Workers are completing the excavation of the site within the footprint of the old Rustic Mall building.
By: Audrey Levine
The last of the creosote-contaminated soil beneath the Rustic Mall will be gone by the end of this month, according to EPA officials.
The excavation of the site is moving along as scheduled, according to Rich Puvogel, site foreman from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and workers are in the process of completing the excavation of the site within the footprint of the old mall building itself.
Once that is complete, they will check smaller areas nearby to ensure they are clean as well.
"We will be exploring smaller portions to make sure we are done," he said Monday. "There may be more, which could push our timeline back."
The Rustic Mall was torn down, beginning in November, after creosote was found in the ground beneath the building. Creosote, which is classified by the EPA as a possible carcinogen, is a wood preservative used primarily on telephone poles and railroad ties.
Once the excavation is complete, Mr. Puvogel said, they will begin to restore the area and remove the equipment that is located throughout the northeast corner of the mall and the eight residential lots at the location.
"This restoration should last through October and into November," he said.
According to Mr. Puvogel, at the end of this step, they will begin removing buildings and equipment used by the EPA for the project, and disconnecting utilities used in the cleanup, which should take until sometime in December.
Although he said they are currently on schedule, Mr. Puvogel said the timeline could be pushed back if they find more areas in need of excavation within the next month.
"The only caveat is what we might find in the next few weeks," he said.
Once the cleanup is entirely complete, Rustic Mall LLC, the borough-named developer, will begin rebuilding the location, creating the site for mixed-used commercial, residential and retail purposes.
The building had originally been built on the site of the former Federal Creosote Plant, which left the carcinogen in the soil after it closed in the 1960s.

