Exercise #3
January 11, 2025 By: Robert (Borealis) Dowe- Douglas
Media One: Building a Dam Comes full Circle with “History of WAC Bennet Dam
The history of the WAC Bennet Dam is a struggle between the demands of Urbanization and the pressures for and against conservation. This video stuck my interest because not only is the WAC Bennet Dam a feature of my home region, the Peace River Region, but the same story and issues are replaying themselves out all over again with the construction of what is known as Site C dam just outside the city of Fort St. John, again in my home region and in fact down river from the Bennet Dam if you go with the flow of the Peace river itself. The Demands of providing hydroelectric power for the province weighed heavily on our region since Premier Bennet himself set in motion the initiative to use the Peace River to offset the Deficit of Power Production requirements mostly due to the trade with the US and the demand down in the Vancouver and Island Metro Area. Conservation issues that arise from WAC Dam also plague the Site C dam, those being, the loss of prime farmland, flooding of ecosystems, and the loss of Indigenous Traditional lands, a person could argue that not much was learned from the construction of the Bennet dam only 70 years ago when you listen to the concerns today with Site C but, a better look at the measures taken will show that while not ideal people were compensated including the Indigenous peoples, (something that wasn’t done with WAC) but also the placement of the dam and its projected reservoir was altered many times to accommodated any land that was deemed too valuable to lose whether it be farmland or undeveloped ecosystems.
“History of the WAC Bennett Dam.” YouTube, October 25, 2024. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIi3VETwqxA.
Media 2: Can Urbanization be Contained by the Shoreline? “History of BC Ferries”
This history of BC Ferries is an excellent example of urbanization as today the BC Ferries are a crown corporation and thus considered public transportation. Remembering that BC Ferries and their terminals are in truth an extension of Vancouver Metro’s expansive urbanization means that Vancouver and the cities on the east side of south Vancouver island such as Nanaimo, Sidney, Victoria, Chemainus, Ladysmith, Crofton, and cities like Gibsons, Powell River, as well as channel islands such as Salt Spring and Gabriola islands, are in reality apart of the same metro area despite having such a major waterway separating them all. It is very possible to utilize Public Transportation to travel from as far east as Hope BC to as far north on the island as Campbell River is a testimony to the progress of urbanization of the area. The Video showed that BC Ferries has plans to keep expanding taking note of environmental demands giving the video a small note of conservation, and while unachievable currently there is an interest in a “Fixed Link” bridge which would further push towards urbanization in the region, From personal Experience, a person can and do work or live on the island and sustainably live or work on the mainland using the ferry service as an every day public transportation, can urbanization be halted if not by the restraints of land and the ocean? This does not appear to be the case in lower BC, Vancouver, and Island Metro.
“History of BC Ferries.” YouTube, December 29, 2024. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KwpFFMipXu8.