Thomas Breen file photo
At the Washington Ave. metal scrapyard.
A four-acre scrapyard in the Hill can continue to recycle 100 tons of metal per day, after securing a five-year special permit renewal from the City Plan Commission.
Local land-use commissioners took that unanimous vote of approval during a special online meeting last Wednesday.
The three commissioners present voted in support of a special permit and a coastal site plan review for a scrap metal processing and limited automobile recycling facility at 808 Washington Ave.
As local attorney Marjorie Shansky explained during Wednesday’s meeting, that site, formerly owned by the Bixon Liquidation Corporation, has been operating as a scrapyard continuously since 1952. In 2022, an affiliate of the Australia-founded, New York-headquartered Sims Metal Management purchased the heavy industrial property for $1.3 million.
Shansky said that the Washington Avenue scrapyard focuses on “ferrous” and “non-ferrous” recyclables. These are “commodities sold in international markets”; the Hill operation helps reduce “what do you call it, when people just leave things on the street and abandon them in place.”
The property owner’s special permit application sheds further light on what work goes on at 808 Washington today.
According to that application, the site has a 100-foot-by-220-foot processing facility and offices, two truck scales, a staff of 14 employees on site, a visitor parking area on the Washington Avenue side, and a “crusher and two shearers west of the former Hill railroad right-of-way.”
The scrapyard’s hours of operation are from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. Mondays through Saturdays, and from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Sundays.
“Daily traffic volume is approximately 75 vehicles, including generally equal number of trucks, employee vehicles, and assorted pick-up trucks,” the application states. “Scrap volume is estimated at 100 tons per day or 1000 tons per week. When processed, all condensed scrap is sent either to Gateway Terminal, North Haven, or an alternate shipping location in Newark, New Jersey.”
The special permit approved by the City Plan Commission last Wednesday extends from when the scrapyard’s last permit expired in August 2023 through August 2028.
City Plan Commissioner and Westville Alder Adam Marchand spoke up in support of the special permit and coastal site plan application before he and his colleagues voted unanimously in support. To the best of his knowledge, this is a “well-run business,” he said. “I am supportive of the request to renew the permit for five years from the prior date of expiration.”