Snowshoe Unauthorized

A proposal to expand a quarry at the foot of Snowshoe has enraged some tourism businesses and created a 2-1 split on the County Commission, according to a story in the Pocahontas Times, which first broke the news January 13. The fear is that the million annual tons of limestone to get hauled out of the Linwood Quarry owned by Waco Oil & Gas Co. would create dust, traffic, and threaten the Upper Elk River which, the Snowshoe Property Owners Council calls “one of the last places in the East where you can fish for naturally reproducing Brook, Brown and Rainbow trout.”

Map showing the key points in the quarry debate.

However, the Commissioner who declined to join the other two with a letter opposing the federal stimulus money noted that the attributes of the proposal, which— tantalyzingly includes restoration of two rail lines have not yet been fully aired. Besides improving the 52-mile-long South Branch Valley Railroad, the project would reopen the 13-mile stretch of the West Virginia Central Railroad that links Slatyfork with Spruce, the latter the now-vanished lumber town tucked into the forest northeast of the Silver Creek ski area. Allegheny Mountain Radio, WVMR, also has a story. (Note: upper photo does not depict the Linwood Quarry.)