Bill Haylock’s career spans more than 45 years in the resources and environment sectors, but his story is about more than just time in the field. From the early days of helping companies secure land and navigate complex approvals, to leading projects on both the private and public sides, Bill has always been driven by a curiosity for how land shapes opportunity.
Along the way, he discovered a passion for solving the challenges that sit at the heart of land management. That path eventually led him to create PX4 Software—a way to bring together everything he had learned into a tool that could make land management more transparent, smarter, and more accessible. In this series, Bill shares his journey in his own words.
The Landman’s Role: My First Encounter with Stakeholder Management
Here I met my first landman and didn’t know it. I knew this fellow interacted with land and stakeholders holders, but I really had no idea of what he did. And what these discussions were about. I was working with the environment and mine rehabilitation team.
The Triumph of Reclamation: Cleaning Up the Slate River
Mount Emmons had previously been an underground copper, lead, zinc mine. And as such had left a legacy of AMD (acid mine drainage). When I arrived the Slate River which ran below the mine and through the town of Crested Butte, was heavily polluted, with acid and heavy metals. There were no fish living in it. Amax (part of the Climax molybdenum group) were building a water treatment facility to remove the sludge and pollutants from the mine drainage waters. It was commissioned whilst I was there and to this day still operates. And the slate River is clean and full of fish.
A week or so after the plant was turn owned and operating, we were in the river sampling. And yes within days of the river running clean, Brown, Rainbow, Brook and Cutthroat Trout were back in the river. That was a fun and exciting day.
Alpine Land Management Challenges (Close to 10,000 Feet)
My job including helping out in the nursey, where we were growing a number of tree species including bristlecone pine, Colorado blue spruce, Douglas-fir, and Engelmann spruce.
Reforestation and Hydro Mulching Techniques
I also helped undertake a number of rehabilitation jobs using a hydro mulching machine. A new and exciting piece of equipment, that we hired to spray seed, fertilizer and mulch onto reshaped tailings dams. We also did the local Gunnison baseball fields. This work was all done in the fall, where the ground would be snow covered in the winter and the grass seeds would germinate in the spring.
The Acid Rain Monitoring Post
My other very interesting task was helping to set up an acid rain monitoring gauge station, part of a nationwide program to help monitor and understand acid rainfall, a significant issue of the time. We built a 3 meter high platform, upon which we placed the equipment. At the height of winter this was the level of the snow. Every week I was tasked with collecting samples and recalibrating the equipment. And in the middle of winter this was an interesting exercise. I would need to mauver a snow mobile as close as possible to the platform. The crawl out of the cabin and try to grab the platform without falling into the snow. Then once balanced I needed to take my gloves off, open the monitoring panel and begin a recalibrating process. Many times I would need to stop and rewarm my fingers. Without the fine motor skills of one’s fingers, one could not punch the small calibrating buttons.
Lessons Learned: Land, Environment, and Community Conflict
It was during this period at Mount Emmons that I started to understand the wider range of issues that a mine site confronted. There was significant anti mine sentiment in the town, and community in general, there were complexities with the land lease from the Bureau of Land management and Forestry. And then the environmental and land rehabilitation challenges in an alpine region (close to 10,000 feet).
Unfortunately, the project was shelved and I needed to look for my next career step.
The PX4 Software Journey Continues
The experiences with AMD, BLM land leases, and community conflict at Mount Emmons directly inform the compliance and stakeholder management tools within PX4 Software.
Read Part 1 to start the journey: Origins of PX4: The UK Survey Years
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