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Trail strategy in works

Backcountry: Groups aim for better management.
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A regional trail strategy will help protect ecologically sensitive areas in the region

Partners behind a regional trail strategy are looking for ways to improve backcountry recreational experiences while preserving environmentally sensitive areas and respecting First Nations’ land rights.

While the strategy is in its early stages, the organizations working on it have extensive familiarity with the Shuswap’s backcountry and how it’s being utilized.

These partners include local First Nations (Splatsin, Neskonlith, Adams Lake and Little Shuswap bands), the Shuswap Trail Alliance, the Eagle Valley Snowmobile Club, Sicamous Quadders, BC Parks, Recreation Sites and Trails BC and Tolko. Together, they are moving towards a plan for better management of the backcountry – improving areas that should be used while protecting those that shouldn’t – all in a framework of respect to Secwepemc territorial values.

Trail Alliance executive director Phil McIntyre-Paul says the strategy should help “improve the recreational experience so there’s a lasting, sustainable recreational experiences that make sense.”

An early stage of the strategy’s development has been the identification of priority areas that need to be addressed and protected, sooner than later. One of those is the Owl Head recreation area, popular among snowmobilers in the winter and ATVers in the summer. Much of it is alpine and sub-alpine terrain and is adjacent to the Kingfisher Creek Ecological Reserve.

“It’s also vulnerable because it’s open in the alpine, so it’s very easy to leave those designated routes and start exploring. And, without really having any co-ordinated management strategy up there, it’s pretty easy to suddenly find yourself… going through the Kingfisher Ecological Reserve.”

McIntyre-Paul says the snowmobile club, the Sicamous Quadders and the Splatsin are taking a lead role with Owl Head, working on ways to keep people out of the wetlands and on the logging roads.

“Most of the logging roads are short… so you get to the end of it and you run out of things to do so they start wandering off into the wetlands and that we don’t want,” said EVSC genera manager Gord Bushell. “So we’re working with Splatsin and we may even be looking at  coming up with a corridor they can stay on, an actual logging road they can stay on so they don’t have to venture off into the wetlands.”

Sicamous Quadders president Marvin Tansley says the quadders would like to see an ATV route along the lines of what the sledders use from Owl Head to Blue Lake.

“We don’t necessarily want to get on all the sled routes, but we don’t want to see us getting restricted on forest service roads,” said Tansley, who is glad to be among the user groups working on the strategy. While concessions are part of the process, Tansley says a similar model of co-operation led to a strategy for the Larch Hills that has benefited all user groups involved.

McIntyre-Paul also refers to Larch Hills as an example of what is achievable – in terms of defining trails for different user groups and mitigating damage in the process.

“It may mean some trail closures, it may mean some trail reroutes, it may mean some alternate designations,” said McIntyre-Paul of the regional trail strategy. “If we can’t ATV here, where can we ATV and is there a way of connecting desirable points or destinations? In some cases, there may be some locations that really just shouldn’t be accessible.”

Tansley and Bushell suggest the new licensing requirements for off-road vehicles may go some way to help curb incidents where riders are going off the beaten path and into sensitive areas.

“It only takes one per cent of a group to wreck it for everybody,” said Bushell “We want to educate people… we don’t want anybody up there causing any kind of permanent damage or threatening the area for us.”