British Columbia recently committed a fresh C$85 million to improve cycling and walking conditions across the province, benefitting tens of thousands of residents of all ages, many in smaller towns and villages.
After the latest round of active transportation infrastructure funding, the 11 selected infrastructure projects would enable nine communities “to leave their cars behind and choose active ways to get around efficiently and affordably,” the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure (MOTI) said in a release.
Two are in the South coast region, which hosts more than 60% of the province’s population. But the rest are in smaller communities, including the Cycle 16 multi-use pathway in the Bulkley-Nechako region of northern B.C.
A three-metre-wide path running 12 kilometres between the town of Smithers (pop. 5,660) and the village of Telkwa (pop.1,500), the pathway has been a work in progress since 2017. The first 3.7-kilometre stretch was funded by a C$1.46-million grant for COVID-19 resilience infrastructure and completed in June, 2023. Now, with another $9.8 million from the active transportation fund, the remaining nine kilometres can be built.
The Cycle 16 Trail Society played a major role in making it happen, assuring the regional district that the pathway would not become a financial strain on taxpayers. The group put together a 20-year maintenance plan to demonstrate the cost would not be a burden, citing pledges from local businesses that would contribute to the maintenance, including the replacement of asphalt in two decades. “This work was done by one of our directors that worked in highway construction,” Trail Society President Allan Cormier told The Energy Mix.
‘Respect Is So Important’
Cormier also credited the work of a project manager hired to guide the community through the complex process. “This was a big part of our success,” he said. “He had the technical knowledge and the personal skills to navigate all of these challenges.”
“And the fact that we had a professional helped to open doors with the various stakeholders.”
Early and frequent stakeholder meetings were critical, Cormier said. Wet’suwet’en First Nation members were consulted and supported the project.
“Respect is so important here,” he said.
Formalizing community buy-in was also key, Cormier added. More than 1,200 people, about 10% of the population of the Bulkley Valley through which the pathway will run, are members of the Cycle 16 Trail Society—a fact critical to getting the project funded.
“At first, people would say ‘I support it, I don’t need a membership,’ but when you let them know that a high membership helps with funding they see the value,” Cormier said.
Today, the pathway is on its way to completion, thanks to “respect, listening, doughnuts, coffee, and homemade sourdough bread,” he said.
The ready four kilometres of pathway is already benefiting the community, he added: “There are often families walking with a baby stroller and toddlers on strider bikes on the new trail, something that would never happen on a highway and even on town streets where there would have to be a level of caution.”
A Cash Infusion for Active Transportation
The $85 million comes just months after the province’s Active Transportation Infrastructure Grant program made $24 million available to support 80 projects, including $500,000 for a multi-use pathway in Courtenay, $175,000 for another in Dawson Creek, and $64,800 for one on the Xatśūll First Nation near Williams Lake.
Since 2004, many communities have also received funding from the infrastructure grant program to support development of active transportation plans. Eighteen such plans were funded in the latest round of support, several in First Nations communities.
In addition to the Cycle 16 path, the latest cash infusion will:
• Help close a dangerous infrastructure gap in New Westminster that forces pathway users onto a designated truck route;
• Create a new, separated path in Peachland (pop. 6,100) to connect residents with the community grocery store, elementary school, and regional transit;
• Fund the design of a 12-kilometre multi-use pathway connecting Burns Lake (pop. 2,000) with Tchesinkut Lake, a popular fishing destination, and all homes and businesses in between;
• Help complete a one-kilometre path on the Tk’emlups te Secwepemc reserve, near Kamloops.
“When people have the opportunity to use safe, efficient, and affordable travel options, they take it,” Transportation Minister Rob Fleming said in the release. “That’s why we’re building overpasses, trail networks, and bike lanes that will give new generations new ways to travel within and between their communities.”
‘Safely Moving, Together’
Giving all generations—young, old, and future—the option to safely power their own mobility is what drives the West Kootenay Cycling Coalition (WKCC). Established in 2019, the organization is guided by its vision statement, “Safely moving, together”, to support active transportation of all kinds—walking, cycling, skateboarding, and even skiing.
Its creation stemmed from two separate incidents involving risks to loved ones, WKCC Vice-President Solita Work told The Mix. The first was when its original founder, a competitive road cyclist, became a mother and realized how “incredibly dangerous” it was to pull her daughter in a bike trailer along the busy roads out from Nelson. The second was a collision in the nearby town of Trail, in which the son of the group’s president was struck by a car being driven by a vision-impaired senior.
The boy escaped serious injury, but this near tragedy became another germination point for the WKCC when the father learned the senior had opted to drive because they had no other means of getting around.
Creating access to safe, non-motorized travel is WKCC’s main motivation. The small but growing group of 200 or so volunteers is working on a number of initiatives, including a plan to build a 45-kilometre multi-use pathway along the Kootenay River between Castlegar (pop. 9,000) and Nelson (pop. 11,700).
Topography and resistant landowners will prove a challenge, Work said, but the WKCC is powering ahead, determined to provide safe, healthy, and fun alternatives to the congested roadway.
The absence of a true active transportation “culture” in the West Kootenays does present a barrier, Work said. People ride for recreation, and a fair number of them are pretty hard-core, with personal safety rather fairly low on their priority list (the same cannot be said for sugar!).
According to Work, competitive bikers and roadies sometimes say, “we don’t really need stuff like separated bike lanes.” But for a parent with kids or an elderly person, that sort of infrastructure is crucial, she said. Without it, getting around on four wheels remains the default for many.
Building ‘BOB’ Better
A beloved piece of infrastructure in Nelson, the Big Orange Bridge (BOB), is another funding recipient. A steel trestle bridge built in 1957, BOB spans the Kootenay River, connecting downtown Nelson with the 100-kilometre north shore of Kootenay Lake—and to the towns that cling to its edges, smaller and smaller, and to the mountains that rise above it, larger and larger, the further north you go.
An essential connector, the bridge is used by many cyclists, and has flashing signs to alert drivers at both ends that two-wheelers are sharing the road. But the roadbed is narrow, and is frequently used by huge logging and transport trucks. Many riders decamp to the narrow sidewalk.
BOB will be the subject of a feasibility study to determine what it will take to construct cantilevered bike lanes on the bridge. If the idea gets the thumbs up, construction will proceed.
Work noted that the provincial ministry has committed to Clean BC’s mandate of a 30% increase in cycling and transit trips, along with a 27% reduction in personal vehicle kilometres driven, by 2030.
But those targets will depend on putting a much greater percentage of MOTI’s budget toward infrastructure like multi-use pathways, she said. “Because you can’t just expect people to stop driving if there is nothing else out there.”
