AUSTINTOWN — The Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR) is set to begin a reclamation project at an abandoned strip mine in Austintown, near the intersection of Fairview and South Turner Roads, after receiving approval from the state Environmental Protection Agency.
According to Marissa Lautzenheiser, the Abandoned Mine Land (AML) program manager at the ODNR, records show a coal mine in the area was abandoned 150 years ago. When the mine was abandoned, ODNR documents say steep highwalls reaching up to 24 feet were left behind.
The highwalls sit between the backyards of several homes on South Turner Road and the Mill Creek MetroParks bike trail. Lautzenheiser told 21 News this location raised the priority level of the project.
“There are some well-worn areas where people have left the bike path and it appears they're walking to the base of the highwall,” Lautzenheiser said. This is problematic because the sheer cliff faces “can be really dangerous to people as they are recreating or building their house or conducting their businesses.”
In the reclamation project, the ODNR will backfill the highwalls to create a smoother and more gradual incline. The goal is to make the topography look more like its original natural form. Lautzenheiser said once that is completed, the ODNR has plans to reforest the area using hardwood trees native to eastern Ohio.
“It's a mix of oaks, maples. We do have a couple pines, because pine does really well in the acidic soil — which, even though we're backfilling, oftentimes we're still left with higher acidity than your average soils,” Lautzenheiser said.
21 News spoke with several nearby residents who declined to give an interview, but had a generally positive reaction to the project. Lautzenheiser emphasized that the AML program is voluntary and said all the neighbors were on board.
The “Engineer’s Estimate” cost of the project is about $433,000, covered by state and federal funds, but Lautzenheiser said the true cost will not be known until the ODNR has selected contractors through a bidding process. Any company that is interested in doing the work must attend a pre-bid meeting on October 15 on site.
The timeline for the project has also not been set, but similar work normally takes between 4-12 months, Lautzenheiser said, with the reforestation taking place afterwards. The real results, though, could take much longer to be seen.
“It will look worse before it looks better,” she warned. “I do like to tell people we are working on a different timeline. … We are fixing a wrong that happened 150 years ago. So we have to think, 'It'll look really good in 50 years. It'll look even better in 100 years.' We're planning out a couple generations.”