Rocking out in Cleveland

Every year, the staff of Pit & Quarry hosts a Roundtable & Conference, where we entertain aggregate producers, manufacturers, association representatives and other industry experts. This year, the event was held in Cleveland and included a visit to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and Museum. Roundtable participants roamed the museum halls to see things like stage outfits from Mick Jaggar and David Bowie and guitars from Jimi Hendrix and U2.

The Roll Hall’s first redesign in its 15-year history was completed in early 2012 and includes several new exhibit spaces and hundreds of new artifacts, including Beatles’ items on display to the public for the first time.

Our conference also included a talk by FMI’s George Reddin on the industry’s economic outlook, and Mike Heenan, Pit & Quarry’s safety/law columnist, discussed MSHA issues.

Split into two simultaneous sessions, the roundtable portion of the event was recorded, as participants talked about the economy, highway bill, MSHA, trade shows, labor issues and much more. As always, we publish an edited portion of the transcript from each session, and the first of these runs in this issue beginning on page 14. Be sure to see the December issue of Pit & Quarry for transcripts of the other session.

If you are a North American aggregate producer and would like to be on the invitation list for next year’s Roundtable and Conference,  please contact me at dconstantino@northcoastmedia.net.

Like father, like son

Another annual tradition at Pit & Quarry is the staff visit to a local aggregates operation. While our editors have opportunities to visit active sites throughout the year, the rest of our staff does not. Therefore, we make an annual staff trip to a local producer, and this year it was to Keeney Sand & Stone in Painesville, Ohio.

Mining started at the location in the 1980s, when Dennis Keeney put together his first screening plant. Today, his son Kevin operates the site with help from his dad and one other employee. There is family help in the office, as well, and the Keeneys are also involved in international charitable activities.

Pit & Quarry Managing Editor Kevin Yanik returned to the small operation to watch a blast, and came back with the story beginning on page 42.

Darren Constantino | Editor-in-Chief | dconstantino@northcoastmedia.net