English
Afrikaans
Albanian
Arabic
Armenian
Azerbaijani
Basque
Belarusian
Bulgarian
Catalan
Chinese (Simplified)
Chinese (Traditional)
Croatian
Czech
Danish
Dutch
Estonian
Filipino
Finnish
French
Galician
Georgian
German
Greek
Haitian Creole
Hebrew
Hindi
Hungarian
Icelandic
Indonesian
Irish
Italian
Japanese
Korean
Latvian
Lithuanian
Macedonian
Malay
Maltese
Norwegian
Persian
Polish
Portuguese
Punjabi
Romanian
Russian
Serbian
Slovak
Slovenian
Spanish
Swahili
Swedish
Thai
Turkish
Ukrainian
Urdu
Vietnamese
Welsh
Yiddish- You are here:
-
Home
-
Community
-
Resources
-
Issues
-
Mainland / Southwest
-
Sea to Sky
- Brohm Ridge / Garibaldi at Squamish
Brohm Ridge / Garibaldi at Squamish
- Written by Paul Kubik
- Hits: 4596
According to Squamish Chief newspaper, April 12, 2019:
The Squamish-area mountain range has captured the attention of prospective developers for decades. Now, a new application proposes a wilderness lodge at the top of Brohm Ridge, near man-made Natasha Lake.
Don Worthington has owned a private cabin on Brohm Ridge since the 1970s, and has made similar applications to provide remote accommodations in the area before. Now, he's proposed a new three-storey lodge, which would house up to 18 clients and four staff within the proposed Garibaldi At Squamish resort area.
The proponent is Donald Worthington, Don Vanderhorst Consulting Ltd. and the proposal is for Commercial Recreation - Eco Tourist Lodge/resort.
Our comments
The lodge and resort proposal is entirely inside a designated ungulate winter range (UWR). The province establishes mountain goat winter ranges to provide high suitability habitat. Habitat attributes include snow interception, foraging opportunities, escape terrain, steep south and west-facing windswept ridges/slopes, conifer bluffs, shrub/grass communities, and security cover.
The range on the west side of Mount Garibaldi is known as MQ-1. It extends from Cheekye River to the top of Brohm Ridge and includes Natasha Lake. The winter range is used by mountain goats and is one of largest winter ranges in the south coast region.
There are two other UWR in the adjacent Clinker Ridge—WR-2 and WR-3. Summer range for mountain goats is in Garibaldi Park, for example the nearby Table Meadows area on the flanks of Mount Price and The Table. It is probable that mountain goats are traveling between winter ranges in winter and that path would take them through the proponent's tenure or that of Garibaldi At Squamish (the Aquilini project). Likewise, travel between summer and winter terrain would normally pass through proponent's tenure.
Biologists are uncertain as to where mountain goats are birthing and to what extent the cumulative development proposals on Brohm Ridge will have on the animals and their very young, especially during seasonal migration. The problem with the approach taken by project proponents on Brohm Ridge is that they only study the impacts on animals within the project boundary. The Garibaldi At Squamish proposal, for example, did not look at the impacts on mountain goats during their birthing period and seasonal migration. An environmental certificate was issued in error, in my opinion because it lacked taking into account regional impacts.
Mountain goats are extremely sensitive to noise and overhead disturbances. The presence of helicopters is a well known harmful impact on mountain goats. The presence of wind turbines is not a known hazard but extrapolating from the generally accepted scientific literature, they would be threatened by large overhead towers with rotating blades, especially above them.
The Squamish Chief articles is here: https://www.squamishchief.com/news/local-news/wilderness-lodge-proposed-for-brohm-ridge-near-squamish-1.23790337
The proposal is not compatible with the objective of preserving mountain goats. There are concerns about migration patterns being disrupted both summer and winter, cumulative impacts from the number of projects proposed on Brohm Ridge, threatening structures such as wind turbines, displacement from increased human activity and construction and lack of detailed environmental studies of a regional nature.
- Written by Chris Ludwig
- Hits: 3924
Rod Macleod, vice president of planning at Aquilini Group was interviewed by Sea to Sky Podcast in September. The interview is over 30 minutes long but there are a few takeaways that are of interest to the backcountry community.
Macleod couldn't help taking a dig into Vail Resorts, owners of Whistler Blackcomb. According to Macleod, Vail doesn't care about the local market. They are interested in the international destination market, whereas Garibaldi at Squamish sees its biggest market as Vancouver downhill skiers.
