El Paso Streets Department Requests More Crushed Rock

We all know the Joni Mitchell classic: "They paved paradise to put up a parking lot." Well, in the City of El Paso, Texas, they level a mountain to pave paradise and put up roads and crushed rock landscaping.

Item 6B on tomorrow's City Council agenda is discussion and action to award Cemex Materials South, LLC and Jobe Materials, LP a total of $3,399,885.00 over a three year period for roadway construction materials: asphalt, crushed rock for the roadway base and more for landscaping.

In the El Paso Times' Saturday story about the proposed contract, Streets Department Director, Daryl Cole, is quoted to say: "This is our bread and butter. Without these materials we don't work." The Department summary form is here.

Perhaps being more deliberate and patient with alternative landscaping on our city streets will do as much to keep people working as well as minimize the destruction of our Franklin and Hueco Mountains to excessive quarrying.

The City of El Paso can set an example by not using crushed rock landscapes and making it harder for private businesses and homeowners to do the same thing.