FORUM ON MINING DRAWS 150; RESIDENTS SHARE CONCERNS ON GRAVEL PROJECT.

Byline: Mary Schubert Daily News Staff Writer

Representatives of a company hoping to mine gravel from a 500-acre site on Soledad Canyon Road met with city officials and concerned residents to discuss the potential impacts of the 20-year operation.

Transit Mixed Concrete Co. has proposed the surface mining of Portland concrete cement aggregates, used in home construction, from a parcel in the 12100 block of Soledad Canyon Road. Last week, the Los Angeles County Regional Planning Commission put the firm's request for a surface mining permit on hold until June 14.

The area is outside the Santa Clarita city limits, but is of concern to officials, who sponsored the informal meeting Monday night at Pinetree Elementary School in Canyon Country. Mayor Jo Anne Darcy and City Councilman Frank Ferry were among 150 people in attendance.

Representatives of Transit Mixed Concrete, a subsidiary of Houston-based Southdown Inc., have said the company will mine sand and gravel on only 177 acres of the site. ``All of TMC's mining excavation activities will be confined to the back side of the mountain, out of sight from people living in developed communities or motorists using the Antelope Valley (14) Freeway,'' a company brochure reads.

In addition, the company statement said 95 percent of the trucks going to and from the project ``will be limited to a 2.5-mile section of Soledad Canyon Road, between the (14) freeway and the operation. TMC will build a westbound merging lane for its exiting trucks and an eastbound left-turn lane for its returning trucks.''

But Ben Curtis, who attended the meeting, said the traffic impacts will be substantial.

``There would be a truck every 21 seconds along Soledad and entering the 14 at Shadow Pines (Boulevard),'' said Curtis, who owns Curtis Sand & Gravel, which mined the same site from 1968 to 1989.

Curtis owns the surface rights on the project, but the federal government sold the mining rights to Transit Mixed.

Transit Mixed brochures say company trucks hauling sand and gravel to Los Angeles will account for 380 daily round trips on the Antelope Valley Freeway during the first 10 years of the mining operation.

During morning rush hour, TMC will run 48 southbound trucks and 10 northbound trucks on the freeway, plus an additional 14 southbound trucks and 12 northbound trucks during the afternoon rush hour, the brochure states.

Also in attendance was Robert Fleck, one of seven board members for the Sand Canyon Homeowners Association. Fleck, who lives about four miles from the proposed project, said he is concerned about the dust that will blow from the operation to neighboring homes.

``There are a lot of concerns that this project is going to generate dust in enormous quantities,'' Fleck said. The noise that the project could generate also concerns him.

``They're going to have rock crushers and other equipment. They say there will be a constant noise level of 40 decibels,'' Fleck said, noting he was skeptical of Transit Mixed representatives' characterization that the sound would be about as loud as a bird's song.

``You start playing that with a crushing component as the soundtrack to your life,'' he said.

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