By Carol P. Bartold

Mar. 23, 2016:  A group of local residents, concerned about potential groundwater and floodwater contamination that could affect The Bronxville School and the impending Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Midland Valley Drainage Basin Flood Mitigation Project, has urged the Bronxville Board of Education to consider testing groundwater at the school campus. 

Village resident Wendy Murphy spoke to the Bronxville Board of Education at the board's March 15 meeting to address the group's concerns about the site of a proposed Marriott Springhill Suites and restaurant at 109 Marbledale Road in Tuckahoe. Plans for a five-story hotel with 163 rooms, a one-story, 6,400-square-foot restaurant, and 208 parking spaces on the contaminated former site of a marble quarry have been presented to the Tuckahoe Planning Board. 

"This was used as a dump," Murphy stated. "They put refrigerators, air conditioners, gasoline, pesticides there because they didn't realize how hazardous it was." 

The existing grade on the site is north to south/southeast. Murphy noted that the group is concerned about potential contaminated stormwater flowing south, and downhill, to the FEMA project's collection tanks to be built on Hayes Field at The Bronxville School. "It's up to us to know what we're pumping back out," Murphy said about the stormwater the project will pump into the Bronx River. "We and those farther south of us will be the ones to be severely contaminated." 

Fill on the proposed hotel site consists of cinders, ash, construction and demolition debris, glass, mattress parts, and metal auto parts. Nine groundwater samples were collected for investigation at the site. In those samples, five volatile organic compounds and several semi-volatile organic compounds were found. Pesticides were detected in five samples and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) were detected in three samples. All items found in the water were in excess of ambient water quality standards established by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC). 

The site plan submitted to the Tuckahoe Planning Board includes a stormwater system designed to capture, contain, and slow the flow of water. As the system captures stormwater, sumps would separate sediment before water is drained into the water system. Four underground retention systems would be installed, which would discharge stormwater at three locations under Marbledale Road. Soil displaced to construct the stormwater system would be moved from north to south to decrease the grade.

The site is considered a brownfield site, where current contaminants exceed health-based or environmental standards or criteria adopted by the DEC. The Tuckahoe Planning Board has filed a conditional negative declaration, which indicates the project will not result in a negative environmental impact, and will not require a full environmental impact statement to be prepared.

Pictured here (rotating):  Village resident Wendy Murphy (L) and Dr. Rachel Kelly, assistant superintendent for human resources and pupil services (photo by N. Bower); site of the proposed Marriott hotel on Marbledale Road in Tuckahoe (photo by A. Warner).