The GaS proposal has been reduced to half its original size. Swift Creek is no longer in the proposed CRA. Potentially good news for ski tourers as that is a natural corridor for access to Garibaldi Park.
The base area is at 1100 meters elevation, higher than Whistler by 500 meters.
Macleod foresees a 2 year process for approval, 1 year for detailed design and 2 years for construction.
BackcountryBC has concerns about the resort's effect on mountain goats and grizzly bears as Brohm Ridge appears to be habitat and a migration corridor for both. There are serious concerns about access to Garibaldi Park that must be addressed. The park master plan will be opened for an amendment to accommodate the development.
The full podcast can be heard here: https://sea2skypodcast.com/2018/09/24/resorting-in-squamish/?fbclid=IwAR1GSAP0ft2B8az-181lmX8VxFN-5AmWiQfasEspo6ys5O-cxebrWHRCbro
- Written by Chris Ludwig
- Hits: 3306
BackcountryBC met today with Rod Macleod, vice president of planning with the Aquilini Group down at Rogers Arena. We discussed our concerns with the Garibaldi at Squamish development.
We strayed onto the topic of Singing Pass access. Mr. Macleod worked at Whistler Mountain when Peter Alder was the general manager. Mr. Alder signed Whistler Mountain's first master development agreement with the province in 1981. The agreement bound Whistler Mountain to maintain the Singing Pass public road allowing private vehicles to reach the parking lot at the park boundary. But, in 1997, long after Mr. Alder left as GM, Whistler Blackcomb broke the agreement by unilaterally gating the Singing Pass road down in the village.
Mr. Macleod recalls that the spirit of the agreement was to continue and accommodate public access for private vehicles. It is not a stretch of imagination to link the closing of the road by WB to the opening of its mountain bike park above the road—restricting public access for the pursuit of private profit, said to be $50 million a year by Mr. Macleod.
We will continue to meet with Mr. Macleod and the Aquilini Group to lay out parameters for recreation and conservation at Brohm Ridge to best serve the backcountry community, wildlife and park users to ensure the bad example set by Whistler Blackcomb/Vail at Whistler does not repeat.
- Written by Chris Ludwig
- Hits: 3414
Garibaldi at Squamish Resorts just never seems to go away, and it seems ever more likely that it will go ahead. There were a whole pile of shenanigans that we uncovered regarding this proposal a few years ago (see below) and we performed extensive mapping work on it.
Reference: https://backcountrybc.ca/…/backcount…/brohm-ridge-custom-map
and
https://backcountrybc.ca/…/brohm-ridge-garibaldi-at-squamis…
Hopefully the Proponent and Government have come up with a better wildlife/mountain Goat Management Plan other than keeping the proposed lifts justly slightly out of view of goat habitat, cutting down old growth and encroaching on Garibaldi Park. We will be keeping a close eye on how this issue progresses.
The Times Colonist Article (June 2018):
http://www.timescolonist.com/…/brohm-ridge-ski-resort-const…
Proponent Website and comment form:
(Photo conceptualization taken from proponent's website)
- Written by Chris Ludwig
- Hits: 3837
April 8, 2016
Aquilini Investment Group meets with the 2020 team to discuss the Garibaldi at Squamish Resort proposal
The 2020 team discussed with the Aquilini Investment Group the proposed resort at Brohm Ridge and the pledge of $75,000 to reopen the Garibaldi Park master plan. The funds would be pledged to BC Parks for the planning process.
AIG stated it has no intention until build out of seeking land from Garibaldi Provincial Park. Based on the length of time to receive approvals and construction timelines, build out is expected roughly 35 years from today. They did not categorically state a position after that time of whether requests for park land would be or wouldn't be made.
AIG stated that the references to heli-skiing made in the 2003 proposal have been removed from the current proposal.
The current proposal is backed by AIG and Northlands, the latter which is controlled by the Gaglardi interest.
The discussion touched on the topics of the integrity of the Garibaldi Park boundary, adjustments to the resort proposal to remove contentious elements, Black Tusk snowmobile club's use of Brohm Ridge and public recreation access. Issues of mountain goat winter range, urban sprawl versus a functional village, water use and old growth management were also discussed. Also discussed was the perception that rules and regulations are inconsistently applied by provincial agencies for commercial interests and volunteer groups.