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Published by Paul Martin, 2019-07-18 03:59:47

Taylormade Timber Site Development

TAYLORMADE TIMBER PRODUCTS SITE DEVELOPMENT

Thank you very much to those residents that attended our community
event in Sherburn on Wednesday 10th July. We appreciate that it’s
difficult for some people to attend these events and as such, are

producing this leaflet to provide some information about the plans and
answer some questions about the feedback we received.

Our plans for the site include replacing all the machinery on site over the
next 5 years – this means we’ll build the new production lines while our old

machines are running. Once the new machine are
operational, we’ll be able to decommission the old lines.
It’s important for us to do this to protect the business for the future. Older
machinery is nosier and very expensive to maintain – and we have a fair bit

of old machinery to address!

Our plans are for the site to look like this

In brief, this involves undertaking these projects

When What are we doing
Mar-Sep 2019 Build new treatment tank facility & decommission
existing treatment tanks
Oct 2019 - Apr 2020 Build new log grading line

2021 Improve entrance to the site
2023 Knock down the Poplars house & create new storage
area
Divert bridleway around the full site

Build new resaw line & decommission existing line

Build new sawmill & decommission the existing sawmill

We do listen when you tell us that we are impacting on the community that we are
lucky to live in and as part of our plans we’ve tried to think around some of the
concerns that we hear about so that we can find a way to improve.

These considerations now follow:

RELOCATION

We would love to be on a purpose-built site away from a domestic area, where
traffic and noise weren’t a worry to anyone.

We have looked into the option of moving site, but this isn’t feasible. The cost of
purchasing 30 acres and then preparing the land for us to be able to use would
exceed £20million. This cost is prior to moving any of the existing machinery and is
therefore prohibitive for us.

84% of our team live within a 15-mile radius of the mill, so it’s really important for us
to be able to operate well from the site here at Sherburn Hill.

TRAFFIC

Previous

We appreciate that the vehicles travelling through the village are imposing and
some do travel during night-time hours.

Although there are no restrictions for deliveries at the site, we have worked with the
councillors of Pittington after complaints about early morning vehicles through the
village. Restrictions have been placed on vehicles delivering to site early morning, so
fewer vehicles now arrive at site thoughout the night. At this stage we are unable to
reduce this any further as it would impact on our log supply. However, we will keep
this under review.

Taylormade contributed £10,000 to the traffic calming measures in Pittington and
would be willing to look again to contribute to improvements in this area. We have
held meetings with the council and local councillors but have been unable to
progress a solution at this stage – we continue to be happy to contribute to this,
should a solution be found.

We appreciate that the vehicles are large and intimidating and therefore we asked
them to drive at 20 mph through the villages. Unfortunately, this led to some
instances of cars trying to overtake and therefore some dangerous situations for
drivers. We therefore had to remove this request. We would be happy to enforce a
20mph limit with our site traffic, should this be applied to the area as a whole.

We investigate fully any incident that involves a Taylormade truck or a sub-
contractor coming to site. Any drivers found to be misbehaving, are either
disciplined if internal drivers, or potentially banned from site. In addition, we are
installing 360-degree cameras on all our vehicles to ensure our drivers are driving
with the upmost courtesy through the villages.

Future

There will some increased traffic during construction phases of our development.
These will be during daytime hours, there will be no deliveries during the night.

None of the plans indicated will increase the amount of ongoing deliveries to and
from the business – the projects are designed to replace aging machinery not to
increase output.

VIEWS

As part of our plans, some of our neighbours outlook would change from agricultural
to industrial. We will be doing all we can with fences and planting to limit this
impact as much as we can.

RUNNING HOURS

The hours that the site runs have been the same for over 10 years. Some of the
projects that we’re undertaking may allow us to reduce running hours in some
areas, though at this stage we aren’t able to confirm what these may be.

RATS

Previous

For the past 2 years after concerns raised by neighbours, we have employed the
council to look after pest control on site.

