Residents raise stink over railroad ties

Thunder, lightning and hail from a fast-moving storm filled the late afternoon skies over Barre, Mass., and provided an appropriate prelude to the chorus of complaints the Board of Health would hear from abutters and neighbors of Wildwood Reload on South Barre Road, the Worcester News Telegram reports.

The Board of Health meeting
was a culmination of months of complaints stemming from a Mass. Central
Railroad contract to get railroad ties ready for use by the Massachusetts Bay
Transit Authority on the Old Colony Line. Creosote-treated rail ties come by
rail car where they are unbundled, fitted with metal brackets and rebundled to
be shipped as needed.

Some residents had e-mailed
complaints and questions to the Board of Health and at least one other
contacted Air Pollution Control at the state Department of Environmental
Protection.

Robert Bentley of Mass.
Central Railroad said the bracket-affixing operation was being moved from just
off South Barre Road to a distant point on the site that was not near any
houses.

While some questioned the
health consequences of breathing creosote fumes, and complained of headaches
and stomach aches, others said they had had to forgo their customary "quality of
life," including enjoying the backyard pool and deck.

Bentley assured those
looking for help that the contract would end in February.

Health Agent Stephanie
Bacon said she had been in contact with DEP and was told that during the curing
process, the emissions from the railroad ties did not exceed levels appropriate
for the industrial zone in which Wildwood Reload is located.

Board Chairman Dana
Mascroft asked residents to meet the railroad halfway and give them the two
weeks Bentley said it would take to transition the bracket and rebundling
operation from South Barre Road to the location where new shipments of ties are
already being offloaded.