Making Mountain Park Reality

Sierra Club of Canada
Contact:
Dianne Pachal
E-mail:
dpachal@myexcel.ca Website:
http://www.sierraclub.ca

High in the Rocky Mountains of Alberta, astride the continental divide between waters flowing to the Artic Ocean and those to the Atlantic, lies a wildland rich in history and nationally significant for its biological diversity.

"Thinking Back" Powerhouse Creek, Mountain Park, Alberta from original painting by Marla Wilson.
About the painting
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This public, “Mountain Park – Cardinal Divide” area is one of the most extensive mosaics of alpine and sub-alpine habitats found in the front ranges of the Rocky Mountains. It is habitat for many rare and threatened plants and animals. Located adjacent the eastern boundary of Jasper National Park, its protection is also essential for the health of the park, a United Nations World Heritage Site.

Originally identified in the 1970s by Alberta Government scientists as deserving of preservation, scientists and conservation groups have since advocated its legislated protection.

However, since 1996, a massive open-pit coal mine, the Cheviot mine, has threatened to irreparably destroy it. The mine would be for exporting steal-making (metallurgical) coal to Asia. Early on, the World Heritage Committee asked Canada to consider alternatives to Cheviot.

The parent companies are Teck Cominco and Fording Canadian Coal Trust, which hold the new Elk Valley Coal Partnership that was formed out of the merger of western Canada’s major metallurgical coal mines. The coal trust’s main owners are Teck Cominco, the Ontario Teachers Pension Plan and the former shareholders of Fording Inc. Originally to begin in 1997, construction of Cheviot had not begun due to the mine’s poor economics and public opposition. Now, the companies are pushing forward with a new Cheviot mine project and that is being challenged in the Federal Court by conservation groups.

(Right) Canadian Rocky Mountain Parks World Heritage Site and the Cheviot Cumulative Effects Area

Stripping the Life – the Threat World Heritage Site Threatened Pandora’s Box of Risks to Human and Environmental Health Silencing the Spring Mine Would Contravene Migratory Birds Convention Act Mine Would Harm Jasper National Park Damage Would Extend Beyond 100 Years Already, Too Few Grizzly Bears Left in Alberta	The Alternative Harlequins - the Spotted Owls of Mountain Streams Proposed Mountain Wildland Park A Hot Spot of Biological Diversity A Refugium Human History & Cultural Use Mountain Park- Historic Site
The New Mine Proposal Why a Park Instead of an Open-Pit Mine