More than four years after a landslide severed one of the North Shore’s most popular trails, the District of West Vancouver is being called out for leaving it closed.
The 7.5-kilometre Capilano Pacific Trail once went right from the mouth of the Capilano River all the way to the Cleveland Dam, but the district permanently closed the section running along Hugo Ray Park and the Capilano View Cemetery following a January 2021 landslide close to Moyne Drive.
“This was an iconic hiking trail.…I’ve walked with my dogs there for 30 years. It’s our beloved hiking trail,” said Chris Dyson, who lives nearby. “More and more infrastructure keeps falling apart in West Van that they’re not repairing.”
Following the slide, West Vancouver established a three-kilometre detour that veers up along the Upper Levels Highway before going into the British Properties’ Third Street, Mathers Avenue, Stevens Drive, Rabbit Lane and Moyne Drive before reconnecting with the trail again.
But Dyson said, for people seeking a walk in the woods, that’s no detour at all.
“It takes about 25 minutes each way for the detour section,” he said. “It’s not feasible at all. People come knock on my door and they’re like, ‘I don’t understand this map.’”
The 2021 landslide also nearly took out a sewer line serving more than 500 homes in the British Properties. In 2022, the previous council voted to install a new permanent line through the woods to the north of the cemetery, well away from the geotechnically risky slide site, and to reconnect the Capilano Pacific Trail on top of it.
The sewer project went ahead, but some Moyne Drive residents were opposed to the trail running along their properties and council instead sought more consultation.
In the first meeting after the November 2022 election, the new council voted instead to seek a new pedestrian bridge across the geotechnically unstable area. In a behind-closed-doors meeting in May 2023, council passed a motion asking Metro Vancouver for financial support for a feasibility study for constructing a bridge. Metro Vancouver provided a response in 2024, confirming the bridge plan was not possible because of substantial geotechnical risks, but the regional government acknowledged the trail is “a popular recreational amenity and is an important north-south connector within the Regional Greenway Network.”
Metro staff added that they would “welcome collaborating with the district on identifying options for a possible reroute that meets safety standards.”
Once it became clear that no viable detour or bridge could be established along the river, council should have reverted back to the 2022 proposal through the woods, Dyson said.
“They still spent all the money on the sewer but they didn’t do anything with the trail,” he said. “The trail would have just basically been putting gravel on top.”
Trail counter statistics indicated more 56,000 visitors walked the Capilano Pacific in 2020, according to a West Vancouver staff report.
More than a beautiful access point through nature, the trail is important to the municipality’s history, having once been a rail line used for early logging, Dyson said.
With the trail access now effectively a dead end on Keith Road, the area is becoming a destination for people camping in vans, but with no facilities or services nearby and no supervision, the woods are accumulating garbage, human waste and needles, Dyson said.
West Vancouver mayor responds
In an interview, Mayor Mark Sager said he too wants to see the trail reconnected, but added there are too many logistical challenges in the way.
“Trust me, there’s nothing I would like more than to find a way to reopen it,” he said. “It’s beyond the financial resources of the municipality at this point in time.”
Sager said he stands by the 2022 decision to nix the proposed trail that would have followed the sewer line.
“Council wouldn’t support that. We looked at that but it was just way too much of an infringement onto people’s properties,” he said. “That’s not fair. It’s a very, very popular trail, and that would be like literally putting people through people’s backyards.”
And Sager added that plan also would have taken hikers away from Capilano River, which is the entire draw of the Capilano Pacific Trail.
“As soon as it goes off the water, then does it really make any difference if it just goes up existing sidewalks and goes on a more established route?” he asked.
Currently, there aren’t any discussions going on between Metro Vancouver and the municipality, according to staff. Sager, however, said he has not given up on his request for the regional government to help re-establish a viable trail again.
“I think it’s a really valuable asset for all of Metro Vancouver. It’s a regional amenity,” he said. “I’m still hoping that Metro might find it in in their budget to assist.”
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