OHVs will be banned in Castle area by 2020

The Alberta government is making a major tourism push for the Castle Parks and implementing its first significant restrictions on off-highway vehicle (OHV ) use in those parks as part of a promised phase-out.

Environment Minister Shannon Phillips announced Friday the province will spend $3 million for capital upgrades in Castle Provincial Park and Castle Wildland Provincial Park this year, while Tourism Alberta will launch a $400,000 advertising campaign for the Castle region.

The government also released its final management plan for the southwestern Alberta parks, which will see OHV use phased out in the parks over the next three years.

As of June 1 of this year, the current 350 km of trails open to vehicles such as quads and motorcycles will be reduced to 137 km as OHVs will only be allowed north of the Carbondale River. In 2019, the trails accessible to OHVs will be cut further to 37 km, and by 2020 only a small section of trail on the park’s northwest edge that is connected to a route outside its borders will remain open.

Phillips said the move to eliminate OHV use is necessary to protect the park.

“We had very serious environmental questions around this area and that’s why conservationists and scientists and the public and the people of Lethbridge asked for a long time for action in this particular area,” she told reporters.

Snowmobile use will be allowed to continue in the winter, as it has less impact.

The government announced last year that it would establish Castle Provincial Park and expand the Castle Wildland Provincial Park in a region it says is “one of the most biologically diverse areas in Alberta.”