Time to reopen Skaha Bluffs

Dear Editor:

BC Parks, please give me one good reason why the access to the Skaha Bluffs is still closed. Climbing and walking keep us healthy. Dr. Bonnie Henry recommends we do it often. It gets us a lot farther from places where we can spread the coronavirus than going to the grocery store, for example.

The Bluffs are not a typical provincial park, a place to camp, picnic and socialize, where one could argue there might be an elevated risk to catch and spread a virus. There isn’t even a single picnic table there. Is it that because all other provincial parks are closed the Bluffs become “collateral damage,” avoiding to make “an exception” even if would make sense? It’s the only reason I can think of, but not a good one, not one I can accept. Is there a reason that actually makes sense? Please humour me.

To add insult to injury, someone now posted “trail-closed” signs on the path that has been there long before the road was built, which has been used for years as off-season access. The professed “environmental” concern over an innocuous, long-established single track is ridiculous and seems more a cover for just malice.

While I am on my rant let me also decry the “no-stopping” signs at the turnaround by the gate: The turnaround is more than large enough for snowploughs to turn, maybe even articulated trucks. Is there an engineering reason, other than to make life as miserable as possible for those who want to visit the Bluffs when the road is closed?

Florian Maurer

Penticton