Plan to save the Northeast swale before its lost to us forever

Geologists say we have entered the Anthropocene, the age in which our species dominates. The sorry fact is humans are eliminating other species at a pace 100 to 1,000 times that of pre-Anthropocene times.

Biologist E.O. Wilson says an age of, for and all about just our species alone, with all the rest of life rendered subsidiary, would be better called the Eremocene — the Age of Loneliness. While we are rushing toward that “miserable future,” it’s by no means inevitable.

Conservation efforts already have slowed the extinction rate by at least one-fifth. The most important of these is preserving natural habitat, including the dwindling grasslands we inhabit. Saskatchewan has lost more than 80 per cent of its native prairie, among the most endangered ecosystems on the planet.

Saving habitats such as our grasslands demands real change in what we think of as normal behaviour, like converting native prairie to farmland and urban subdivisions, or slicing it into small pieces with roads.

Saskatoon has a one-time opportunity to save a sizable piece of this disappearing habitat, the Northeast Swale. The swale is 26 kilometres long, making it one of the largest pieces of unbroken prairie-riparian forest-wetland around, with about 300 hectares located within city limits. The swale is home to at least 200 plant species, more than 100 birds species, and at least 19 mammal species, as well as amphibians, reptiles and insects. Among these are endangered species and patches of rare fescue prairie.

The good news is that under the care of the Meewasin Valley Authority the swale is being preserved from some forms of development. The bad news is the ecological values of the swale are still threatened in several ways.

Of critical importance to conservation efforts is ensuring the habitats are large enough to maintain ecological connectivity. We know small patches of native grasslands lack resilience, yet several roads already intersect the swale. The new commuter road and perimeter highways will further reduce connectivity. Residential neighbourhoods will also hem in the swale on both sides: Silverspring, Evergreen and Aspen Ridge, and a larger neighbourhood planned on its northern flank.

The surrounding and intersecting developments mean a loss of nighttime darkness, pollution, noise and vibration from heavy traffic, road danger for wildlife, and pollution of wetlands with pesticides and other run-off water contaminants, as well as additional pressure during construction. All these threaten the swale’s ecological values.

As Louise Jones of The Northeast Swale Watchers, a group of concerned citizens, points out, current plans for development put us in danger of doing what we have always been doing, but under another name. If we don’t take more decisive measures to preserve the integrity of the swale, aren’t we just pretending that we are conserving it?

If we really want to preserve this space and other remnants of our natural heritage, what must we do?

As the StarPhoenix editorial, Development disconnect (Nov. 25), pointed out, Saskatoon has an outmoded development plan that favours costly suburban sprawl over cost-effective, sustainable infill development. On top of that, the city is wedding itself to building bridges and connector roads well into the future by, for example, planning a 20-square-kilometre industrial development north of the river that will see as many as 32,000 people working in that area. Many of them will drive twice a day to new residential development built across the river, surrounding the swale.

Do we really want to continue forms of development that lock us into the kind of sprawl, which means more traffic, pollution and greenhouse gas emissions that progressively encroach on endangered spaces?

The cost of building a perimeter highway near Saskatoon is $2 billion. Hundreds of millions are being spent on commuter roads and bridges. Do we need these roads? Could the money go instead to create an excellent public transportation system, one so good that it is better than driving a car? Can we prioritize infill development over urban sprawl so that we can really save the swale and other natural areas that remain?