"It's a great victory!" Béatrice Lejeune, mayor of Bailleul-sur-Thérain, does not hide her relief after the decision of the administrative court of Amiens (Somme) to cancel the authorization to operate the Cent Mines site that had been issued to the company Bonnevie et Fils in 2022. The company based in Arnouville (Val-d'Oise) will no longer be able to deposit the 4.2 million cubic meters of inert waste, 88% of which comes from Greater Paris, on the 34 hectares of this land it owns between Bresles and Bailleul-sur-Thérain. "Any fight that is not engaged is lost," says Béatrice Lejeune. The file was eminently difficult and not many of us believed in a positive outcome. »
In his decision, the judge first recognized the interest of the municipalities in bringing proceedings by considering that they were "likely to suffer noise pollution from the operation of the site as well as the increase in road traffic". The scale of the project, including the 19-meter-high mountain of waste, is, according to the judge, "likely to have an impact on the landscape and biodiversity of this area surrounded by Mount Caesar and natural areas of ecological, faunistic and floristic interest".
"We see that we were right about everything"
For the court, the project should also have been the subject of "an environmental authorization under the Water Act", the site of implantation being "on a wetland". Finally, the court highlights the lack of knowledge of the local urban plan (PLU) of Bresles, incompatible with this project which "induces a circulation of about fifty vehicles per day and provides for the realization of a parking lot and a tank of oil".
"We see that we were right about everything," says Béatrice Lejeune. Nevertheless, there was a feeling that this file had not been dealt with properly administratively speaking. "From the beginning, I said that it did not correspond to the PLU of the commune, recalls Dominique Cordier, mayor of Bresles. This is a victory but we remain vigilant. »
It all started in 2019. "We were against this project as soon as Bonnevie came to present it to us," recalls Béatrice Lejeune. In this new battle, we had the support of the elected representatives of the Beauvaisis agglomeration and the local population. Hope is back but Bonnevie can still appeal. We will continue our collective fight for our territory. Contacted and informed of the court's decision on Friday morning, a representative of the company Bonnevie did not wish to speak.