Second Landfill in Holly Springs To Expand

HOLLY SPRINGS, N.C. — Months after Holly Springs lost its battle to keep a county landfill from opening, town officials say they are being dumped on again.

Wake County commissioners this week approved an expansion at the Red Rock Construction and Demolition Landfill. The site has accepted construction debris from eight counties, but will now be able to take waste from 59 counties.

"I don't like Holly Springs being pegged as a dump town. It's wrong," Mayor Dick Sears said.

Last June, county commissioners approved a plan to build a landfill on a 471-acre site at Main Street and N.C. Highway 55. The dump would provide solid waste disposal for county residents for 25 years, beginning in 2008.

Sears said he also is concerned about additional truck traffic on town roads.

The county landfill is expected to receive at least 150 trucks a day. The Red Rock landfill can now accept up to 200 loads a day, more than double the 80 loads a day previously allowed.

Officials with Waste Industries, which operates Red Rock, said the volume at the landfill will increase about 10 percent. The added capacity will have little impact on Holly Springs, they said, because most trucks will come in from U.S. Highway 1.

"You can't come through town loaded and come to our facility because there are weight-limited roads out there," said Jerry Johnson, vice president of Waste Industries' Landfill Division.

Johnson said the company requested permission to take debris from additional counties primarily to serve area companies that do business elsewhere. About 80 percent of Red Rock's waste comes from Wake County companies, he said.