Squamish Gondola Proposal
I just received a notice from the Climbers Access Society of BC (CASBC) about the new Gondola proposal for Squamish.
According to GroundEffects Development (the company that has made the proposal), the new gondola would be a "key piece of tourism infrastructure in Squamish that would drive economic growth and create jobs through expansion of the town's tourism sector, and further solidify Squamish as the outdoor recreation capital of Canada."
While this is not the first gondola to be proposed in Squamish (all previous proposals had been shut down by the community), I believe the proposed location of it is unique. While I'm not altogether against gondolas, I couldn't help but think about the experience I had when I rode one in Switzerland up to ~10,000 feet, which eventually dropped me on a glacier high in the Alps. Of all the places I've been around the world, it was the biggest culture shock I've ever had. My previous experiences getting to that kind of environment usually involved a long approach, carrying your own gear, routefinding, and knowing how to survive in the elements. Now I was watching tourists from around the world (some wearing high heels, or carrying little pink purses, others lighting up cigarettes or grossly overweight), flock to the edge of the mountain, snap some pictures, buy a t-shirt, and ride back down. Is this the type of experience that will help define Squamish as the 'Outdoor Recreation Capital of Canada'? I'm not sure I know the answer, but I'm open to exploring the potential consequences..
More info on the proposal can be found at: http://www.seatoskygondola.com/ or www.grndfx.ca
I'll be posting updates here as things develop..
Comments
I understand the desire to
I understand the desire to take something that's good and make it better. This doesn't always pan out, though, when dealing with the natural world.
The Shannon Falls car park is already full to overflowing during peak tourism season. People come to look at the spectacular natural beauty of Shannon Falls and the Stawamus Chief. With further development, putting in a gondola, no doubt followed by restaurants, new toilet blocks and other services, more land will need to be cleared, destroying the very nature of things that attracts people to the area.
This is a mistake that our government and their developer buddies continue to make around our national and provincial parks. The British Columbia natural landscape is already spectacular in a unique way. It doesn't need gold plating to attract tourism.
It's also interesting that while the Provincial Government has been step-by-step quietly closing off access to back country logging roads over the last ten years, this project is being put forward as promoting access to the very same places. The Forest Services Road (FSR) to Mt.Habrich was gated quite a few years back. It wasn't de-activated, as are most FSR roads once logging finishes, but was gated, apparently to preserve the water catchment. Now they're proposing putting in a gondola giving access to that very same area. This is completely contradictory management policy, and should be reason enough to reject this gondola proposal.
I say NO to the Gondola, NO to putting in a new ski resort below Mt.Garibaldi, NO to developing a series of luxury fly-in hotels along the Spearhead Traverse out past Whistler and Blackcomb, and NO each time some destructive development proposal is re-jigged, re-worded and re-presented as a new proposal when it has already been time-and-again rejected by the local community. I say YES to a MORATORIUM on the lot of 'em.
If promoting tourism and growing the economy is what we're aiming to do, then stop cutting back on spending on park wardens and maintenance, stop charging an arm an a leg on trail head parking, create more parks to preserve more of the natural beauty in this province, spend more money on marketing BC's natural beauty here and abroad, and, at the very top of the list, keep the developers out of areas that only exist because we've managed to keep keep them out so far.