Proceeding To Extract Minerals From Fort Worth's Oakland Lake Park

Last week, when I picked up the latest FW Weekly, I also picked up a little neighborhood newspaper that covers where I live, called Greater Meadowbrook News.

In the Greater Meadowbrook News there is a full page "column" titled Running with Wanda, by Wanda Conlin.

Via Wanda I learned that the Handley Neighborhood Association, at their March meeting, heard from a Land Agent named Diane Reid.

For you who are not in a gas/oil drilling zone, a Land Agent is the person who finagles the rights to poke hole in the ground for the drillers.

The Land Agent updated the Handley group about Chesapeake Energy drilling operations in the neighborhood. Apparently Chesapeake owns land near where Lee Harvey Oswald is buried on Shannon Rose Hill. And on Ederville Road near the Handley Post Office.

The Chesapeake activity near the Handley Post Office raises some concerns due to the troublesome increase in truck traffic on a street already prone to wrecks. I have seen 2 wrecks by the Handley Post Office. I don't quite get why this is such a wreck prone location.

And then the West Meadowbrook Neighborhood Association also had a March meeting. At that meeting Fort Worth Parks and Community Services Planner, David Creek, "educated" attendees about the beginning of procedures to extract minerals from Stratford and Oakland Lake Parks.

Huh?

Is "procedures to extract minerals" double-speak for drilling for Barnett Shale Natural Gas? Is a drilling rig going to be set up in Oakland Lake Park?

It's very perplexing.

Something Might Be Happening Soon Under Fort Worth's Ederville Park

There is a very very little park, called Ederville Park, across the street from Fort Worth's Handley Post Office. In all the years that I have been going to the Handley Post Office I do not recollect ever seeing anyone using this park.

There may be one picnic table, but Ederville Park appears to me to be a small, open, treeless grassy field.

When I left the P.O. I saw a sign that caught my eye, so though it's not my usual route away from the P.O., I drove by to read the sign.

It says...

PUBLIC NOTICE

The subsurface of this park is being considered for non-recreational use to allow off site drilling and extraction of natural gas from underneath this park. There will be no drilling units located on the park and the surface of the park will not change.

There are a lot of houses near Ederville Park. And the aforementioned Post Office. A church is across the street from the Post Office. On the north end of Ederville Park there is an Enterprise Car Rental outlet.

So, is this off site drilling only taking natural gas that sits under this little park? How does that work? One of those slant drilling operations that ends up under Ederville Park? I've seen no signs in the area of people objecting to drilling or being pressured to sign over drilling rights, like I see in other areas where the drillers are poking holes in the ground.

I wonder where the off site drilling site is?

Another Car Hits A Tree By The Handley Post Office In Fort Worth

I have no clue about the details. All I know is I saw a strange scene this afternoon when I pulled into the Handley Post Office to mail some important documents to the Queen of Wink.

8 or 9 Fort Worth police cars, a couple emergency vehicles, a lot of flashing lights and one dilapidated looking car slammed up against a tree.

That is the tree and the car you see on the right.

I saw no tasering or any other Gestapo-type Fort Worth police behavior, which is why I referred to them as police, in case you were wondering.

What appeared to be a blanket was covering the back of the wrecked car. That seemed odd to me. There was no rush by the emergency vehicles to take anyone to a hospital. Was this a police chase that ended badly? This is the third wreck-type incident I have seen while at the Handley Post Office. Nothing seems unusually dangerous about the road in this location.

It's very perplexing.