Nickolas Meets
Medina Rock & Rail’s
Javier Mancanillas
On Oct. 8, Nickolas toured Medina Rock
& Rail, which remains the company’s
largest capital project to date. Though
the site just opened in 2016, one of its
pit loader operators, Javier Mancanillas
(pictured here at left), is a longtime
company employee who recently
celebrated his 20th year of service.
Mancanillas, along with the rest of the
Medina crew and the team at Beckmann
Quarry, is working to provide 900,000
tons of aggregates for the Golden Pass
Liquified Natural Gas export terminal,
a $10 billion megaproject just south of
Port Arthur, Texas.
“In addition to checking in on the ground
of each facility and meeting with division
and district leadership, learning about
the situation with the Golden Pass
project was a main reason for our trip,”
Nickolas said.
A Visit to the
New Caney Yard
On Oct. 7, Nickolas and a large group of
Martin Marietta’s people met at the New
Caney Yard. The site, which provides
aggregates and cement to the Houston
market, has run safely in 2019 while
its teams have provided material for the
area’s Grand Highway project. When
completed, the Grand Highway will form
a 180-mile loop around Houston. It will
include 480,000 tons of Martin Marietta
limestone and 150,000 tons of Type I/
Type II cement, Lynch said.
“These products will feed our portable
ready mixed concrete plant, which is on
the project site,” he said. “In total, we’re
going to produce 600,000 cubic yards
of concrete for the project.”
A Road
Warrior’s View
22 November/December 2019 22 2019 The Conveyor | www.martinmarietta.com
While the company has won a contract
for the aggregates part of the project,
Gulf Coast District Vice President-
General Manager Jason Lynch said talks
about the ready mixed concrete required
for the job remain ongoing.
In our latest Road Warrior’s
View column, we again
check in with Senior Vice
President and Chief Financial
Officer Jim Nickolas, who,
along with Chairman and CEO
Ward Nye, recently traveled
across the great state of
Texas. There, they visited
more than a half dozen Martin
Marietta locations over three
days in October. Among
those operations visited
were Hunter Cement and
Hunter Stone, New Braunfels
Quarry and Medina Rock &
Rail in the San Antonio area;
Bridgeport and Chico quarries
near Dallas; the New Caney
Terminal near Houston; and
a handful of ready mixed
concrete operations.
“Ward and I made the
trip from Raleigh and were
joined by our local Division
Presidents, Ron Kopplin and
Kirk Light,” Nickolas said.
“What we saw across each of
the operations we visited was
impressive. Business activity
is good. Employee morale is
high. The outlook for the Texas
market remains strong.”
Pictured from left are: (front row) Bret Freudenberg, Ward
Nye, Jake Koehler, Josh Bracke, Elrick St. Clair and Kirk Light;
(back row) John Castro, Jason Lynch and Harold Bullard.
Jim’s Journeys
/www.martinmarietta.com