An advocacy group that aims to protect Garibaldi Provincial Park from commercial interests is accusing the provincial government of a double standard when it comes to protecting environmentally sensitive areas and wildlife in the park.
Members of Garibaldi Park 2020 say the Ministry of Environment allows portions of Whistler Heli-Skiing’s 50-square-kilometre tenure to fall within the Garibaldi Park wilderness conservancy zone, a protected area of the park. Whistler Blackcomb owns Whistler Heli-Skiing.
For its part, the ministry argues the Whistler Heli-Ski tenure is not situated in the wilderness conservation zone, but instead within a natural environment zone, which permits the heli-ski operation.
But Garibaldi 2020 spokesman Christopher Ludwig believes ministry staff is mistaken and he supplied maps to The Squamish Chief that seem to show the overlap between the wilderness conservation zone and the heli-ski tenure.
“Four of the landing zones, several of the runs that they use are within the conservation zone of the park, which is against [the government’s] own policy,” Ludwig told The Squamish Chief. “One of the four landing zones is over 900 metres into the conservation zone.”
Whistler Blackcomb did not respond to repeated requests for comment on this story.
“I would like the Government to explain how our mapping is wrong,” Ludwig said.
Ludwig wrote a letter to the assistant deputy minister Jim Standen and copied The Squamish Chief.
“While a large portion of the Whistler Heli-Ski tenure is in the natural environment zone as you say, it is a fact that four landing zones and multiple runs identified within the tenure are within the Garibaldi Park wilderness conservancy zone,” he wrote.
Heli-ski helicopters are landing in areas that are in violation of the government’s own two-kilometre buffer required for helicopter operations in winter ungulate mountain goat ranges, Ludwig added.
Helicopters are landing within 100 metres or less of a large mountain range in the park, he said.
In an email to The Squamish Chief, the Ministry of Environment defines the objective of the zone “to protect a remote, undisturbed natural landscape and to provide unassisted backcountry recreation opportunities dependent on a pristine environment where no motorized activities will be allowed and no facilities will be developed.”
A 2010 Ministry of Environment report states, "Mountain goats react more strongly to human disturbance and may be more sensitive to muscle exertion than most ungulates, particularly from the extreme physical exertion and stress caused by helicopter disturbance. Therefore, the report recommends “that helicopters have a 2000-m horizontal and 400-m vertical separation from all mountain goat habitat.”
The goat population was diminished by hunting originally, but has not rebounded because of the helicopter activity, Ludwig argues.
The ministry told The Squamish Chief surveys done in 2012 and 2013 “suggest that the populations of mountain goat in the Spearhead Range area of Garibaldi Park are healthy and reproducing. Mountain goat populations will continue to be monitored over time to assess populations trends.”
Ludwig argues that in 2015, the whole Spearhead Goat Range data set was suddenly no longer included in the main data the government has available.
In August of 2015, Ludwig and other mountaineers proposed restoring the Darling Lake Trail. The Ministry of Forests Lands and Natural Resources turned down this plan, he said, on the grounds that the trail was within the conservation zone and would pass through a mountain goat winter ungulate range.
Ludwig and his trail building crews were in fact issued a stop work order, he said.
“For supposedly violating goat terrain,” Ludwig said. “When we got the data we discovered that the heritage trail is, at its closest point, over 300 metres away, which is actually far beyond ministry guidelines.”
Ludwig supplied The Squamish Chief with copies of the ministry’s Darling Trail rejection letter, the stop work order, the wilderness conservation area maps and the group’s FOI documents. Much of the information is also publically available on the group’s website, garibaldipark2020.com.
Ludwig said he does not blame the company for the tenure issues, instead sees it as a government regulation issue.
“The rules are not being applied equitably. We have one rule for the trail, another rule for Whistler Blackcomb… make it consistent for everybody.”
The Ministry of Environment told The Squamish Chief the heli-skiing tenure was already operating in the park at the time the 1990 park management plan was developed and a decision was made to allow this activity to continue.
“The question of the heli-ski permit was considered again in the 2014 Management Plan Amendment for the Spearhead Area. Heli-skiing was approved as an acceptable activity and the management plan recommended a review by 2026 to confirm the long-term direction regarding this activity in the park,” reads the emailed statement from the Ministry of Environment.
Ludwig said the Darling Trail also predates the 1990s, in fact back to at least 1983, so if that is the logic then the group’s trail work should be “grandfathered” as well.
Finally, the ministry also argues there is no known “heritage” status of Darling Lake Trail.
Ludwig calls this a “red herring” argument. “The definition of heritage: something that is handed down from the past, as a tradition,” he said.
