A couple of year back, stories persisted that many of the potato farms between Shelburne and Singhampton had been purchased allegedly for the gravel deposits that were thought to exist below. According to a recent article in the Toronto Star entitled "Limestone quarry threatens price farm land" the stories would appear to be true.
Allegedly the party in question began accumulating farms along the County Rd 124 corridor paying $8,000 per acre over market value under the pretense of becoming the largest potato farmer in Ontario. According to the aforementioned article, approximately 7,500 acres of land has been acquired with a plan to develop a 2,400 acre quarry to extract the limestone that lies below. As would be expected, many people felt duped by the scheme. Considerable public outrage has resulted stemming from the threat many people see to not only the environment but also to the way of life many of the local farming families have engaged in for years.
In addition to the loss of highly productive agricultural land, critics argue that a large quarry operation could have a significant impact on groundwater sources in the area. The same general area has already been subject to a considerable amount of development as a wind energy producer with literally dozens of wind turbines that dot the landscape.
Initiatives such as these will continue to threaten this area as we know it. Opponents to the Site 41 dump site north of Elmvale were successful in their bid to stop that controversial landfill. Hopefully those fighting this latest threat will be as successful in their efforts to what could pose a real threat to not only the agricultural production of the area but to the water deposits below and the aesthetic appearance of the countryside as well.
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