White gravel

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Factory premises in Weiach
Inert material dump in the north pit
Factory premises, part of the Fixit factory
Partly renatured former mining area in Weiach (under nature protection)
Vehicle fleet
"Veronika" works locomotive in Eberhard colors at Zweidlen station
"Weiacher Kies" freight car in Haniel colors at Zweidlen station

The Weiacher Kies AG is one of the largest gravel mining company in Switzerland. It has been part of Eberhard Holding AG, based in Kloten , since May 2009 . The company appears on the market under the “Weiacher” brand.

Economical meaning

In Zurich Unterland are 75 percent of gravel reserves of the canton of Zurich . The mining areas of Weiacher Kies AG are among the most important locations where this raw material is extracted in the Zurich Unterland.

The company is the only industrial company in the Weiach area and the municipality's most important taxpayer . Not least because of this, Weiach has become one of the most tax-efficient communities in the Zürcher Unterland. 5 percent of the share capital is owned by the political community of Weiach, whose community president is ex officio a member of the board of directors of Weiacher Kies AG.

The bulk goods and later also the excavation trucks from Weiacher Kies AG carry the name of the community throughout Switzerland .

Degradation and products

The mining takes place in the open pit to a depth of approx. 30 meters below the grown terrain. This means that the bottom of the gravel pit is almost at the depth of the Rhine flowing north of the mining area . After the humus layer has been removed , the wall gravel is removed with the help of wheel loaders and taken to an interim storage facility, from which the material is transported from the pit to the factory building via conveyor belts.

In the gravel plant , the gravel material is washed, sorted according to grain size and, in some cases, further processed in crushers. The product is then used as a concrete aggregate or bulk gravel for installation in road suitcases.

Weiacher Kies AG also offers sand, gravel, chippings, crushed stone and ready-mixed concrete.

history

After the failure of a commercial gravel mining project by the Aymonod brothers from Pratteln and Muttenz , approved by the municipality of Weiach in 1957 , the Franz Haniel Group in Duisburg , Germany, took over the concession and built it in 1962 in Hard, the plain between Rheinsfelden and the village of Weiach , a large gravel works.

The plant was the first in Switzerland to mine gravel using an industrial process. Another special feature was that rail transports to customers played a major role from the start. Weiacher Kies AG has been using its block trains with bulk goods wagons from its own loading point near Zweidlen train station on the Bülach-Koblenz route since 1962 . The first large deliveries of gravel went to the construction sites on the N3 national road (now A3 ) on the ridge on the left bank of Lake Zurich .

In 2001 Weiacher Kies AG had the main road Basel-Winterthur and the Axpo high-voltage line Breite - Beznau laid at the foot of the slope under the Chilenholz in order to be able to extract further gravel reserves. During archaeological investigations in connection with the relocation of the cantonal road, extensive traces of prehistoric settlements came to light.

Until spring 2004, Weiacher Kies AG was a 100% subsidiary of Franz Haniel & Cie. GmbH in Duisburg ( Fortune Global 500 list 2006: Rank 179). From spring 2004 to the beginning of May 2009 the company belonged to the French building materials group Lafarge , based in Paris (Fortune Global 500 list 2006: Rank 325). At the beginning of May 2009, the family company Eberhard, active in the fields of civil engineering, remediation and landfill management and based in the Zürcher Unterland, bought Weiacher Kies AG.

Replenishment and reclamation

After gravel mining and replenishment, agricultural land was created in the Rüteren area north of the railway line, but also uncultivated, near-natural zones. Large areas with gravelly-stony soils were left fallow. Substitute habitats for the biotopes of plants and animals worthy of protection that were built over during the 5th construction phase of Zurich Airport can develop on this basis. In consultation with the canton and municipality, a total of around 23 hectares of ecological compensation areas ( ponds , biotopes , dry sites, meadows and hedges ) will be created on the Weiacher Kies AG site . The renatured areas become habitats for rare pioneer plants as well as threatened bird and insect species. The little ringed plover has started breeding successes. However, according to the cantonal structure plan, the area is long-term designated as a possible waste dump, which led to objections from nature conservation organizations during the 2007 revision of the structure plan.

Dismantling plans

Since the gravel reserves in the mining areas between the Winterthur-Koblenz railway line and the laid cantonal road were running out, Weiacher Kies AG planned to open up new mining sites in the Hasli area , a gravel terrace northwest of the village of Weiach, located in the direction of Kaiserstuhl and Fisibach . These plans are currently blocked because the company has not yet been able to come to an agreement with a second owner of mining rights and with the authorities of the neighboring canton of Aargau , up to the area of ​​which the mining perimeter is to extend.

Web links

Commons : Weiacher Kies  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Hilmar Höber: Prehistoric Street in Weiach exposed on nzz.ch (accessed September 25, 2017)
  2. ↑ Report on new dry meadows in the Weiacher gravel pit on eberhard.com (PDF)