Quarry brings wildlife worry (From Oxford Mail)

Quarry brings wildlife worry

12:10pm Tuesday 31st January 2012 in Abingdon By Damian Fantato

Residents living near a new quarry site have raised concerns about its impact on local wildlife.

But the company behind Upwood Quarry, Hills Quarry Products, has pledged to turn part of the site near Abingdon into a nature reserve once its work is done.

Work started at the site, near Tubney Wood, this month but some who live near the works are concerned about its impact.

Charles Parker lives near the site and his family owns Parsonage Moor, a Site of Special Scientific Interest next to the quarry.

He said: “There is a need for gravel but my concern is that it is near Parsonage Moor, a site with a very complex ecosystem.

“There are birds there and badgers there. You name it and we have it there.”

Sushila Dhall, Oxfordshire Green Party chairman, said that quarrying needed to stop.

She said: “Our general feeling is that we cannot quarry endlessly and keep building endlessly.

“I see skips full of stones and bricks all the time.

“There has to come a point when we just sustain what we have.”

Oxfordshire County Council gave Hills permission to begin work on the quarry in 2009.

It is expected to have an operational life of about 15 years, with Hills expecting to extract more than a million tonnes of stone, sand and gravel.

Once work is complete, one of the four fields at the site will be transferred to the Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire Wildlife Trust to be turned into a nature reserve.

Hills said progressive restoration will mean the other three fields will be backfilled, meaning the quarry will be refilled with the excavated material.

Group director Alan McKenzie said: “With Tubney Wood coming to the end of its operational life, Upwood is its natural successor.

“There are an estimated 1.5 million tonnes of reserves in Upwood Quarry which will supply dry screened sand and a range of limestone products.”

The 22 hectare site replaces Tubney Wood Quarry.

Land at Tubney Wood will now be restored and become woodland. This is expected to take around five years.