| Abstract: | Of all the materials required for construction of a new town, the only one that must be obtained locally is aggregate for concrete. Very large tonnages of sand and gravel, or crushed stone, will be needed. Their production must be planned for from the beginning, to avoid the conflicts in land use that have long plagued older communities that undergo expansion. Production of sand, gravel, and stone is now disallowed by zoning in most major urban corridors in the U.S.A., making it necessary to bring these materials from a distance, at higher costs than formerly. Yet some success has been achieved in fitting the aggregates industry into the urban picture. Two examples are cited, involving production of stone in New Jersey and gravel in southern California. Where planning is done from the start, areas of occurrence of sand, gravel, or good-quality stone must be set aside for extractive industry. It is the geologiest's responsibility to provide information on locality of occurrence, tonnage present, thickness of overburden, best way to exploit the deposit with minimum environmental effect, and feasible use of the area after it has been worked out. The possibility of obtaining stone from below ground should also be evaluated. Only by such advance planning, with geological input, can conflicts in land use and excessive cost of construction aggregate be avoided. |
