WINDHAM – After more than five years of litigation and construction, the quarry located at the corner of Nash Road and Route 302 is finally in business this week after the town of Windham issued a permit to the site’s new owner, Shaw Brothers Construction.

Upon receiving the occupancy permit last Thursday that allows direct sales of rock, owner Danny Shaw, who bought the site for $1.4 million at auction last fall, is promising to set a new tone of cooperation between the Gorham-based business and abutting landowners.

Shaw and abutters met last Thursday morning at town hall. At the meeting, which was arranged by Windham’s code enforcement officer, Heather McNally, Shaw distributed his cell phone number to all abutters so they could contact him directly if they have any issues.

“I think we’re going to be fine,” Shaw said this week. “Most of the neighbors seem to be really good people.”

The two most vocal abutters, Margaret Pinchbeck, who lives with her family in a classic farmhouse overlooking the quarry, and Carl Russell, longtime owner of the Avant Garde kennel located directly below the quarry, were at the meeting and both hope the new owner will come to their aid should an issue arise.

“I’m trying to remain hopeful,” Pinchbeck said. “Danny Shaw did say he wants to be a good neighbor. He says that within a couple years he’ll be friends with all of us. He said they have a lot of pits, this is the ‘O pit,’ that’s how far they have come in the alphabet. And he said that we will get used to the blasts. He said he’s been through this with other neighbors at his other quarries. All of his operations are in places where there are neighbors and he said everyone’s been upset at the beginning, but everyone gets used to it.”

Pinchbeck’s hopes were further buoyed during the meeting when she asked if blasts would approach the allowable 2.0 inches per second vibration limit, a measurement imposed by the Town ?Council that is based on how much the ground moves at the pit’s boundary.

“I asked if it’s possible to not get near the maximum allowed vibration and they said they don’t plan to get anywhere near that high. So that gave me a little ray of hope,” Pinchbeck said.

However, Pinchbeck says the blasts so far have been terrible, and one left her daughter, who was seated on the living room floor at the time of one concussion, feeling sick. Pinchbeck said she’s also finding black granules in her water, which she chalks up to the blasting.

But with such a contentious and disturbing history surrounding the pit, which was envisioned and built by Peter Busque, a former Windham town councilor who died of suicide last year, the two abutters are also realistic that quarry-related blasts and rock crushing will still have an impact no matter how accommodating the new owner is.

Russell predicts his kennel business, which he and his wife, Linda Rowe, have owned for 40 years along busy Route 302, will likely be out of business by year’s end due to what he calls unbearable vibration and noise from blasts. He also says no one will buy his business and he faults the town for allowing the quarry to begin operations despite protests from many abutters.

“Being on Route 302, we had one of the best locations of any business, kennel or otherwise,” Russell said. “Now, we are seriously considering the fact that we will have to shut down at the end of the year because we can’t maintain our business, our clientele.”

Russell said the Windham business community and government have dismissed their pleas for help. Many have carelessly suggested they move if they don’t like the blasting, he said.

“People often ask us, are we going to move? And I say, you can’t just move. First, if we found another location, it’s not going to be anything like this anyway. Look at the access,” Russell said. “And, secondly, we can’t sell this as a kennel. The structure was built initially as a kennel, and who wants a kennel next to a quarry? No one. So, our business is done. We talked to kennel brokers when Busque got started, and they said, [it’s] not even saleable. No one’s interested in a kennel that’s sitting on top of a quarry.”

Rowe said dogs react badly when blasts occur – urinating, defecating and generally acting up. Some gnaw their cages, resulting in bloody jaws.

“It’s affecting our business,” Rowe added. “We’ve had clients in the office when there is blasting and they’re rocked off their feet and they go, ‘What the hell was that?’ And, we say, they’re blasting again. And they say, oh my God, how do you deal with that?”

According to McNally, the Windham code enforcer, the town is keeping a keen eye on the quarry.

“We’re going to stay on top of it and make sure it’s a positive rather than a negative,” she said. “I want to open up the channels between the abutters and Danny Shaw and my department and also the [Maine Department of Environmental Protection] so everybody knows that we are all there. Any questions they have they can contact one of us and we’ll be able to get the answers for them.”

McNally said her department is in charge of fielding any complaints and forwarding those to the state, which reviews blasting reports to determine if the blasts are within compliance. A large blast last summer when Busque was still building a detention pond measured .7 inches per second of vibration, about one-third of the allowable limit. Still, neighbors reported it as excessive, and the fire department was called to the scene.

Partly due to that experience, Shaw said all abutters will be notified the morning of a blast. McNally said if a violation occurs, “the state acts as the enforcement body at that time,” she said. “But so far, everything has been well under the allowed limits.”

Russell questions the method of measurement, in which he said a device is set on top of soft ground in the woods near the lot line. He said foundations are often set in gravel or bedrock that would shake much more violently than “a bed of dirt.” Acknowledging it would be difficult to prove, Russell said, cracks have formed in his foundation and walls since blasting started.

Shaw said pre-blast surveys, which include video documentation and photos, have been conducted on structures within a half-mile of the site, and “we will do more further out if we get a request.”

Shaw said he expects to bring in a rock crusher starting next week to break down the rock into variable-sized pieces for sale. However, he said the market is “very slow” due to the economy, so he doesn’t expect much crushing or blasting once the initial mounds of product are created. Once that product is depleted, more blasting and rock crushing would then take place.

According to assistant town planner Ben Smith, the quarry can operate 6:30 a.m.-5 p.m. Mondays through Fridays year-round. On Saturdays and Sundays, Shaw Brothers can perform maintenance only with no crushing or blasting allowed. Blasting can take place Mondays through Fridays 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

Shaw said the year-round operation will employ at least one full-time person who acts to fill orders when customers come to buy rock. When the operation is blasting and crushing rock, Shaw said up to seven employees would be needed.

Shaw said the noise should decrease as the operation moves forward.

“We’re moving crushers down into the quarry next week, [the equipment] has been up on top just getting started. But it’ll be better,” Shaw said. “The deeper we get, the better it’ll be.”

Shaw, who said he was friends with Busque, is happy to take over for his former friend and feels a responsibility to do right both by Busque and the neighbors.

“It’s terrible really. What do you do? It’s just sad. Very tough,” he said. “There’s a lot of pressure on these things and so we’re just glad to get it open. The perception is always the worst at the beginning, but I think once we get it open, I think we’ll get along just fine.”

The former Busque quarry on Nash Road in Windham is now owned and operated by Shaw Brothers of Gorham, which has named it the “O pit” indicating it’s the 15th pit the Gorham-based construction and excavation company has opened. The home of quarry opponent Margaret Pinchbeck is visible in the background. (Staff photo by John Balentine)