mook Wrote:
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> Spurs ... where?
>
> When I lived in the S.C. area in the late 1970s
> most of the spurs north (west) of Watsonville were
> either inactive or gone. It should be even worse
> now, because even those few industries have
> disappeared for the most part - whether because of
> activities of the Socialist Republic of Santa Cruz
> or simply the economy (housing and small
> commercial make more money per square foot). The
> trains seen on the branch at the time in the S.C.
> area were cement loads and coal empties out,
> cement empties and coal loads in, and very
> occasional other cars for the cement plant,
> Wrigley's, and a few other lumber yards and the
> like. Non-cement-plant traffic was very light even
> then.
>
> One thing discussed back then - very briefly - was
> building a garbage transfer station at the Buena
> Vista dump and sending it out (somewhere ...
> anywhere) on trains. Given the state of that
> industry and the fact that despite recycling S.C.
> residents still make garbage, Iowa Pacific might
> want to start talking to somebody about that
> again.
>
> The chromium issue at the cement plant was
> probably related to coal burning. It's a common
> product of coal burning, along with mercury, etc.
> The plant was rebuilt from heavy oil (mostly
> delivered by tanker) to coal power in the late
> 1970s -- yes, there was "comment" at the time but
> the company showed that they would meet all air
> pollution regulations and in fact would be much
> cleaner than they were before. Since then
> regulations have gotten tighter and the number of
> things that are of concern has grown. So I'm sure
> that Cemex looked at the prospect of having to
> rebuild it again (to use gas, probably) to keep
> operating and decided that it was better for the
> corporate bottom line to ship it in from someplace
> else. Preferably someplace with no environmental
> regulations and very low-wage labor (i.e.
> expendable slaves). I'm kind of cynical in my old
> age, because my observation from many years in the
> environmental regulation and planning game is that
> Americans in general, and "environmentally
> concious" folk in particular, are very good at
> exporting their impacts and very bad at paying for
> them. I really don't blame the Cemex's of the
> world for doing what they do with offshoring when
> we make it so hard (via unlimited lawsuits,
> clueless politicians, etc.) to just do the job
> right. It's not just the cost; the hassle factor
> and uncertainty are major points -- sometimes more
> important that the cost.


Right on!!!!
C.