Ed Struzik, Journal Staff Writer
Edmonton, The Edmonton Journal, February 23, 1999
It seems there is no local opposition to adding a gem of an area alongside Jasper National Park to the Special Places program. But for some reason, the government seems reluctant.
Andy Matheson's go three generations of coal in his veins. In 1918, Matheson's grandfather travelled by horseback from Pocahontas to Cadomin in the Jasper area searching for work when the Phocahontas mine shut down.
"My father worked alongside him," he says. "He lived and died in this country."
Matheson is 58 years old now and he still makes his residence in Cadomin.
While he has no use for environmentalists who have been fighting to stop the proposed Cheviot mine from being developed in the area, he has no objection to having the upper reaches of the Cardinal River included in Alberta's Special Places program.
"It's beautiful country up there," he says.
"The cremated ashes of people who once worked in the area are spread about those hills. It really should be protected, and the mines are really too far away to interfere. I think it would represent the best of both worlds."
The Cardinal River is a bit of an oddity in the larger scheme of Special Places. It was never formally nominated for inclusion in the provincial program, and there is no local committee actively pursuing the idea.
But the province's own technical advice to the Provincial Coordinating Committee for Special Places recommended five Rocky Mountain sites, including the upper Cardinal.
Most everyone expected that some of the area would one day be protected after the Alberta Energy and Utilities Board and the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency cited the ecological significance of the upper Cardinal River when they gave the go-ahead to the Cheviot mine almost two years ago.
Thumbs Up From Experts
"The Panel strongly recommends that the level of protection for wildlife in the upper Cardinal River be increased." The Cheviot panel noted in its final report.
"The panel would suggest that Alberta Environmental Protection consider inclusion of these lands, as well as the upper Prospect Creek lands, into the Cardinal Divide Natural Area, if only to reduce any confusion regarding the level of protection from disturbances that is required to protect their ecological values."
The importance of this area was underlined last year when 15 scientists signed a petition calling on the governments of Canada and Alberta to protect the area.
Environmentalists are giving Environment Minister Ty Lund credit for subsequently establishing the 43,000 acre Whitehorse Wildland Park northwest of the Luscar mine site.
But they are urging him to add the Folding Mountain, Red Cap, and the upper reaches of the Cardinal to the Whitehorse Park.
"The panel was really impressed by the importance of this area for grizzly bears, mountain lions, wolves and other carnivores moving in and out of Jasper National Park to other wilderness areas," says Diane Pachal, who represented the Alberta Wilderness Association at the Cheviot hearings.
"From an ecological point of view, protecting the area makes a lot of sense."
Peter Lee, the World Wildlife Fund director who sits on the government's Provincial Coordinating Committee for Special Places, points out that there are no timber licenses or permits to make it difficult for the government to implement the proposal.
Last September, he called on Lund to consider the possibility of adding the areas to the wildland park, noting also that many rare species of plants in the upper Cardinal are not found in the Whitehorse reserve.
Lund rejected the idea, saying there is "an appropriate level of protection" for the area.
He added that the Provincial Coordinating Committee needed to focus its full attention on completing its work.
In spite of Lund's reluctance, Lee is hoping that a meeting that environmentalists had with Premier Ralph Klein last month about the flawed nature and slow pace of the Special Places program might be enough to get the government to reconsider the idea.
"This is really and easy one for the government to do," says Lee.
"It would go a long way in convincing the public that the government is interested in protected natural areas like this which really are of special significance."