The smelliest train in America has rolled out of Parrish, Ala., and the small town hopes it will never see its like again.
In what Mayor Heather Hall described as “wonderful news,” the train’s load of 10 million pounds of sewage sludge from New York and New Jersey has been transported to a private landfill site 25 miles away after stinking up the town for more than two months, NPR reports.
The 250 tractor-trailer loads of poop ended up in the Parrish rail yard after nearby West Jefferson sued to prevent the sludge from being handled locally. The sludge “smells of dead rotting animals as well as human waste” and caused the town to become infested with flies, West Jefferson’s legal action stated.
Parrish residents say the stench from the waste, which was parked near Little League ballfields, was inescapable and made life in the town of 982 people almost unbearable.
The mayor, who said the sludge smelled “like death,” plans to introduce zoning laws to prevent an encore. She says other small towns in the South are dealing with similar problems on a smaller scale.
“This material does not need to be in a populated area … period,” she said in a Facebook post. “It greatly diminishes the quality of life for those who live anywhere near it.” Parrish residents firmly agree.
“Would New York City like for us to send all our poop up there forever?” one resident tells the AP. “They don’t want to dump it in their rivers, but I think each state should take care of their own waste.”
