A group of Alberta landowners hope a plebiscite to be held during the upcoming municipal elections will stop an abandoned CN rail line from becoming a recreation trail for motorized vehicles.
“We’ll do whatever we can to stop this trail going through,” said Steve Upham, a director on the Lakeland Rail Adjacent Landowners, who felt it was a victory to get the plebiscite question on the Oct. 15 Alberta municipal election ballot.
“This has not been an easy process,” said Upham of Spedden, Alta., whose group presented petitions to local counties to force the addition of the plebiscite question.
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Faye Engler, of the Alberta Association of Landowners for the Protection of Agricultural Land, said this is the first time in Western Canada landowners opposed to abandoned rail lines used for recreation have forced a plebiscite on the issue.
“This is going to be very significant,” said Engler, who believes municipalities across Canada will be watching the results of the Oct. 15 plebiscite.
Voters in the counties of St. Paul, Smoky Lake and Bonnyville will vote on the question: “Do you agree with a municipally regulated public trail on the soon-to-be abandoned CN right of way?”
The question of what to do with abandoned rail lines has become a national issue, pitting farmers who own land near the rail lines against recreation users who think the long strips of land would be ideal for hiking and motorized travel.
Upham said landowners in his area worry the 30-metre public right of way will be used mainly by snowmobiles in the winter and four-wheel motorized vehicles in the summer.
“The public and motorized are two words that don’t go together.”
He said the landowners are concerned about an increase in fire or theft from the additional traffic.
Robert Bouchard, reeve of the County of St. Paul, said council felt it would be shortsighted to break up the 240-kilometre Coronado Bonnyville subdivision with branches to Elk Point and Cold Lake and return it to landowners.
The county purchased the right of way for a tax receipt from CN and will turn it into a public utility corridor. A 30 centimetre water line is being dug into the side of the right-of-way from Cold Lake to Ardmore and Fort Kent.
Bouchard said the corridor may be used for high-speed fibre optics cable or even a new rail line.
CN has kept an option to rebuild a new railway.
Upham said he has no problems with the area being used as a public utility corridor, but worries about motorized vehicles being allowed on the surface.
“I think we have to really work hard. The trail proponents are very well connected. We feel like we’re in the middle of an election campaign.”
Bouchard said the election would determine what would happen on the corridor’s surface.
“If the majority of people want it to be a recreation trail, it will go ahead.”
