49 replies to this topic

[simon]

^or, users could just band together & buy the land themselves.
CRD Parks running a moto-based rec area seems a tad unlikely.

[renthefinn]

if you wanna hike there are plenty of non-motorized parks around, but I've yet to see one on the lower island that's not non-motorized.

Just because you can get around the bollards doesn't make it a "motorized park" (which is an oxymoron). Maybe you're talking about different Sooke Hills, but the CRD and TLC lands do not allow motorized vehicles.

This is just a recent event though, before it was bought by the TLC it was open to the public! Plus note I never said it was a motorized-park, maybe you should re-read my post, I said there are plenty of other non-motorized parks around, and that I've yet to see any that are not non-motorized!

[renthefinn]

^or, users could just band together & buy the land themselves.
CRD Parks running a moto-based rec area seems a tad unlikely.

I bet some people who donated to the TLC didn't envision their use of the area being eliminated immediately, and completely!

[simon]

I bet some people who donated to the TLC didn't envision their use of the area being eliminated immediately, and completely!

Indeed, that would be discouraging.

But personally, if I wanted a place to drive around in the woods I'd probably give my money to someone other than the TLC. :wink:

[renthefinn]

I wasn't one that gave to the TLC, but I could see how someone may have, expecting it to live on as a public park in a similar capacity as it had been in the near past (not fully understanding the goals of the TLC). I'm sure most people were more concerned at the time with eliminating logging and other possible semi-industrial or commercial uses than they were about creating a nature sanctuary.

[simon]

Yep. Whether you can drive/hunt/bike/pogo stick/whatever in the park or not, keeping the trees is a bit nicer than another mtn top golf course development.

[ressen]

Green dreams



Ted Hill/Goldstream News Gazette
Long-time conservation advocate Ray Zimmerman looks west over Sea to Sea Green Blue Belt Park Reserve Land, in what will be the Capital Region’s next regional park. If CRD Parks gets its way, forests stretching from Sooke to Saanich will form a massive natural corridor and a permanent buffer to urban development.


By Edward Hill
Goldstream News Gazette
reporter@goldstreamgaze
Feb 02 2007


About half the land for the proposed 12,000-hectare Sea to Sea Green Blue Belt has been set aside. Securing the remainder still requires a lot of work

Looking northwest from a ridge abutting Mount Manuel Quimper, the land is green unbroken forest as far as the eye can see. It is the pure simplicity of trees, rivers and rolling hills – only when the maps come out does it get complicated.

A polygonal swath surrounding Mount Quimper in Sooke, and another in the Juan de Fuca Electoral Area to the north, is the 1,600-hectare Sea to Sea Regional Park Reserve, the bulk of what will be the Capital Region’s next regional park.

For CRD Parks, the lands are another part of an ambitious plan to create a 12,000-hectare greenbelt from the Saanich Inlet to the Sooke Basin, called the Sea to Sea Green Blue Belt. The aim is to preserve a broad ecological and wildlife corridor arcing across Greater Victoria.

“The greenbelt is the boundary of urban expansion of the western communities in particular. It is a unique opportunity in North America to have an expansive wilderness next to a growing urban area,” says Lynn Wilson, a CRD Parks planner.

More than half of the belt is already in place – in the form of the Sooke Hills Wilderness reserve, CRD watershed lands, and Goldstream and Gowlland Tod provincial parks.

But there are a few property owners left to contend with. Surrounding the Sea to Sea reserve is a messy patchwork of forest company land, Crown land, family-owned land, and more provincial parkland.

Connecting all the pieces will take a lot of time and money, if it is possible at all. In the meantime, CRD Parks is devising a single overarching management plan for four disconnected reserve lands: Sea to Sea, Kapoor, Ayum Creek and the Sooke Potholes (the Potholes became a reserve in 2005 but as yet it has no management plan).

A plan for the vast Sooke Hills Wilderness reserve already exists, but not everyone is happy about this piecemeal approach. Ray Zimmerman, a retired B.C. Ferries skipper and a long-time conservationist, says drawing artificial lines through what should be continuous wilderness doesn’t make sense.

Zimmerman is largely credited with initiating the greenbelt concept for southern Vancouver Island about 20 years ago (although some in CRD Parks reckon the idea has floated around for 50 years). He argues the land should be kept in reserve status until a complete wilderness corridor is connected.

