The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Jonathon Naylor Editor Environmentalists have lost an appeal to stop a controversial logging road from running through Grass River Provincial Park. The Wilderness Committee (WC) says the appeal was dismissed last week in a written decision by the Manitoba Court of Appeal. 'I can go on and on about the problems with this logging road,' said Eric Reder, Manitoba campaign director for the WC, in a press statement. Lumber giant Tolko was granted provincial permission to build the road in 2009, arguing it needed the route to ensure profitability by cutting four hours off transit time as trucks travel between logging areas north of the park and company operations in The Pas. See 'Courts...' on pg. 7 Continued from pg. 3 The WC initially tried to halt the road by asking the courts to determine whether a logging road constitutes logging, an activity that is supposed to be banned in provincial parks. When that didn't work, the WC, a national environmental organization, launched its appeal. 'According to the rulings, a logging road can definitely be considered logging,' said Reder. 'Unfortunately, though, (provincial) legislation does not ban logging in parks. Instead it bans commercial timber cutting rights, which means cutting down trees to sell. In reality, a logging road can be just as damaging as a clear cut.' The result, Reder said, is that the provincial park logging ban 'is not nearly as great as we had been led to believe, and the legislation has serious flaws.' The WC had argued that the road, known as Dickstone Road, threatened woodland caribou habitat. For its part, the NDP government has said the road was approved following extensive technical and public review of potential environmental impacts. Within the law The province also said the project was entirely within the law. Yet Reder has not completely thrown in the towel. 'We have one more opportunity to get the right decision on this road. We have written a letter to Premier Greg Selinger, asking for an explanation of this issue,' he said. 'In the time we have been investigating this road, we have had four Conservation Ministers and two Premiers. Five other decision-makers had this in their hands. 'Premier Selinger has the final say on this road now, and his response to our letter will spell out the Manitoba government's position on logging in parks. He has the power to stop this project, and while some damage has already been done, stopping it now will still be better than constructing an all-weather road which will disturb woodland caribou habitat for generations.' With its western borders around Cranberry Portage, Grass River Provincial Park covers an area of 2,279 km squared. Among its lakes are First Cranberry Lake, Second Cranberry Lake, Reed Lake, Iskwasum Lake and Simonhouse Lake.
