LAND-USE PLAN FAILS SENSITIVE WILDERNESS, SAY GREEN GROUPS
STRATEGY BALANCES INDUSTRY, ENVIRONMENT, PROVINCE SAYS
A long awaited land-use plan that will guide future decisions on development, recreation and conservation in southern Alberta fails to protect critical headwaters and misses the mark when it comes to preserving the Castle wilderness area, according to several conservation groups.
Robin Campbell, minister of environment and sustainable resource development, released the South Saskatchewan Regional Plan on Wednesday in Calgary.
The 200-page document was developed with a 50-year outlook in mind and covers an 83,764-square-kilometre area that spans from the Rockies to the Saskatchewan border.
After a draft version of the plan was released in the fall, more than 7,500 Albertans provided feedback on the document over the span of several months.
“Feedback was everything,” said Campbell, noting the final plan strives to balance the interests of both industry and environmental groups with the desires of citizens who want to recreate in the area.
“People come with different interests. So environmental groups are going to push to have more and more land set aside, I understand that. Industry is going to want to continue to do what they do and that’s provide jobs. Albertans want to recreate ... so we have to find that balance,” he said.
The South Saskatchewan Regional Plan creates eight new or expanded conservation areas, two new and six expanded provincial parks and recreation areas, and 12 new primitive recreation areas for camping and trail access.
The new conservation areas include a 546-square-kilometre area designated as Castle Wildland Provincial Park.
But conservationists say they’re disappointed the plan only protects half of the critical Castle area landscape, which spans 1,020 square kilometres, and argue the area being protected is mainly rock and ice.
“We’ve made it clear that protecting the full Castle is the litmus test for the success of this plan and that test has failed, unfortunately,” said Wendy Francis, program director at the Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative, a Canmore-based organization working to maintain wildlife and wilderness in mountainous areas.
Prairie and mountain ecosystems meet at the Castle wilderness area, which is rich in both wildlife and natural resources. The area provides about one-third of the water for the Oldman basin, the source of drinking water for downstream communities such as Lethbridge.
The waterways are home to Alberta’s provincial fish, the bull trout, while the land is critical habitat for provincially threatened grizzly bears.
Environmental groups say much of the 546-square-kilometre area that will be re-designated as the Castle Wildland Provincial Park under the plan released Wednesday was already protected as a Public Land Use Zone, and they say the plan simply changes the designation, without protecting more land in the area.
Gord Petersen of the Castle-Crown Wilderness Coalition described the South Saskatchewan Regional Land Use Plan as “a new name for business as usual” in the Castle wilderness area, and questioned why the government even bothered to collect feedback.
“It really is quite disappointing. We’ve spent years and the government has spent millions of dollars to come to the same place they were at before, except now it’s entrenched in this policy,” he said.
Petersen said the government has refused to stand up to industry and motorized recreation groups, and they’ve ignored the concerns of the majority of Albertans, who support protecting all of the Castle wilderness area.
“To a large extent, the private interests of Spray Lake Sawmills and the bureaucratic interest of the forest service have trumped the public interests,” he said.
“(The area) is being trashed right now. … It’s turning into an industrial zone.”
Sean Nichols, a conservation specialist with the Alberta Wilderness Association, also expressed frustration with the land-use plan released Wednesday. “It’s a little bit better than what we saw in the draft. We’re still quite disappointed at the amount of protected area, especially in the Castle,” he said.
But Campbell insisted the South Saskatchewan Regional Plan strikes the right balance between recreation and economic opportunity, while also protecting the environment.
“I have no issue with people saying they wanted more but, again, I’m quite comfortable that in looking at the whole plan we have found a very good balance — looking at being environmental stewards but also making sure that people can enjoy the area and also making sure that we continue to have economic developments so people continue to live here and work and play,” he said.