In 1994, Zimmerman with the Western Canadian Wilderness Committee, the Sierra Club and other conservation groups, took the CRD to court to stop logging in the watershed, and won.

Back then, the vision was to create a wilderness corridor, as Zimmerman says, “where you can’t see, smell or hear the city.” He fears opening the land as park risks abandoning the greater goal of habitat preservation, and could ultimately lead to spoiling natural areas.

“The planning process seems to be backwards. They are doing bits and pieces instead of the whole,” he says. “We need the broadest perspective possible.”

CRD Parks doesn’t disagree with Zimmerman’s concerns. Wilson, with CRD Parks, says creating a unified greenbelt is a high priority, but the reality on the ground is something else.

Wilson said many people already hike and camp on reserve lands, and that allowing access with a plan in place is a sound strategic decision. “There is a lot of public support to open up this land to public use,” she said. “People are in there now with no trail markers and no signs. We want to provide that level of service.”

CRD Parks released the outcome of public input surveys on Sea to Sea reserve lands in January. Most people were keen to have minimal park services, such as washrooms and trails, but want area kept as natural as possible. Many people also agreed areas identified as culturally or ecologically important should be off limits to public access. There was also some support for ATVs in the survey, but Wilson stresses that CRD parks not allow off-road vehicles.

Wilson expects to submit a draft management plan for the Sea to Sea, Kapoor, Ayum Creek and Sooke Potholes to the parks committee this fall. The Potholes already operate as a regional park, but the other parcels are set to open by 2009.

It’s not clear when and if the 4,100-hectare Sooke Hills Wilderness reserve will open as a park, if ever. CRD water and parks managers need to work out protocols to keep the watershed free of trespassers. The priority in that area is connecting the Trans-Canada Trail into the Cowichan Valley, Wilson said.

CRD Parks says completing the Sea to Sea Green Blue Belt is a high priority, but may not be possible for several reasons.

Parks gets $1.6 million per year for land acquisition, or roughly $10 per homeowner in the CRD. It often partners with The Land Conservancy, but skyrocketing land values is a serious problem, says Jeff Ward, CRD Parks assistant manager. He notes that the cost of property has doubled in the past five years and there has been no talk of increasing the levy.

There is also the question of whether forest companies are willing to sell their land, which makes up most of the territory between the Sea to Sea reserve and the Sooke River. Wilson says no forest company has said a “flat out no.” Ward says he can’t release any details on current land negotiations.

“The vision is to have more land. But even if we don’t acquire more land, we have a park there,” Ward says. “There is a lot of demand to acquire land and to open parks. But there is only so much money and so many staff, and we want to be good stewards of public money.”


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© Copyright 2007 Goldstream News Gazette

[ressen]

Deer Trail Lodge is located near marker 47 Km. on the Galloping Goose trail, or drive to the end of Sooke River Rd.

[ressen]

More photos from 1980's ?






























This is the inside of the giant fireplace.





Hope you didn't mind turning your monitor on its side.

[Holden West]

Wow, thanks. I'd never seen Yuen's folly close up before.

Such a shame. Such a waste.

[Caramia]

I remember that place! Its so awesome I always wondered what happened with it.

[m0nkyman]

I used to love ducking under the 'no trespassing' signs to wander around those ruins. I wish I'd taken pics of the railway up there, and the other buildings. The main lodge was spectacular to wander around.

[gumgum]

When was it torn down?
I was there a couple of years ago and it was there.

[G-Man]

2 years ago.

[Lover Fighter]

I could have sworn it was there in Summer of 05...
maybe I'm just getting time mixed up again :smt102

[Holden West]

^You must be getting old!

The remnants of the lodge were torn down in the Spring of '05. Only some of the stone foundation remains.

[G-Man]

No summer 05 was when they completed the demolition of it. Of course all the stone work for the building is still there. Including the massive fireplace. Also if you stay at the campground which is about 2 kms north of the site there is quite a bit of stone work there too as this was supposed to be a small subdivision of vacation properties.

[Holden West]

The Sooke Mirror
Sooke, B.C.: Mar 16, 2005

"The organization has nearly finished demolishing the rotting wood of remains of the started resort project, although it will leave extensive stonework as a base for their planned visitors' centre."

[baz]

wow. it seems like years since the last time i took visitors to see this place, i used to think it reminded me of the blair witch project.
how much of the stone work is left?

[G-Man]

Pretty much all the stone work is still there.