Signs saying "no trespassing" line the grassy field at the corner of Ridge Road and Oak Ridge Drive in Jackson, so Bill Ellis and his yellow Labrador walk on the street.

The 14.2-acre grassy lot appears a bit boring and out of place next to the attractive three-story brick homes near the Bent Creek Golf Course and the expensive pickup trucks and SUVs that sit in the driveways of those homes. But some don't know that it's a cover-up: What is now one of Jackson's finest neighborhoods used to be a dump -- literally.

City leaders are now looking into ways to turn the former landfill, shut down in 1978, into some sort of park. But the use of that land, which was capped with several feet of clay-rich soil when it was shut down and is currently a field of Johnson grass with a few trees, will always be limited because of Missouri Department of Natural Resource restrictions.

If a park on the site became a reality, it would be more of a nature-trail, green-space type of park. The DNR restricts any breaking up of the land because, by doing so, more water would seep into the soil, which would allow anaerobic bacteria, which breaks down the decaying trash to produce more methane gas, which is highly explosive, said Jim Bell, chief engineer for the DNR's solid waste management program. Besides, Bell said, the soil is unstable and it would be nearly impossible to build any kind of structure on it.

What would be allowed, Bell said, is the type of park that Jackson officials are talking about.

Going green

City administrator Jim Roach said the focus will be on making it more pleasing to the eye.

"We want to keep it kind of a green area, but at the same time, do something that has some aesthetic value," Roach said. "We'd like to have some native plants and bushes, maybe some wildflowers, something more attractive than Johnson grass and weeds. My vision may be beyond what we could do to the property, but maybe put in an unimproved trail like a mulch trail or something gravel that people could use."

Shane Anderson, Jackson's park superintendent, has been working with local Missouri Department of Conservation officials in trying to find out how to go about implementing the project. Anderson said he hasn't spoken with anyone from the DNR in about a year, but A.J. Hendershott, with the state conservation department, is assisting with the process.

Hendershott was out of town Tuesday and could not be reached for comment.

The city and conservation department are still very early in the "finding answers" process, Anderson said.

Roach said no timeline or cost has been tagged to the project yet.

Roach said the city gets two or three complaints every year that the grass gets too high. He said others complain that, when the city mows, too many rabbits and birds are killed.

Ellis, who lives a few blocks away from the old landfill and was walking his dog near the area Tuesday, said he doesn't have any problems with the way it is now, but he wouldn't mind seeing improvements either.

"They keep it mowed, there's no odor and a lot of deer graze here in the evenings," he said. "I don't have any negative thoughts."

Joe and Nickie McCadams, the parents of 6 month-old twins and the owners of two dogs, said they'd like to see the area opened up to the public.

"We need something back in this neighborhood to take our dogs," said Nickie McCadams, who lives in a home across the street from the landfill.

Beyond grass

Mayor Paul Sander agreed that it would be nice to improve the area.

"Over the years, councilmen and people like myself have had an interest in making that area something besides something that grows grass," he said.

Sander said the city won't be allowed to put up any swing sets or playground equipment, because that involves breaking up the ground.

"It's a very tightly regulated thing," he said.

Bell said closed landfills can be very dangerous. In other states, people have been killed by buildings that exploded from rising methane fumes from old landfills.

He said no one in Missouri has been killed by such an accident, but a home in Perryville caught fire because the gas from a landfill migrated underneath the highway.

"There's certain directions we can't go from a public safety perspective," Bell said. "There aren't a lot of good uses for old landfills. Basically, if something is built, it has to be over the top and it can't have confined spaces."

bmiller@semissourian.com

243-6635