourth Ward, questioned whether Colarusso brought material back from the dock. In fact, they do. In addition to hauling gravel to the waterfront, they haul asphalt from the waterfront back to their headquarters on Newman Road. The company has a permit from the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation to receive asphalt millings, no more than 500 tons a day, which was issued on May 9, 2019, and will expire on May 8, 2024. Although the current permit was issued in 2019, it seems the practice has been going on for longer than that. The picture below, showing asphalt millings piled up on the dock, was taken in 2017.
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| Photo: Julie Metz |
Yesterday, someone followed an empty dump truck heading toward the river and took these pictures--on Columbia Street and later at the waterfront.
Going to the waterfront, the empty truck followed the Route 9G truck route to Colarusso's private road that passes through South Bay. Loaded with asphalt millings, however, it would have returned using Front Street and the portion of Columbia Street below Third Street--city streets that are not part any state highway that passes through Hudson.
COPYRIGHT 2022 CAROLE OSTERINK
Ask anyone who lives down here, the volume and intensity of ACS's 50 ton semi-trailers has grown exponentially over the past 4 months. They are carving a blast line right through the heart of our most densely populated minor & senior neighborhoods, all atop 300 year old infrastructure. I'm sorry, but it makes it (once again) crystal clear, the shits they give are less than zero. And no amount of park monies will convince the residents of the First and Second wards otherwise. Begs a single question. Why doesn't Shane Bower rescind the directive from 02/18/76? It is in fact, contrary to the grandstanding, that simple. Front street is not a truck route, Columbia below Third is not a truck route, Broad street is not a truck route – we are choosing to give our commons over to grossly benefit a private mining corporation – not by obligation nor by preemption – but by a simple directive made by our own city police commissioner some 46 years ago. Rescind Directive 3.
ReplyDeleteMaybe if Mr. Bower ever showed up to an informal council meeting like the other commissioners regularly do, you or anyone else from the public or the council could ask this public servant if he has any plans to do away with the directive and everyone could hear what he has to say, if anything.
DeleteI guess Colarusso didn't make their expected contributions to the liberal wing of the local Democratic Party
ReplyDeleteNo such expectation. The only thing they've done is trash the spirit of the City's draft LWRP, lie about the usability of their causeway road as a two-way conduit for their current business, and run huge gravel trucks through fragile city streets to bully their way to a zoning change and the ability to vastly expand on the waterfront at the expense of every other, more productive use.
DeleteRight you are, dkon.
DeleteBut if I may help you up your game, the LWRP (waterfront program) is only "draft" vis-a-vis the state "approval" which it never won.
In 2011, however, the Common Council and mayor "adopted" their LWRP into Local Law. For most local applications, then, the qualifier "draft" is unnecessary unless one is referring specifically to the federal/state program.
As the LWRP's laws and policies are in near total agreement with the federal-and-state coastal policies, specific references to Hudson's "draft LWRP" are typically unnecessary.
I only mention this because there are those who'd seek advantages in perceived ambiguities, whereas the City's adopted and official LWRP warrants the respect of Local Law.
There are city officials who still don't grasp the distinction, having introduced confusion and harm to many public efforts in the intervening years.
(Think of the mischief and potential great harm caused by the technical adjective "haul" in the misnomer "haul road.")
There's plenty of research on the environmental impacts of reclaimed asphalt leaching metals into groundwater (see below). As far as I know, this possibility was never considered for the Hudson waterfront, nor were contaminants likely evaluated by a NYS DEC rife with corruption.
ReplyDeleteNow let's see, who would have issued that permit? I believe it was the DEC's Trish Gabriel, whom a well-informed public had removed from any further authority over Hudson.
"Environmental impacts of reclaimed asphalt pavement on leaching of metals into groundwater":
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7388916/
Frustrating and sad. It's only going to get worse as we have a large warehouse being constructed down on Dock Street where the bakery was - enormous. Did anyone calculate how many trucks would be added to the mix before approving this? Totally out of scale compared to anything down there.
ReplyDeleteThe Hudson Planning Board has failed us miserably. They have been messing around with the Colarusso application for 6 years. During that time, the company has filed suit against the Board twice, and for 4 years refused to provide even the most basic info about their truck traffic. This lousy proposition should have been denied years ago, as the Colarusso operation is imposing massive downside impacts on the City with nearly zero in offsetting positives. Every other community in the Hudson Valley is cleaning up their waterfronts and making them more accessible to the citizens, while we cower in front of a gravel outfit based in Greenport. It's shameful and disgusting, and an affront to all of those who are making major capital investments to improve our community.
ReplyDeleteOver the years I'd occasionally bring a guest to a Planning Board review of the Colarusso application. They'd always come away with the same impression.
DeleteOne friend, an attorney, summed it up perfectly afterwards: "Why are the Board members so timid?!"
He was contrasting the disposition of the members to the arrogance and false witness of the petitioner's attorney.
Perhaps it's all part of a years-long rope-a-dope strategy, passed down from generation to generation of Planning Boards. But somehow I doubt it.
Whoever took those photographs of the red trucks, thank you. I've been wondering every time I've walked down the 800 block of Warren Street and seen those trucks barreling along , or driven past the Newman Road entrance on 23B wondering what those trucks were carrying and what route they were taking? I walk frequently, see too many, everyday. I don't get what the City or Planning Board is thinking.
ReplyDeleteWhat the City should be doing is preparing for Colarusso's defeat at the appellate court.
DeleteProviding that the city's appeal demonstrates that Colarusso merely reworded the exact same arguments it lost in its initial lawsuit in 2019 (before Judge Melkonian), the Appellate Division may not feel kindly towards a petitioner who wasted its time.
In that event, the city and Planning Board will be well-positioned to PUSH BACK HARD.
But seeing as the Melkonian judgement recognized the City's right to deny further operations without a conditional use permit, and seeing as the Colarussos have operated in Hudson ever since, and even utilized their advantage to sue for a second time, who would believe that a favorable judgement for the City will find anyone in City Hall ready to do anything about it.
Let's hope that someone's preparing a planning strategy, but in the end it really comes down to residents making some noise. Frankly, anyone who'll be caught off guard by the defeat of Colarusso's lawsuit is part of the problem.
We need another group like FOH (Friends of Hudson) but sadly the community spirit doesn't exist any more and there is no inspirational leader.
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