This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2006, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Heavy equipment has begun scooping hazardous waste from a small corner of the 21st Street Pond at the heart of industrial west Ogden.
Soon, if the city's plans pan out, the old cleanup site at the Union Pacific rail yard will morph into a patch of entertainment heaven. Ogden plans a park, an amphitheater and a world-class water ski pool around it.
"It's going to be a marvelous addition to the community," said John Patterson, Ogden's chief administrative officer, who is a force behind the project and mastermind of the USANA amphitheater in West Valley City.
Patterson said the Goode Ski Technologies company, which already uses the 29-acre pond for testing water skis, wants to improve it for competitive water-skiing events.
An 18,000 seat amphitheater would look out over the water ski venue toward the Wasatch Mountains and serve as a stage for everything from big name entertainment to local weddings.
Add 50 acres of park, a 15-acre fishing pond, park acreage and another water skiing pond being discussed by surrounding landowners and you have a destination venue connected to the city by a network of new trails and the nearby commuter rail line.
In all, the new development is expected to cost about $30 million.
The returns will include sales tax revenue, a community gathering place and a draw for world-class entertainers, said Ryan McEuen, a concert promotor and producer who is also behind the project. And, with some thoughtful planning, renewable materials can be used in both the construction and operation, he said.
"You can make good out of bad," McEuen said of the site, which also includes a construction materials dump. "We can make a beautiful thing out of a tough situation."
These big plans advanced last month as bucket trucks and environmental engineers began moving in to do the cleanup along the Ogden Rail Yard.
Solvents, petrochemicals and other hazardous materials have wound up at the rail yard during more than 130 years of use. The pond, created from a gravel and sand pit for construction of nearby roads and Interstate 15, was even stocked with fish until hazardous PCBs were detected there in 1973.
Since the early 1990s the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has been investigating the site and Union Pacific has been cleaning it up.
Now, the railroad company, the EPA and the state Division of Emergency Response and Environmental Remediation, have zeroed in on a half-acre at the southeast edge of the pond.
It contains several chemicals linked to cancer, including polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, vinyl chloride and trichlorethene, according to court documents that outline the federal cleanup agreement.
"Union Pacific has stepped up to the plate and it has agreed to do whatever we have asked them to do," said Andrea Madigan, an enforcement attorney in the EPA's Denver office.
James Barnes of Omaha, Neb.-based Union Pacific Railroad, said the company's investigation of the site turned up about a half-acre that required cleanup, some of it from activities that took place before Union Pacific was in control of the site.
"Over the years, [the contamination] kind of built up," he said.
Plans are to drain the area, scoop out the contaminated soil, put a protective cover on it, screen off a potential contamination plume and monitor the area.
The pricetag? About $2.5 million.
About the cleanup site
* Railroads began using the site in 1869. The 3.5-mile area includes 1,120 acres bounded by the Weber River on the west, the 21st Street pond and the Ogden River on the north, Wall Avenue on the east and Riverdale Road on the south.
* The Utah Department of Transportation created the 21st Street pond after using the site as a sand and gravel pit. The state Parks and Recreation Department filled it with water and stocked it with fish, but they had to close it in 1973 when PCBs were found.
* The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency began investigating the site in the early 1990s in light of the area's many industrial uses. Numerous hazardous chemicals were detected.