The Raging River Conservation Group has been hard at work “behind the scenes” furthering our goal of protecting the Raging River and its watershed. One of the main issues we've continued to spend time on is the current operation of the Raging River Quarry.
We have just received information that King County Department of Transportation (KCDOT) has discounted our concerns (validated by our traffic consultant) about line of sight distance on the Preston-Fall City Road. KCDOT has also discounted a documented statement by a Fall City resident that 5 cars did back up due to trucks pulling out of the quarry.
We need to let the King County Department of Permitting and Environmental Review as well as the King County Roads Division the ACCURATE information of what is going on with traffic and road conditions near the quarry on Preston-Fall City Road.
If you have been in a long line of cars (4? 5? 6? more?) waiting for a quarry truck to exit or enter the quarry, King County needs to hear from you! They have said this would rarely if ever happen! Let's tell them YES … it does!
We've also heard from you that there have been other unsafe conditions such as trucks veering into oncoming traffic lane as they leave the quarry, dirt/rocks on the road near the quarry, and that the line of sight distance is too short to be able to see stopped cars near the quarry as you drive on Preston-Fall City Road at 45 mph.
Please: Document date and time, number of cars if possible, and as many specifics as you can as to what happened to cause the issue - traffic delay, rocks, line of sight issues, etc.
Consider joining our Board and becoming part of the team to strategize and carry out plans to solve the quarry issues concerning our community and to help develop overall plans to improve the health of the Raging River Watershed habitat.
Thank you!
Raging River Conservation Group
Please note the ANSWER from DPER regarding property issues:
24._The quarry operator shall be responsible for any damage to nearby properties, including domestic water supply wells, attributable to blasting on the subject property. Claims for any such damage shall be the responsibility of the affected property owner and the quarry operator to handle directly between themselves, but a failure of the quarry operator to respond in good faith to any such claim may be cause for denial of future grading permits, or prohibition or restriction upon future blasting.