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LETTER: Compost facility should be rejected

Anyone who has ever followed a septic truck down the road knows that they stink
8941666_web1_Typewriter

Dear Editor:

The mere possibility that my beautiful home town of Summerland could soon be referred to as Smellyland really irks me.

Anyone who has ever followed a septic truck down the road knows that they stink!

How on earth can we hope to have tourists leave the highway and follow these trucks into our town?

How can we invite people to visit our museum or stroll the streets of Summerland with smells of diesel and sewage wafting through the air as these trucks rumble through the roundabouts?

Who would want to explore the country backroads to visit wineries and artisans if they have to contend with trucks hauling waste on these same roads?

And how about the fact that access to our town’s main tourist attraction, the Kettle Valley Steam Train is on the same route as the trucks and operating in the same vicinity as the proposed composting site?

Or what about our stretch of the Trans-Canada Trail also being in the same area?

Do we really believe that there will be no odours in the air as these trucks dump at this proposed facility that will spoil these valuable attractions?

There is also much talk about wanting young families to move to Summerland, with children to attend our schools.

What parent would want their child to navigate roads full of heavy trucks? And what kid wants to walk to school holding their noses to avoid the smells emanating from these vehicles?

How will this extra truck traffic affect the air quality of our seniors living at the different facilities along the way, or the residents living along the route? What about their property values?

I would like to see the RDOS build this facility somewhere on Crown land, off of a major highway — perhaps off of the Connector.

Highways are built for this kind of traffic, while our poor old roads are not.

That way everyone in the province would share the cost of road repairs and there would be no people living close by to suffer the negative aspects of this composting site.

I can’t imagine any town wanting to be known as the region’s dumping ground, or any residents eagerly accepting the label.

I hope our council members remember what the residents value about our town, as spelled out in the Cultural Plan.

We want Summerland to be known for the quiet peaceful safe place that it is, with its beautiful beaches, agriculture, festivals, arts and attractions, not to be known as the stinkerland of the Okanagan.

Carla McLeod

Summerland