Foundry Sand Used For Clean Fill

Having a Say in the Lay of the Land

What do you get when you cross acres of unusable land with tons of foundry sand? A happier community. Just ask the members and neighbors of St. Mary Magdalene Church in Waupaca, Wisconsin. 

The land around the church wasn’t very useful — the ground was uneven, making construction projects nearly impossible. Partnering with the congregation community, however, Waupaca Foundry helped make a dream project become reality. Through geotechnical fill and a lot of goodwill, we helped create a baseball field, multi-use recreational field, and an outdoor amphitheater where there once was nothing but unusable land. 

Leveling rough terrain can be as problematic, and as expensive, as moving a mountain, but in Waupaca, all it took was a pinch of creative thinking and 85,000 tons of foundry by-product. Thanks to the availability of Waupaca Foundry sand and slag, the land around the church was improved at very little cost to the community and with benefits to the Earth. Foundry by-product escaped a wasteful fate in a landfill by replacing more expensive construction materials, saving the community over a million dollars. 

As the community begins to enjoy the new additions around St. Mary Magdalene, they probably won’t think too much about the repurposed materials beneath their feet. What they might think about is how much nicer it is to be out in the sunshine making the most of a space that was once unusable.