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Success Story
"City Concrete Mixes Right Ingredients for GrowthCompany sits on redeveloped Sheet & Tube property.By Dan O'BrienA Youngstown concrete company has discovered the right investment at the right time is the perfect mix for its growing business.City Concrete LLC today employs 40 and within the last year has spent more than $3.5 million to upgrade its mixing and materials-handling operations."We're using the newest technology available for concrete mixing," says its president, John Annichenni. Eight months ago, City Concrete gunned up a new twin-shaft mixing plant and a new rail-unloading operation. "It's increased our production capability from 125 [cubic] yards per hour to 360 yards per hour," he added.Annichenni's company spent $1 million on the rail operations and $2.5 million in the mixing plant, he reports. The new equipment comes online just as major infrastrucure and construction projects in the region get under way, allowing the company to serve contractors with a superior product, he says.Each Friday, 60 rail cars pull up to the site next to V&M Star Steel where the aggregate mined from a limestone quarry in western Ohio is unloaded. The new operation allows the cars to dump their loads directly onto a new conveyor system, which transports the stone into the yard. Then it's picked up by trucks and carried to the new mixing plant."We're the first in this area to use this kind of technology," Annichenni says. "It's used in Europe a lot, but not here."What sets this plant apart is that the aggregate -- that is, stone slag and sand -- has been mixed earlier to the right consistency before being loaded onto cement trucks. The concrete is then ready to be poured at the job site.Normally, the aggregate mix would simply be rationed out and fed into the trucks, which would then mix the batch in the rotating bin, Annichenni explains. The company uses limestone from western Ohio because that variety of limestone lacks deposits of shale, a fine-grained rock formed by hardened clay. "We're not using local limestone because shale has been a huge problem here for years," he explains. One of the biggest problems builders face today is driveways made of concrete with a high concentration of shale, Annichenni relates. "Often, they're going to pit and pop up," he notes. "I think we make the best quality product the area's ever seen."The company supplies concrete to many of the major ongoing infrastructure and commercial building projects in the Mahoning Valley, Annichenni says. Among them are the various schools under construction and the 711 connector project.In 2000, City Concrete formed a partnership with R&J Trucking of Boardman to vertically integrate concrete manufacturing and delivery to both company's customers, says R&J's Mark Carrocce. "It's the only area where we do this sort of thing," he adds. The trucking company once independently hauled concrete and material for City Concrete. Today it runs six terminals in Ohio, employs 700 and operates 430 company trucks, he elaborates.Youngstown's economic development director, Jeffrey Chagnot, says the city has helped the company since its inception with the incentives that encouraged the business to grow. "We've granted them two abatements and sold them the land for a dollar," he notes.The site is also of local historical interest, Chagnot adds, because it was once the home of Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co.'s Jeannette Blast Furnace, built in the early 20th century. The "Jenny" -- as it's referred to in the Bruce Springsteen song "Youngstown," was the oldest furnace still in operation when the mill shut down in the late 1970s. "When we acquired it, we were thinking, 'What could we possibly do with this site?' " Chagnot recalls. The answer came about a year later when Annichenni negotiated to acquire the land and redevelop the 25-acre property to accommodate the new business.Under a contract with the state, Annichenni helped raze buildings that stood on the land, including the Jeannette furnace, in 1996. All that remains is a large iron slab.From there, city officials and Annichenni began discussing a proper use for the site; establishing a concrete business seemed a logical step, Annichenni says. The biggest stumbling blocks were removing the concrete foundations of the old mill, some of which still stand but can be incorporated into the business' operations. Old rail car trusses, for example, can be redeveloped and transformed into storage bins for material, he says."It seems to be a great site," Annichenni says. "It's not located in a residential area and it's right off the new 711 connector, which will be a major artery in the city.""