Bow Valley Under Siege
Do you care about wildlife and wilderness conservation in Alberta's fragile Bow Valley?
The Western Canada Wilderness Committee:
The proposed Three Sisters Mega Project expansion encompassing commercial and residential developments of three new golf courses and thousands of new housing units on 2,500 hectares in Canmore is unprecedented in Alberta's political and corporate history. The provincial government took away Canmore's basic municipal right to self determination through removing this development from local government jurisdiction. The Alberta Natural Resources Conservation Board (NRCB), in its 1992 decision to allow this project to go ahead (see insert), recognized the need for an understanding of cumulative effects from development with respect to airsheds, aquatic ecosystems, terrestrial ecosystems and ecosystem management. As well, the NRCB fully anticipated that development would be subject to the local planning process of the town as defined by the Alberta Planning Act.
While not the only environmental concern in the Bow Valley, Three Sisters Mega Project is so big that it can permanently disrupt and destroy ecosystem components that form the basis of a healthy environment for humans and wildlife alike. The Three Sisters Mega Project must be scaled back and the developers and provincial government must be held accountable to the environmental commitments and undertakings, which led to the NRCB's conditional approval in 1992.
The Canmore chapter of the Western Canada Wilderness Committee will be working towards the preservation of the fragile ecosystem(s) in the Bow Valley through social and scientific research and grassroots participation in democratic processes and individual strategies.
