SEYMOUR VALLEY CHRONOLOGY OF KEY EVENTS
Watershed researcher Will Koop stands beside the very tall "Tolkien Giant" cedar in the "Temples of Time Grove".
A nearly 300' tall 8' diameter Douglas fir on Meyers Creek on the "Will Koop" Trail by the 7 kilometre marker on the Seymour Mainline road.
Before 1850 - For millennia the Seymour River was a rich natural salmon stream fished sustainably by the Squamish First Nation.
1850 to the late 1800s - The undeveloped Seymour Valley is proposed as the main route from Vancouver to the B.C. interior - the Lillooet trail.
Early 1900s - Most of the lands in the Lower Seymour Valley are privately purchased for future logging.
1906 - Vancouver is concerned about its water supply and the provincial government places a reserve on the remaining unalienated lands in the Seymour for future water supply protection.
1907 - Some Vancouver City Council members predict that the undeveloped Seymour Valley might eventually become a "magnificent" tourist attraction.
1908 - City of Vancouver taps Seymour River as a water supply.
1913 - 1914 - The Provincial Water Rights Branch and the Ministry of Forests conduct a study of the Seymour Valley and recommend that the Seymour Forest be protected from logging.
1915 - 1917 - Greater Vancouver medical health officers petition the government to protect the Lower Seymour Valley from future logging and human contamination.
1924 - E.A. Cleveland, the provincial water comptroller, says in a speech to the Engineering Institute: "The watersheds on the north shore are a heritage for this whole area....To allow anybody to get entrenched on Seymour Creek with logging and shingling operations would be almost criminal."
DEMONSTRATION FOREST NEVER BUILT PROMISED TRAIL SYSTEM
When the Seymour Demonstration Forest opened ten years ago, the original plan included building a large trail system for public access and recreational purposes. These plans were evidently de-railed by the pro-forestry lobby. The one single trail started (to an oldgrowth Sitka spruce forest near the Seymour dam) remained unfinished for years due to "lack of funds". Completion of this trail has finally been funded through Forest Renewal B.C.
With the establishment of a Seymour Ancient Groves Park, this would change. Unencumbered by a logging agenda, park managers would be proud of the world- record-sized trees and the Seymour's evolving oldgrowth forests. They would provide a world class trail system to enable citizens to see the Seymour's ancient groves and marvel at these timeless treasures.
Many fine extremely old redcedars still remain in the lower Seymour and elsewhere throughout Greater Vancouver's watershed lands.
1926 onwards - The Greater Vancouver Water District (GVWD) is formed. Its mandate: to protect the Seymour, Capilano and Coquitlam watersheds from logging and mining interests. Private unlogged lands above and logged areas below the Seymour water intake are purchased by the GVWD and the provincial government leases all the Crown lands to the GVWD for a term of 999 years. The Seymour watershed is placed under restricted entry. E.A. Cleveland was the GVWD Commissioner from 1926-1952.
1928 - Small dam and reservoir completed at Seymour Falls.
1953 - 1956 - GVWD hires forestry consultant C.D. Shultz Co. to provide an inventory of the Seymour and two other watersheds (Capilano and Coquitlam). The Schultz company recommends that sustained yield logging occur in all watersheds and that off-catchment lands, such as the Lower Seymour, be logged immediately as pilot projects.
1958 - 1960 - Current dam on the Seymour constructed. Forest cleared for reservoir by former Schultz Co. employees. Foresters announce that amabilis (balsam) fir infested with balsam woolly aphids. GVWD's forester, also a former Schultz Co. employee, recommends that both the Lower Seymour non-catchment lands and the Upper Seymour catchment lands be logged.
1961 - 1992 - During this time the GVWD builds roads and clearcuts the private lands which it purchased from loggers in 1926. Most of the Lower Seymour valley-bottom oldgrowth, including giant Douglas fir, western red cedar, Sitka spruce, balsam, and western hemlock are clearcut for profit.
1965 - B.C. Minister of Recreation and Conservation shows interest in making the off-catchment lands of the Lower Seymour Valley into a public park. The GVWD hires a consultant to look into the area's public recreation possiblities.
1967 - The GVWD and provincial government establish Tree Farm Licence #42 to legislate sustained yield logging for all the lands under GVWD control, including the Lower Seymour.
1983 - Proposals are made to allow public access for recreation in the Lower Seymour. The Lynn/Lower Seymour Recreation Advisory Committee formed. The Committee works towards both areas becoming parks.
A sad legacy of super stumps up to 53' in circumference (16' diameter) serve as reminders of the incredible original oldgrowth rainforests that carpeted the valley bottoms around the Greater Vancouver region.
The "Curley Chittenden Giant" is one of the eight great Douglas firs averaging over 9' in diameter in the "Temples of Time" grove.
In 1992 WCWC helped save this beautiful grove of redcedars with 13' diameter trees near Paton Creek from the Demonstration Forest loggers.
1985 - Lynn Headwaters Regional Park is created. To counter the proposal to have the Lower Seymour become a park, the GVWD hires two forestry consultants to propose that the area become a demonstration forest to "demonstrate" multiple resource use: logging and recreation. The Seymour Advisory Committee is established, comprised mostly of high profile forest industry representatives, with no public process on the matter.
1987 - The Lower Seymour is officially named as a Demonstration Forest and opened to the public. The forest industry, the B.C. Ministry of Forests, the Federal Ministry of Forests, and the GVWD contribute funds for operational costs, reports, and for "educational" publications and tours.
1993 - 1994 - After watershed logging is put on hold in 1992, the Seymour Advisory Committee twice proposes to log the "Temples of Time Grove" in the Seymour Demonstration Forest (see map on right). Concerned environmentalists succeed in stopping the proposals.
1994 - The GVWD presents four options for the Lower Seymour. Public park option is glossed over.
1995 - Plans are unveiled by the Seymour Advisory Committee to log the Demonstration Forest on a sustained yield basis, pending an "ecological inventory".
1996 - "Don't use the word park. We've just battled for two and a half years to avoid that designation," says Don Lanskail, chair of Seymour Advisory Committee and former president of the Council of Forest Industries, at a Seymour Advisory Committee meeting.
