The Threats
Suburban sprawl
Poor urban planning has allowed hundreds and hundreds of hectares of intact wilderness on the edge of Halifax to be consumed by sprawling development. In places, this development has already overtaken parts of the Blue Mountain – Birch Cove Lakes wilderness, and in others has crept right up to the boundary of the future Wilderness Area and Regional Park.
Over the next 25 years, this problem will get worse as an additional 100,000 residents are expected to call Halifax home. We must plan responsibly for this growth now, while we still can, and protect key natural areas near the city such as Blue Mountain – Birch Cove Lakes, so Halifax remains a vibrant and green city that attracts visitors and residents alike, and provides some balance to the pending development rush. Put simply, smart cities protect green spaces.
Before
and After
Disposal of public land
For a long time, public lands in Nova Scotia have been traded-away, swapped, or sold. Only roughly 30% of the province remains in public ownership.
The wilderness at Blue Mountain – Birch Cove Lakes has been particularly hard-hit by this practice. Here, large tracts of public land have been traded away or sold to developers. One such deal in the 1990’s resulted in the last piece of public land on the shores of the popular Quarry Lake disappearing from public ownership and this property could now be faced with development pressure.
Other, even more extensive, proposals have also been in the works for Blue Mountain – Birch Cove Lakes that could have seen most of this magnificent wilderness traded for lands elsewhere in the province, or portions cleaved off to solve political issues in one political jurisdiction or another.
The practice of disposing public lands to private interests is often a very secretive process that usually occurs behind-closed-doors, entirely out of view of the general public. Concerned citizens tend to only find out about the loss of important public lands after it has already happened, and only if they are paying attention and routinely looking through stacks and stacks of Orders-in-Council.
Through our campaign, we’ve successfully managed to stop several ill-conceived Crown swap proposals that would have seen the demise of the Blue Mountain – Birch Cove Lakes wilderness and erased the possibility of a large, publicly-owned wilderness area on the edge of Halifax.
But, the practice of disposing public lands from this area won’t stop until it is finally designated as a legally protected wilderness area. Once designated, provisions within the Wilderness Areas Protection Act will help prevent de-listings from occurring behind-closed-doors outside of the view of the general public.
Photo Credit: Dan Hutt
Public lands have been traded away from the Blue Mountain - Birch Cove Lakes wilderness, including this magnificent property on the shores of Quarry Lake.
Proposed Highway 113
The western boundary of the soon-to-be-designated Blue Mountain – Birch Cove Lakes Wilderness Area is defined by the corridor of a proposed new 4-lane 100 Series highway that will link Highways 102 and 103 between the communities of Bedford and Hubley.
The proposed Highway 113 has been stalled in an environmental assessment review for over 10 years. Through this environmental assessment, the significant majority of public lands in the Blue Mountain – Birch Cove Lakes wilderness to the south and east of the proposed highway corridor were identified as high-priority for the creation of a legally-designated protected wilderness area and regional park.
Originally, the highway proposal included a ridiculous plan to blow-off the top of Blue Mountain Hill itself, to provide a source of gravel for the construction of the highway. Fortunately, we managed to overturn that crazy plan and the Provincial Department of Transportation and Infrastructure Renewal now supports the creation of the Blue Mountain – Birch Cove Lakes Wilderness Area and has committed to keeping Blue Mountain Hill intact.
