The Debate

Oct. 8, 2020 – There may have been a debate in Salt Lake City last night, but of equal interest is the debate in this article from the Salt Lake Tribune, which chronicles the issues of a commercial cherry orchard trying to co-exist with nearby quarry operations. While on the surface the article may be about land-use issues facing agriculture and mining, these two types of business have the exact same challenge. You can’t just plop a mine down anywhere, you have to go where the deposit is and where the geology leads you. In the article the owner of the cherry orchard talks about the specifics of the land contours where the orchard is located, saying, “And you can’t just pick any spot down in the valley and plop a cherry tree because they like to be warm.” It did bother me that the article stated, “The Salt Lake Tribune invited comment from officials at Staker Parson and Kilgore, the operators of the two major pits highlighted in this story, but neither supplied a response.” It has been said time and time again, if a quarry operation doesn’t state its case, someone else will do it for you, and much less favorably.