Bellingham Comments from Digital Recorder - EISs for the Proposed ...

GATEWAY PACIFIC TERMINAL EIS SCOPING HEARING VOL. II
COURT REPORTER: BETH DRUMMOND PROCEEDING DATE: October 27, 2012
Page 127
1 before me, but that's perfect. Seven years ago, my husband
2 and I retired to Mount Vernon from Texas. We chose Mount
3 Vernon because it's a beautiful environment, a resort kind
4 of town.
5 We bought a house above downtown that we're
6 living in that's about 100 years old. We've made
7 improvements to the house and the yard because I'm an avid
8 gardener.
9 We already have three or four coal trains a day
10 passing by our house, so I'd like to respond and I have
11 experience, and this is our experience:
12 Sometimes when the long heavy coal trains come
13 and at night, they wake us up, and they keep us awake.
14 When they come during the day, they drive us
15 indoors. Sometimes I cannot garden.
16 When 18 more coal trains for the GPT come
17 through, are we going to be able to open our windows in the
18 summertime to cool our houses at night? I don't think so.
19 Even friends visiting us this past summer,
20 complained about the noise and they noticed our house
21 vibrating from the existing coal trains.
22 One day my husband and I counted not just what
23 you heard there, but 23 blasts from one coal train; of
24 course, it drove us out the back porch.
25 Please conduct a detailed study on the cumulative