Ashland Two Site

 landfill site / rubbish/garbage dump, nuclear waste storage

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Originally ceded to the Haist Family, this large patch of property straddling Rattlesnake Creek was little used by its original owners until the late 1930's, when it was sold back to the ownership of Erie County. Subsequently idle until the mid-1940's, the property became a dumping site for radioactive Uranium waste, a byproduct of refining operations taking place at Union Carbide/Linde (currently Praxair) facility during the Manhattan Project. By the time dumping on the site ceased in the early 1950's and the land was turned over to the GSA for disposal, the site was described as being "completely covered by deep piles of refinery waste", the majority of which was radioactive in nature, with the heaviest concentration being located between the two forks of Rattlesnake Creek in the center of the property.

Despite this, the land was sold in 1960 to the Seaway Industrial Park and then to the Ashland Oil Company, who owned an adjacent plot of land, and was by and large left in a fallow state for several decades. Periodic "remediation" was carried out on the site by Ashland as needed for construction, most notably for an oil storage tank on the Southwest corner of the property, with the majority of all excavated soil and waste being dumped into a small landfill near the present-day Interstate 190/290 interchange.

Sold back to Erie County in the late 1970's, the site was evaluated by the US Army Corps of Engineers and Department of Energy in 1976 and found to still be exhibiting radiation levels in excess of those required to declare a site acceptable for unrestricted use. Environmental remediation projects were subsequently undertaken from 1999-2005, aimed primarily at removing the highest concentrations of contaminated soil around Rattlesnake Creek. The balance of the property was surveyed and found to be exhibiting low-level radioactive contamination but the decision was made to leave the majority of the land undisturbed so as not to increase health risks to the surrounding population by excavating the entire property to reach the layer of contaminated soil.

www.factsofwny.com/58haist.htm
www.factsofwny.com/auth-rev.htm
www.factsofwny.com/overview.htm
www.lrb.usace.army.mil/portals/45/docs/fusrap/ashland2/...