DENVER AIRPORT/TOWER ROAD LANDFILL DIG
The landfill located off of Tower Rd. two miles west of the Jeppesen Terminal was added onto in the early 2000’s despite the airports appeal to the District Court against the landfill in 2002 which claimed that it was an FAA safety hazard. The landfill has a functioning element to it but is “mocked-up” to look like a landfill hidden in plain sight. There isn’t much garbage in the landfill and is otherwise spotless.
Now hear me out, I've been performing civil engineering design and land development assignments for over 15 years now and for anyone to say that a landfill has gone from virtually brand new to over 300 feet high in a relatively “short” amount of time - well that immediately piques my interest.
Does a landfill exist 2 miles west of the airport on Tower Road? Answer = yes. At least there appears to be signs, vehicle accesses, 6 foot high barbed wire fencing throughout and indeed a monstrous pile of 'earth'.
The first thing I noticed was how "dirt-like" the giant 'earth' pile appears to be. Now I don't know about you folks, but I've been watching the landfill in my own town grow for over 25 years and believe me garbage can still be seen at the bottom levels of the pile. The landfill in question looks perfectly like 'dirt' and it has perfectly formed terraces as the pile grows. I couldn't locate a scrap of garbage waste on the sides of the pile.
The second thing I noticed was the conspicuous absence of any kind of groundwater/environmental monitoring equipment ANYWHERE. The operating authority of this so-called landfill should be held to task for what appears to be a severe failure to monitor the place for any leakage, gas buildups, slope stability, etc. At the tiny landfill in my hometown by comparison there are monitoring stations on the side of the refuse heap about every 30-50 feet horizontally with a couple of rows going up. Keep in mind our landfill is nestled on two sides by rising mountain slopes. The landfill in question rises straight up out of what appears to be a relatively flat and soft-soiled landscape. All the more reason in my opinion to be monitoring all sides of such a ginormous pile of land. Any pile of pure garbage that high would have major potential for internal and slope instability issues. But again there only exists perfectly graded terraces of generic looking dirt with no monitoring equipment at all.
From the environmental side, any regulatory body worth a red cent would have REQUIRED substantial mitigation in the form of an elaborate diaphragm surrounding the entire site to keep hazardous leaching materials from escaping into the local waterways and going underground. In my hometown, at our little landfill, this environmental diaphragm is quite visible as it needs to capture surface runoff also AND physical monitoring equipment is also visible at consistent offsets running down the line. I can't see anything at all on the 2 sides of this so-called landfill that are visually accessible from GoogleSV.
And finally, at our hometown landfill we just installed chain-link fencing and barbed wire in selective places in an attempt to stave off the hungry bears in the neighborhood. By my reckoning the so-called landfill in question could see a bear coming for days (perhaps I'm wrong), so what would be the satisfying answer for the installation of thousands of linear feet of fencing, with, and here's the kicker; barbed wire topper ANGLED IN?!?! Designers are of course well aware that if you want to keep people from trespassing into your property you angle the barbed wire OUT. Angle-out is the best option, for INTRUDER prevention.
So why does this landfill site have the barbed wire "ANGLED IN"? Remember that thousands and thousands of linear feet were ordered, paid for and installed, this was not an accident.
WHO WOULD BE TRYING TO ESCAPE A LANDFILL???
For sure the strangest thing about the DIA for me is this so-called "landfill"…