When the Bow River flooded in June 2013, costing billions and disrupting lives, most people didn't have time to connect this disaster with land uses upstream. An ever-growing network of clear-cut forests, access roads and undesignated off-road trails is what is upstream.
Dear editor:
When the Bow River flooded in June 2013, costing billions and disrupting lives, most people didn't have time to connect this disaster with land uses upstream.
An ever-growing network of clear-cut forests, access roads and undesignated off-road trails is what is upstream.
Some say that the 2013 flood was simply caused by rain falling on snow in the mountains, and clear-cut timber harvest is of no concern.
However, each flood is different, and heavy rains on wet soils, exacerbated by clear-cut logging and off-road vehicle damage caused the 2005 flood.
It's a dangerous error to consider the 2013 flood as the pattern for all future floods.
And now, Spray Lake Sawmills prepares to clear-cut 900 hectares in the Ghost Valley, upstream from Cochrane. Alberta Environment and Sustainable Resource Development has given permission to condense the harvest planned for 25 years into only three years.
With 1.6 million people living downstream, it's risky to clear-cut the Ghost headwaters, especially at this accelerated pace. This clear-cut plan must be modified or stopped all together.
We need this forest landscape to perform its vital tasks: absorbing, storing and slowly releasing snowmelt and rainfall, thereby providing our drinking water and easing flood effects.
What happens upstream has consequences downstream: whether to save Trumpeter Swans, or maybe our own homes from future floods, we must speak up for the Ghost River watershed.
Richard Walthall
