Farmland conversion and landfill sites

[ijmorlan]

Irony in today's e-Record.  Nimby's complaining about a proposal to put fruit processing and farm worker residential facilities on land being used as an orchard next to the St Jacobs market.  So complaints when farmland is taken out of production, and complaints when farmland is used for food production.

The Record article quoted a local resident worrying about the impact of additional truck traffic because of the fruit processing on site. And yet, those fruit get shipped out by truck today, and if the processing facility is built, those same fruit will still be shipped out by truck, albeit after processing. Where is that additional truck traffic coming from? Hello?

Depending on what the processing is, the truck traffic could actually drop. I don’t know what they’re growing or what the processing is, but imagine that they are proposing to dry apricots. I’m pretty sure way more dried apricots will fit on a truck than fresh ones. Also this avoids shipping all that water.