Parks Canada is Off Route
Visitation to Canada’s Rocky Mountain National Parks has been declining. In an effort to reverse that trend, Parks Canada has announced it will allow the construction of a via ferrata in Banff National Park, at Mt. Norquay Ski Area, above Banff townsite.
Parks Canada does not construct new hiking trails in the Rockies. They don’t even adequately maintain existing hiking trails. (See photos below.) Yet they support what will essentially be an amusement-park attraction? We think this is ridiculous.
While hiking throughout the Canadian Rockies national parks, we’re constantly noticing areas where, if a new trail were constructed, it would soon become famous, because hiking it would be thrilling. Does anyone at Parks Canada recognize these opportunities?
A via ferrata focuses climbers’ attention on the immediate challenges it poses. A hiking trail opens hikers’ eyes, minds and hearts to the environment it traverses. Is anyone at Parks Canada aware of this difference?
Last year, we climbed some of the original via ferrata in the Italian Dolomiti. The routes were constructed during WWI to enable military troops to travel through the mountains. Re-purposing these via ferrata for peacetime recreation made sense.
Constructing a new via ferrata route where there is no such history, however, is nonsense, especially given that the Canadian Rockies’ hiking-trail potential remains largely untapped.
Yes, largely untapped. For every Sentinel Pass trail, Lake O’Hara Alpine Circuit, Rockwall trail, or Skyline trail, there are dozens of prospective trails in the Canadian Rockies that would be equally engaging.
Any of them, if constructed, would boost park visitation more effectively than would a via ferrata, because they would enhance the Canadian Rockies’ long-established reputation as one of the world’s premier hiking destinations.
Any of these as-yet unrealized trails would also better serve Parks Canada than would a via ferrata, because they would direct visitors’ attention differently: not toward a manmade contrivance (safety cables strung across a cliff, which could just as easily be located in New York State), but instead toward the unique, vast grandeur of the Canadian Rockies.
That’s our opinion. What’s yours?
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- Several trails we’ve recently re-hiked in the Canadian Rockies are a national disgrace.
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- Yet Parks Canada thinks building a via ferrata in Banff NP is the way to boost park visitation.
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- Parks has also decided to fund the re-introduction of buffalo to Banff NP. They can afford that, but not trail maintenance?
Can’t comment on the benefit of a via ferrata near Banff – but have to weigh in on the maintenance of hiking trails. Most of the problems originate with poor design (bad location)- where the original trail “builders” seemed to just follow pre-existing horse trails thru wet areas, which where not in the correct locations to begin with. It is amazing that with the level of use that Parks does not re-route the troublesome portion of these trails. Instead, they do very little, while often coninuing to allow horse use. Tonquin Valley and Mosquito Creek trails are two examples.
Posted by Darcy Monchak on August 18th, 2011.
Hi Darcy, we agree with your comments. Thanks for weighing in. — Craig
Posted by hikingcamping on August 19th, 2011.
Interesting post. The concept on possible Via Ferrata is intriguing in itself. We have often pondered how these might allow many others to enjoy a high place experience when they don’t have the necessary skills. There must be a lot of discussion around these over the ethics and the need for the lowest impact possible. As for the trials issue, we could not agree more! Every time we wander in Lake O’Hara for example, and wonder at what Grassi did long before such stewardship was needed even more now… The trails that exist at this time are few in many ways; thus the impact upon them is greater. Your comments about the possibility of other established trails are succinct! It would seem only a matter of time, hopefully, before someone at Parks Canada takes this on as a real cause in itself: the thoughtful creation of such new trails and then their necessary maintenance… No downside to this at all.
DSD
Posted by DSD on August 21st, 2011.