Pros outweigh cons in Bodycote land deal

Contaminated land doesn’t have to mean no man’s land.

The Fort Worth City Council has approved plans to purchase the remaining land needed for the $450 million Will Rogers Memorial Center arena project.

A facility called Bodycote sits on some of that land, in what once was primarily an industrial area. Underneath Bodycote is contaminated soil.

Bodycote, an U.K. thermal processing service company, heats metal together, and that industrial process uses hazardous materials. It caused some concern with the City Council when it considered the site more than a year ago.

Elevated levels of arsenic, barium and lead were found in the soil, but the city decided to take on all environmental responsibility for the land once it’s purchased.

Council members and the city environmental manager seem confident that the contaminants can be successfully removed.

The city will dig up the soil and take it to a landfill.

The Bodycote property is 2.567 acres of the proposed 22.3-acre arena site.

This story was originally published April 13, 2016 at 5:55 PM with the headline "Pros outweigh cons in Bodycote land deal."