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Zone might stay same
Contractor's plans clash with Legacy
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Published: July 6, 2009
J. Westmoreland Inc. is proposing to build a new base of operations on the east side of Walnut Cove Road in northeast Forsyth County, but city-county planners are balking.
The contractor has requested that the City-County Planning Board consider rezoning 17.5 acres that it owns at 5964 Walnut Cove Road from residential to limited industrial.
The site is just north of Pine Hall Road. There is currently a 2-acre landfill for land clearing and inert debris on the property.
The planning board's staff is recommending denial. Gary Roberts, a project planner for the City-County Planning Department, said that the request is for building contractors and a 6,000-square-foot building.
He said that Westmoreland's property is in a rural-growth-management area as defined by the county's Legacy plan of development. Legacy discourages rezonings in rural-growth-management areas to more intensive districts.
Jim Bryan, an environmental and planning consultant, will represent Westmoreland at a planning-board meeting Thursday.
Bryan said that Westmoreland, which has been at its existing location on Old Still Trail in Kernersville since 1967, would use the new building on the Walnut Cove Road/U.S. 311 site as a shop to support equipment used in its grading business and for an office.
He said that Westmoreland officials want to occasionally bring a piece of equipment on the property to produce materials such as mulch and gravel from some items that end up in the landfill. It would sell the materials at the site.
The company is "trying to recover some of the material that's in the landfill and recycle that so there's a net effect of going green," Bryan said.
He said that the mulch, gravel and other materials derived from recycling would be a convenience for people living in the area who need them because they wouldn't have to drive into town to make purchases.
Bryan said he doesn't believe there would be a big difference in activity on the site than what's there now.
"There are a lot of trucks that go up and down that road now and the property currently serves that approved landfill," he said.
He said that neighbors should not see an increase in truck traffic as Westmoreland keeps most of its equipment on different projects.
"Rarely does a majority of the equipment come back to the home base," he said. "They need to keep their equipment out there working on projects in order to be effective as a heavy contractor."
He also doesn't consider the proposed site the kind of area for a subdivision because of transmission lines on the property.
"Those transmission lines cut across the property," he said, "and across the street there is a large railroad right of way."
Bryan said that Westmoreland owns an additional 20 acres behind the property that the company plans to use for agricultural crops and cattle.
■ Fran Daniel can be reached at 727-7366 or at fdaniel@wsjournal.com.
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