Pardon Me For Asking: US Concrete

Last week, PMFA received emails from two readers who asked about the construction currently happening along 5th Street on the Public Place site adjacent to the Gowanus Canal.

Stephen, a local resident wrote: "I just went down 5th street between Hoyt and Smith. There is a building going up in the gas company lot across from the Kabir bakery. It looks like a warehouse definitely an industrial building. I thought that site was off limits for construction until the cleanup issue is resolved. Any idea what's going on?"

Anik, another neighborhood resident sent in the photo below of "a weird structure" being built on the site.

photo credit: Anik L.

I made it a point of walking along 5th Street along Public Place, where Ferrara Brothers operates one of their five a ready-mixed concrete batch plant in new York City. Sure enough, a construction crew was busy building a rather large steel-reinforced concrete structure on the City owned property.

For the past two or three years, the question of why Ferrara Brothers is expanding its operation on Public Place when the heavily contaminated site should be undergoing environmental remediation, has been repeatedly asked by the community.

Why should this be of concern to local residents?
Here is some background on Public Place:
The approximately 8.4 acre site was the home of the former Citizens Gas Light Company's 12th Ward Gas Work Plant, where coal and petroleum products were turned into flammable gas. The gas was used for cooking, lighting, heating and commercial purposes in the surrounding neighborhoods.

Unfortunately, one of the by-products of this gasification process is coal tar, a black viscous liquid, which is harmful to the environment. Coal tar has been found at depths of 150 feet on the site.

The Citizens Gas Works plant was decommissioned in 1958. The responsibility for the clean-up falls on National Grid, which has entered into a Voluntary Cleanup Agreement with the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation (NYSDEC).

Since some of the coal tar has also been found to ooze from the site into the adjacent Gowanus Canal, the US Environmental Protection Agency, which declared the canal a Superfund site in 2010, is also involved. EPA has named National Grid a Potential Responsible Party [PRP] which means that the company will contribute to the Gowanus Canal clean-up.

The City of New York acquired ownership of Lots 1 and 100 of the former MGP site through a condemnation proceeding in 1975. That land is known in the community as "Public Place". The other parcels are privately owned.
Ferrara Brothers Concrete has been operating on lot 100 near 5h Street since the early 1970's. The company rents the land under a month-to month lease agreement with New York City.

There has been talk of Ferrara Brothers relocating since at least 2007. Obviously, the City has continued leasing the lot to them.
Granted, the actual environmental remediation has not actually begun yet, but one has to wonder if the expansion of Ferrara on the site has not hampered or even slowed things down somewhat since this has forced National Grid and the EPA to perform their remedial investigations around the concrete trucks.

Don't misunderstand. We should of course protect existing businesses in Gowanus, and cement plants are an important and necessary part of the city. However, Ferrara Brothers, which lists its main address in Flushing Queens, has four other plants.
From Ferrara Brothers' Facebook page:
"Over the past 45 years, we have grown to become a concrete producer whose name is synonymous with quality and service. From 5 trucks and one concrete plant to 80 trucks and 5 concrete plant, Ferrara Bros. continues to grow."

Interestingly enough, I came across an article from 2015, which mentions that Ferrara Brothers has been sold to U.S. Concrete, Inc.. It quotes Joseph A. Ferrara, President and CEO of Ferrara Brother: "Since our founding in 1969, and continuing through three generations of the Ferrara family, our company has consistently strived to enhance our position in the marketplace so as to better serve our customers, employees and other stakeholders. We greatly admire U.S. Concrete's strategic and financial achievements, and we are honored to become part of a national leader in our industry."

I have reached out to Christos Tsiamis, EPA Region 2's project manager for the Gowanus Canal Superfund and sent him the photos above of the construction activity on Public Place. He forwarded my inquiry to National Grid who "confirmed this is Ferrara related work and not National Grid's."

This all begs the question: Why is Ferrara/ U.S. Concrete, Inc. allowed by New York City to expand and build on Public Place? It is hard to understand why the City wouldn't want to make things as easy as possible so that the complicated environmental remediation work can move forward with as few obstacles as possible. It is rather ironic given the fact that the City has slated their parcels for development. The Gowanus Green project would bring 770 units of affordable housing to the shores of the Gowanus.