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West Elk Mine <br />weather road. Its 24-foot wide surface consists of seven inches of road subbase, seven inches <br />of road base, and three inches of pavement. The road has maximum grades of 5 percent and <br />10 percent along the east-west and north-south boundaries of the refuse pile, respectively. From <br />the employees' parking area up to the portal bench area, the road was constructed with a cross <br />slope of two percent. The overall vertical grade of this section is ten percent. <br />The West Elk Mine property is within 100 feet of the outside right-of-way of State Highway <br />133. Consequently, a variance was needed from the Colorado Highway Department to allow the <br />mine to encroach on this right-of-way. The Department has granted Mountain Coal Company <br />a variance from the minimum 100-foot spacing requirement. <br />Access Roads <br />The Wesi Elk Mine has four access roads (Map 53). They are the stack tube storage road, silo <br />storage road, middle-mine facilities road, and Sylvester Gulch fan road. The lower part of the <br />old haul road located between the run-of-mine and crushed coal stack tubes comprises the stack <br />tube storage road. The upper part of the old haul road serves as access road to the middle-mine <br />facilities, such as the crushers, surface shop water treatment plants, and other nearby facilities. <br />Although these roads are now designated as access roads, they were designed as haul roads and <br />may occasionally be utilized to haul coal, coal refuse or other materials. The silo storage road <br />will be constructed around the new crushed coal stack tube storage area to the silo storage area. <br />The Sylvester Gulch fan road provides access to the Sylvester Gulch fan site. <br />Vertical grades on the access roads vary. The middle-mine access road has an overall grade of <br />5.68 percent. The stacktube storage road has an overall grade of 6.85 percent and a maximum <br />grade of 12.18 percent. These roads are paved. The new silo access road has a maximum <br />grade of 10 percent and will be gravel surfaced. <br />The mine roads require relatively little surface maintenance. Holes and ruts are patched in the <br />early stages with a cold mix of composition similar to the original road mix. in addition to <br />pavement maintenance on roads, maintenance operations include shaping and sealing of <br />shoulders, cutting back or chemically treating weed and bush growth, maintaining ditches and <br />drains, removing litter, and repainting stripes. Snow and ice removal during the winter months <br />are a roadway maintenance priority. Parking and side areas are similarly maintained for safe and <br />efficient use. <br />Light-Use Roads <br />A gravel surfaced light-use road will be constructed around the southern and eastern perimeter <br />of the new MB-2R sedimentation pond and around the base of the lower refuse pile for <br />occasional construction and maintenance equipment uses. Existing Forest Service roads and roads <br />constructed during exploratory drilling provide access to monitoring stations not accessible from <br />haul or access roads and were not constructed nor maintained as light-use roads. <br />2.05-22 Rc~iscd Augua 1993. 7865 <br />N~ w ~~ ~~ <br />