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River management

Strain of multiple uses showing on River of Golden Dreams About 10,000 boats travel the River of Golden Dreams each year, and it’s only getting more and popular as a day trip.

Strain of multiple uses showing on River of Golden Dreams

About 10,000 boats travel the River of Golden Dreams each year, and it’s only getting more and popular as a day trip.

That is part of the reason for the adoption of several memoranda of understanding between various stakeholders who use and protect the river and its environment.

"The river supports many uses," said Whistler fish technician Lisa Helmer.

"There is recreation but there is also fisheries and the surrounding environment. So what we are trying to do is look at how we can manage all those things."

The memoranda laid out in the River of Golden Dreams Recreation Management Strategy Operations Plan released this week covers:

• when and how the river can be used if it has a very high water level, a very low water level, or fish are spawning;

• the removal of large wood debris and riparian vegetation;

• the removal of wetland vegetation;

• the removal of beaver dams;

• the use of new signs to keep users informed about river habitat and protection.

Helmer said the strategy is the culmination of months of work by all the stakeholders and is based on their input.

The stakeholders are the Resort Municipality of Whistler Stewardship Department, Department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada, B.C. Ministry if Water, Land & Air Protection, Whistler Eco Tours, Whistler Outdoor Experience, Whistler Backroads and Wild Willies.

The memoranda of understandings in the management plan were developed to address specific concerns.

For example the removal of large woody debris can affect fish and wildlife habitat.

Some boaters may be tempted to move it to make their travels easier, but it can have a lasting effect.

That debris can put nutrients into the water. It also offers shelter from predators and the hot sun. Submerged logs can provide in-stream resting and holding areas, and shore up riverbanks.

Generally it has been agreed that this type of debris, beaver dams, and wetland foliage cannot be removed without approval. If approved for removal the recreation operator must pay for it and it must be done in the presence of resort and/ or ministry officials.

Local canoe companies are already working with the strategy and will no longer be boating on the river between Alta Lake and the weir near Tapley’s corner.

That’s due to low water levels and the imminent arrival of Kokanee salmon to the area near the Valley Trail bridge at the bottom of Lorimer Road.

If the salmon come back this will be the third year of spawning after a 20-year absence.

Helmer is hoping the public will abide by the same rules and boat only in the section from the Valley Trail bridge to Green Lake.

Boaters can access the river using a new portage trail just to the right of the Valley Trail over the bridge at the bottom of Lorimer Road and past the railway tracks.

"We don’t have a problem with anyone canoeing the river downstream from there," said Helmer.

"We would like people to continue to enjoy the river and this is one way we are able to protect our salmon population and still allow for some recreation."

In fact Helmer believes that creating more portage trails is a key tool to protecting both the river and the viability of the recreation companies and the idea is included in the operations plan as a long-term strategy.

"In future years we are hoping to build some portage trails and create ways that we can allow the canoe companies to continue operating during low water and spawning season," she said.

"We recognize that it is tough This is their livelihood and we don’t want to stop them altogether and there are ways that we can allow them to continue operating without impacting that aquatic environment."

Eric Wight of Whistler Backroads welcomes the strategy as a first step.

He is hoping that decision-makers will turn their attention to rehabilitating the river so that it more closely resembles the waterway it was 100 years ago.

"Even in my time I have seen the water diminish greatly," said Wight who has been in operation going on 20 years.

"Historically that river had lots of water in it. It was filled with log jams and beaver ponds and things like that.

"What I am hoping is that we will be able to convince the law-makers to try and rehabilitate the river back to historical water levels. Then we will have a world class product and we can showcase Whistler as a green community and one that is able to live and work with the natural surroundings."

Wight said many of the visitors now coming to the resort in the summer do not generally access wilderness so it is a great adventure for them to travel down the river and see fish, beaver, wetland birds and other creatures enjoying their own habitat.

That is something to be protected and enhanced as Whistler continues to reinvent itself as a four-season resort.

There are several reasons the water level has been reduced over the years, said Wight. Those include damming, water diversion from 21-Mile Creek, use of the river to transport logs, and the development of golf courses.

"All these things slowly, over time, add up so that now we have a river that doesn’t have, for example, a resident population of fish," said Wight.

"And we know that we can gauge the health of a community’s natural resource by its fish and wildlife.

"So I think this is where there is going to be a lot of input from the stakeholders and others in the community because we need to take a look at that river and see what we can do to rehabilitate back to having the water.

"I think in the long term it will be a great natural resource and recreational amenity, not just for boating, but for fishing and wildlife viewing.

"I think the intervention we are doing now is an immediate stop gap measure but in the big picture, we as a resort, have to take a look at this and rehabilitate the river."

The memoranda of understandings in the management plans were developed to address specific concerns.