L.G. Everist begins production at South Dakota ready-mix plant and recycling yard

Asphalt production has started at L.G. Everist’s newest facility outside Harrisburg, South Dakota, the latest phase of a 60-acre development that also includes a ready-mix plant and recycling yard.

“It’s nice to have a big-enough footprint to do all the things that we need to do,” L.G. Everist President and CEO Rob Everist tells Sioux Falls Business. “It doubles our existing capacity in the Sioux Falls metro area, and it’s a very clean, very safe site. It’s laid out so well, it doesn’t ever seem that busy even though we’re having a strong year.”

The development, called Nine Mile Park, is staffed by about three dozen people and is the largest of the company’s operations. Operations at the ready-mix plant began last fall, and the asphalt plant came online in May.

“It’s now a full-fledged ready-mix and hot mix asphalt facility,” Everist says. “And then we’ve got recycled materials—road millings and crushed concrete in the back—so it’s a 60-acre, all-weather site that can produce all sorts of construction materials.”

Located along the Interstate 29 exit, just outside of Harrisburg, Everist tells Sioux Falls Business that the facility is intentionally landscaped and hard surfaced to create an “attractive setting.”

“As you drive by, you look at it and say it doesn’t look like a typical construction yard,” Everist says. “We did that on purpose. We invested more to make it look nice, not only to attract employees but to show the county and the community we’re here to be good neighbors.”

Described by L.G. Everist as “state-of-the-art,” the facility features technology for team members to monitor trucks and prepare required loads in real time to maximize efficiency, and every truck goes through a wash before leaving the plant.

Everist says the location is key to supporting regional growth, complementing a plant in northeast Sioux Falls and replacing a smaller plant nearby.

“So, we’re on opposite sides of the Sioux Falls area now, right off the interstate, and we have a lot of access and flexibility and redundancy as far as how we’re delivering throughout the city,” Everist says. “Sioux Falls, there’s a lot of infrastructure work right now between Veterans Parkway, area bridge construction and the overall road construction season. Private construction has tapered off some, especially on the apartment side, but we’re happy and busy every day.”

L.G. Everist has grown to about 440 total employees, from its downtown Sioux Falls headquarters to about two dozen locations of various sizes throughout the Upper Midwest and Colorado.

The new site also features a recycling yard where asphalt and concrete are crushed and processed. L.G. Everist owns a total of 140 acres in the area, with some set aside for future commercial land.

“It’s being farmed right now for crops, and when the interchange gets redone, we will start looking at development,” Everist says. “It will either be a build-to-suit or we’ll sell, but we own both sides of the intersection on the east side of the highway.”

A ribbon-cutting and two-hour open house will be held June 19, beginning at 11:30 a.m. CT.