Junkyard_Biosphere.
2022.Feasibility Study

This study explores options for affordable rehabilitation and development of a historic junkyard site that abuts the Niagara Escarpment.

The site has been an auto wrecking yard and subsequently a used tire lot for at least the last 50 years. Pockets of various heavy metals and petroleum hydrocarbons are present throughout the site, as well as heaps of tires, car parts and industrial debris.

The contrast at the site is stark. A lot full of trailers and car parts sits next to a wetland sanctuary owned and operated as a public trail by the Bruce Trail Conservancy.

This study explores the local ecology, the distribution of contaminants, precedents for innovative soil remediation and also potential for collaborative demonstration projects for phytoremediation along the property line that is shared by the Bruce Trail Conservancy. The preliminary proposal consolidates the commercial area and provides space for a retirement home for the owner.

The proposed site plan shrinks the area of the wrecking yard while removing ‘hot spots’ of the most contaminated areas. A re-naturalized ‘buffer space’ is added that will naturalize the perimeter spaces over time, while creating a visual buffer between the public trail and the site. A new trail access point is proposed, with public parking, formalizing what is already being used as informal parking areas at the edge of the lot.