Dozens picket concrete recycling plant that has been blanketing Cobble Hill in dust for a year: ‘always getting sick’

Dozens of Brooklynites raged Wednesday over a city-run concrete recycling facility that has been blanketing Cobble Hill in thick layers of dust for a year — spouting concerns that the fumes are making them sick.

More than 50 people formed a human shield outside the SIM Municipal Recycling to block trucks from entering Wednesday — as they protested the rock-smashing operations that they say have been a blight on the neighborhood.

“We’re really mad. We needed to do something drastic to get them to listen to us because they’ve told us countless lies. We’ve tried to be nice,” Jana Weill, 42, told The Post.

Weill, who has lived on Columbia Street for 21 years, was among the first to wedge herself between a city Department of Transportation truck and the entrance to the facility, a move she said she was forced to take after months of dealing with air noise pollution emitting from the recycling facility.

More than a dozen outraged neighbors joined her, chanting “Shut it down!” and “We need a real solution, no more air pollution.”

The driver sat idly until police swooped onto the scene just minutes later. The group quickly dispersed without further altercation or arrests, though they continued shouting at the stream of pick-up trucks that followed.

“We can’t open the windows. We have constantly there’s dust everywhere. Even when I’m walking, there’s dust in my mouth. Our building shakes from the trucks, the whole building shakes. And it’s just created a really unsafe — it’s disrupted the peace in my neighborhood,” Weill seethed.

Weill was one of several who told The Post they ditched work to air their grievances at the facility — which was supposed to be only a “temporary” operation at Kane and Columbia streets.

But the angry residents said they have recently learned the plant would continue operating at the location for at least five years.

The SIM facility was relocated from its Sunset Park location last February to make way for the construction of offshore wind infrastructure at the South Brooklyn Army Terminal — a move that has flooded the wealthier Cobble Hill neighborhood with constant air and noise pollution.

Strong winds frequently lift piles of exposed recycled concrete aggregate (RCA) and spread it throughout Cobble Hill, blanketing the neighborhood in a layer of dust, they claimed.

“We can never open the windows. We run air purifiers 24/7 and I’m always getting sick,” Sharon Gordon, 63, told The Post.

Gordon, who has lived around the corner from the SIM site for two decades, noticed her respiratory health decline over the last year. She suffers from a selective immune deficiency, making her especially vulnerable to the fumes — which has severely impacted her career as a professional singer.

Gordon doled out dozens of facial coverings to other protesters who were concerned about breathing in the toxic concrete dust, which comes from efforts by the city to reduce concrete waste in landfills by pulverizing it.

The city Department of Transportation claims it has made a number of measures to mitigate the quality of life concerns, including reducing the size of the RCA piles, installing noise minimizers to reduce back up alarms from most of its vehicles and ceasing all operations when winds reach 30 mph.

The department also plans to install a new irrigation system by the spring to help keep the piles wet to keep them from flying.

“We are taking all the necessary steps to keep the public safe—though in response to community feedback, NYC DOT has taken new measures to decrease the size of the recycled material piles in this plant and further reduce dust and noise,” a DOT spokesperson told The Post.

The agency in July told the Star-Revue that an environmental review showed no negative environmental impacts — but would not respond to The Post’s request to view the document.

A spokesperson for the Economic Development Corporation added that it was working closely with the DOT “to ensure that all possible steps are being taken to keep the community safe while this important work continues.”

Residents say the efforts have done little to appease the problem. Nearly two dozen 311 complaints about the air quality have been filed over the last three months, records show.

One Kane Street resident, who asked to remain anonymous, questioned why the DOT chose to relocate the recycling plant to a residential neighborhood — particularly with an elementary school two blocks away, a public park down the road and at a site with a greenway running through its driveway.

“It baffles me. There’s so many better places this could go,” the man, who arrived to the protest wearing a wrestler’s mask, told The Post.

“You measure health issues over years, sometimes decades. Health effects, whatever they are, we won’t know for a long time, but I personally have noticed definitely sore throat. Definitely respiratory differences.”