They believe that no rat activity is generated from our site – all rubbish bins are
emptied daily into large skips, there is no food waste or compost. They believe that
it is more likely to be generated from the fly tipping in the area.

However, we will continue with the pest control boxes on site to ensure we’re doing
everything we can to help keep the pests under control in the local area.

DEBRIS ON ROADS

We have received concerns regarding debris on the roads and pavements – be that
bark or woodchip.

The roads are now swept twice per month, usually the first and third Thursday of
the month.

In addition, every fortnight, one of our team checks and clears the surrounding
pavements of any bark or dust.

If you are experiencing difficulties with debris, it could be that we’re not covering
your area – please let us know where you are, and we will try to expand where we
cover.

NOISE

Previous

After some concerns from neighbours about the site nearest to North View & Kell
Crescent, we restricted vehicle movement in this yard to before 10pm. Since this has
been in place, we’ve not received any more concerns. The residents that attended
the event let us know that there are still issues in this area.

After concerns from other neighbours, we are currently installing a tall acoustic
fence at the back of the site to test for noise reduction. This will be rolled out further
through the site in areas where there are noise issues if it proves successful and
should there still be issues in Kell Crescent and North View, can be trialled here too.

Future

Any new machinery on site is designed with as much noise mitigation as possible –
right from the design phase.

When installing the new treatment tank building, we invested £80,000 in insulation
to ensure that this building doesn’t emit any noise – this was an added cost to the
project, but one that we were keen to do to ensure we are doing everything we can
to improve.

The existing log grading line is one of our loudest pieces of machinery and isn’t
within in a building. This is the first project that we’ll be undertaking as part of this
development and really will improve noise from the site.

There have been mechanical considerations – including the type of chain to reduce
the clunking noise. The pockets that the logs drop in to will be filled with concrete to
reduce the “thud.” And the butt reducer will be fully housed – to reduce the
grinding noise.

In addition, the acoustic fence will improve noise also.

There will be more activity in the fields that we’re developing to the west of the site,
but the acoustic fences and planting will ensure that this is minimized.

DUST

Previous

After concerns about dust 2 years ago, we installed 2 new dust extraction systems to
extract the fine sawdust from the sawmill. The dust is extracted into trailers, which
replaced an open bunker. These meet all the required legislation and are monitored
regularly as part of our permit; to check that they are performing correctly.

We have noticed huge improvements on site and thought that this should have
solved the problem – however residents kindly let us know that it is still an issue in
some areas.

We have two remaining bunkers that we can’t improve at this time as there isn’t
space to do so in that area. As part of this development we will be able to improve
or relocate the bunkers and hope that this will make improvements.

LIGHTING

Previous

We have been unable to switch off any lights of an evening due to security as the
area would be in full darkness.

Future

All new installations will have lights that have two settings – a brighter one for
working hours and a dim light during none working hours, but that will allow the
security cameras still to operate. We hope that this will make big steps to improving
lighting concerns.

In addition, as part of the 1st storage project, we will retro fit the existing lights in
the yard nearest to Kell crescent & North View will lights with two settings, meaning
we will be able to dim those lights after working hours too.

COMMUNITY
We’re very proud that we’re a successful manufacturing business within
the North East and the communities that we operate in mean a lot to us.
Our community fund is in its 2nd full year and well on the way to spending
the £10,000 for the year that it has in the pot.
This is a flavour of some of the things we’ve been up to this year (see our
website for some more details
https://www.taylormadetimber.co.uk/community/)

Litter picking days

Durham Food bank

Jenny Ruth Workshops
Sherburn Utd

Planter donations
Thornley Primary School

We’re currently working on some benches for Littletown Cricket
club and the Christmas trees for several surrounding villages.

If there is a project that you think we could help with, please give
us a shout – best via email to [email protected]
We hope that this leaflet has given you some useful information. If
you have any remaining questions or concerns, please contact us
on [email protected] or 0191 372 0524.

Best wishes

Taylormade Timber


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