SYDNEY, N.S. — A group that’s trying to protect a popular walking trail that winds through an urban forest will host another community walk on Saturday.
Wayne McKay of Save the Baille Ard Forest said the walk will be both a show of support for the trail and a chance to learn about some of the work the group has been doing, including a crowd-funding campaign to hire a consultant who can give them a second opinion on the Cape Breton Regional Municipality’s proposed flood prevention plan and an online petition that will be sent to municipal council.
“We’re going to update folks and we’re going to ask them to send some photos that they take during the walk to council, and we’re going to ask them to sign the petition if they haven’t signed it already,” he said.
While the GoFundMe fundraiser is still active (it’s raised about half of its $5,000 goal), McKay said they have already hired consultant Nick Hill, a specialist in wetland conservation and the senior scientist at Fern Hill Institute for Plant Conservation in Berwick, N.S.
McKay said Hill, who has examined the report engineers from CBCL Ltd. prepared for CBRM staff, has already visited the site and spent two days exploring the Baille Ard area and the entire watershed area.
“He’s been looking over the report and he’s coming up with some interesting information and is going to be developing a report that outlines some alternative possibilities for us. It also highlights why the proposed approach might not be the best one from an ecological perspective and a social perspective,” said McKay, who expects the report could be ready in coming weeks.
He said they will immediately make the report available to the public and will likely hold a public meeting to discuss it. They also want to formally present the report to CBRM council.
“We’re going to use it to help start a conversation about alternatives and maybe why there should be more public consultation and looking at are there ways we can actually do some things that are going to keep Baille Ard the way it is and protect the infrastructure that’s downstream. We might be able to actually do some really neat stuff here with establishing wetlands, making the area even nicer than it was before the flooding happened. That’s what we’re kind of hoping, that we can start that bigger community discussion.”
So far about 900 people have signed the online petition at change.org that calls for the CBRM to pause current mitigation planning and activities for Baille Ard, request an extension of the deadline to spend federal funding, develop a multidisciplinary team of experts to advise on all aspects of the plan, conduct environmental and social impact assessments and engage in comprehensive public consultation, including a citizen advisory committee.
McKay said he’s hopeful the CBRM will reconsider its original plan for the trails, which could see a series of massive earthen berms — eight feet high, 50 feet wide and between 300 and 400 metres long — crisscrossing the four-kilometre trail system and surrounding 70 acres of woods.
While CBRM council has already approved the plan, McKay said councillors they’ve invited to walk the trail with members of his group and the Baille Ard Recreation Association have given them good feedback.
“Many of them are keen to come to the tour. The ones who expressed that they aren’t able to come to the tour for whatever reason, they want to have that discussion in some other format. We’re getting a real positive response, so I think they are listening,” said McKay, who added he’s encouraged by MLA Derek Mombourquette’s assurances that the project has yet to receive approval from the province, which owns the land.
“There’s still some opportunity to open up a bigger dialogue and maybe change the approach.”
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