Ongoing cleanup at the former railroad tie plant in Somers will be outlined at a community meeting Thursday in Somers.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will give a presentation and talk about the Superfund site from 6:30 to 8 p.m. at the Somers Volunteer Fire Department, 27 Leslie Ave.

The 80-acre site is northeast of Somers on the north end of Flathead Lake. BNSF Railway Co. and its predecessors operated the railroad tie and wood treatment facility between 1901 and 1986. The historic operation resulted in creosote impacts to soil and groundwater.

The EPA outlined a cleanup plan through a record of decision in 1989. Since then more than 30 years of groundwater samples have been collected to evaluate the cleanup and ensure delineation of creosote impacts, the EPA said in a press release about the upcoming meeting.

A groundwater treatment system operated for 13 years, from 1994 to 2007, but silt and clay in the soil make it difficult for the treatment system to remove a high volume of creosote-impacted groundwater, the federal agency said. That same silt and clay limits the movement of creosote in the groundwater. The treatment plant is being decommissioned and is scheduled for removal either this year or in 2017.

About 440 gallons of creosote and creosote-impacted groundwater have been pumped from 10 wells near Somers Road in the last four years.

About 50,000 cubic yards of contaminated soil were treated over 17 years, ending in 2002. Wetlands in the area also have been restored.

BNSF acquired additional property along Somers and Pickleville roads last year and is finalizing institutional controls for those properties, the EPA said.

The Superfund program requires the EPA to review the Somers site every five years to make sure the remedy is functioning as intended. The next five-year review is due in 2017.

The EPA updated the human health risk assessment for the Somers site last year, determining that people who live and work in Somers are not coming in contact with unsafe soil, groundwater or air connected to the site.

Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or by email at lhintze@dailyinterlake.com.