Concerns are growing over a proposed highway project that many West Kelowna residents say will destroy Rose Valley Regional Park.
“It would be devastating if they put a highway through here,” Rose Valley resident Nadene Shirtliff said. “This is a 250-hectare park that is a national conservancy area for the Okanaagan natural wildlife and plant species. We have bears up here, we have cougars, we’ve had big horn sheep, there’s a lot of coyotes and all kinds of birds and it would be a tragedy to lose this.”
The B.C. Transportation Ministry is exploring the option of building a 14-kilometre bypass in the hills above the city with sections of it cutting right through the park.
“This is pristine landscape,” Rose Valley resident Jude Pipher said. “There are a lot of younger families in this area and a lot of them have moved here specifically to take advantage of all the hiking trails.”
According to ministry documents, the proposed bypass would also potentially run close to the Rose Valley reservoir.
“That is one of the questions I posed to the Ministry of Transportation,” Shirtliff said. “I said, ‘You can’t put a highway through a watershed area and they said, ‘Oh well, we are putting in a treatment plant at the end of the reservoir so it will be fine but it will not be fine. Chlorination won’t take out diesel fuel if there is a spill.”
The transportation ministry would not provide any details about the proposed bypass citing the upcoming election.
City council has asked the transportation ministry to look into options for a bypass. While Mayor Doug Findlater supports the idea of a bypass, he told Global News he does not like the route of the current proposal.
“I don’t like the line through a park and just below where our dam is for the reservoir is,” Findlater said. “I think there is an issue there that raises some big concerns.”
A Facebook page has now been set up opposing the bypass along with an online petition to try and stop the project from moving forward.