A once lush urban forest, now reduced to bare ground and piles of cut timber.
“It’s just sad… it makes me sick to my stomach,” Kelowna resident Amanda Wall said. “It kept me up at night thinking about it.”
Dozens of trees have been cut down as part of the City of Kelowna’s $9.1 million Mill Creek flood protection project, tied to the broader Parkinson Recreation Centre plan.
City officials say the work is necessary.
“What’s happening is we’re restoring the natural creek, improving fish habitat, and creating about a 15-metre setback,” said Mac Logan, Kelowna’s Infrastructure General Manager.
That includes removing mature trees along the creek’s edge.
“They need to be removed for a number of reasons, some are not natural to the area, in some cases they are invasive species, and others are in the way of the future channel,” Logan said.
But for nearby residents, the environmental cost is hard to ignore.
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“This is destroying homes, animals’ homes, that have been here for over 10 years,” said Kat Scott.
The city maintains that timing is also a factor.
“One of the reasons we’re doing the work at this time of year is to take the trees down before migratory birds come back and nest. We did get the permits to do that,” Logan said.
Still, tensions escalated after a raccoon was spotted in a tree marked for removal.
“There’s a raccoon up there,” someone can be heard yelling in a video captured at the site.
“I was horrified, absolutely horrified,” Scott said.
While the landscape now appears stark, the city says it won’t stay that way, promising to plant 800 new trees along with roughly 6,000 plants and shrubs.
“They’re going to have to bring in some big trees to make it even a fraction of what it used to be,” said resident Ashley Renner.
For now, the chainsaws have quieted, but for many who live nearby, the debate over what’s been lost and what comes next is far from over.
A mature forest ecosystem cannot be ” replaced” by planting 6000 new trees and sshrubs. Have the city managers no understanding whatsoever of the “wood-wide-web? This refers to the interconnected system of mycorhizal fungi and trees roots that work together to sustain t.he forest. The loss of biodiversity and the impact on climate change related ecosystem services is immeasurable! What a tragedy!
They did this in Vernon too. And we all cried about it here too, including myself. However, now that the project is complete, it’s absolutely beautiful and far more natural than the man made channel that was put there in the 60s which was prone to flooding
Since when has it been okay to remove trees from the riparian zone that not only proects the banks from erosion, but cools the creek for fish while providing homes for habitat. Very disappointing.
This was my parents and grandparents home for 40 years…it was a dairy farm and they planted the willows. It was called Willowbrook Farms..I have a picture but cant send it
There is something very wrong with this decision to remove so many beautiful old trees. It’s just not right.. Every last one of them hacked to the ground.
That’s perfect for creek remediation…. Just got the trees down that are already part of this beautiful little habitat hahahaa them trees would have done more flood mitigation then anything man can do.
Did they consult fn first ? Did they perform an archeological survey first ?
Moti allowed yellow head bridge to cut down swaths of trees that provided wind breaks and privacy to residents without any consultation. A beautiful subdivision ruined unnecessarily.
Remember this at the next municipal elections. No discussion, no warning – what a mess.
We all know that flooding is happening because of the removal of large trees that help stabilize the ground and soak up water. Removing all these trees and planting saplings will create future flooding issues in this area. Saplings will never replace mature trees as they take decades and decades to have the same affect. Cities across BC need to stop chopping large trees. They have so much significance and good for the overall environment. They provide shade and drop temperatures by t degrees. The creek can easily meander thru the forest. This was a shirt sighted decision by city officials. Very sad and disappointing.
Welcome to the biggest sht hole in BC
Not a problem, Trudeau planted 2 billion trees.
Oh, wait a minute ,that was just another one of his lies.