Monthly Archives: March 2010

Gordon Dewis identifies himself as a geocacher, and based on what he knows about climbing I’d guess he’s a rock climber too. Without making inflammatory statements  he comments in his blog about the Gatineau Park Ecosystem Conservation Plan and climbing , concluding with a hope that there will be more information sessions about the plan.

The Climber’s Coalition Blog indicates that ice climbing in Gatineau Park is to be prohibited based on a Quebec rule protecting deer yards but that overgrazing by deer is seen as one of the stresses to the ecology of the Eardley Escarpment.

Dan Brunton has written in the Ottawa Citizen that the NCC are right to limit rock climbing in Gatineau Park.

Brunton is a well known naturalist and professional environmental consultant.

Saidimu Apale reports via Twitter that he was lost in the snow on the Gatineau Park hiking trails and got rescued by snowmobile.

I guess this is a testament to the fact that even though it feels like spring in town, there’s still snow in them thar hills.

On March 18 Alan Neal of CBC’s All in a Day interviewed Eric Grenier the Chair of the Climbers Coalition about his reaction to the restrictions the NCC is placing on rock climbing. As well Alan Neal talked to Daniel Gagnon of Université du Québec à Montréal and Chair of the NCC’s External Expert Committee for the Ecosystem Conservation Plan.

I had posted the audio of those interviews but was asked by CBC to take it down, instead linking to the CBC “Listen Again” web page where the same material has been made available until more recent items displace it. The link to that page is below.

Removing the item from this site meant losing the comment that went with it so here it is, from Dave Foster:

“Listened to Prof. Gagnon. The problems he refers to are all things that were resolved years ago. His seems to have no knowledge of climbing practices in the Park since the first climbing management agreement a number of years ago. It’s unfortunate when an “expert” says things that are so misrepresentative.”

Here is the link to the CBC “Listen Again” page. Look for “Rock Climbing in Gatineau Park”

I note however that over time the CBC audio will become unavailable at the CBC site. I think it’s worth keeping it available. Accordingly I have written the following email to Jeff  Keay, Head of Media Relations, English Services at CBC. Mr Keay has lived in Ottawa so he may have some familiarity with Gatineau Park.

Hi Mr Keay

I’m in Ottawa. I’m running a website dedicated to Gatineau Park. I recently recorded some Radio 1 audio concerning a park issue and posted it.

I informed the show (All In A Day) I had done so, offering to remove the material if needed.

Julie Delaney kindly responded saying she had added the material to their list of “listen again” clips and that I should take it down because CBC required me to pay a large licensing fee to keep it up. I have now removed my post and instead directed visitors to the CBC “listen again” URL.

The issue is a disagreement between the NCC and rock climbers.

Here’s my question: The material now at “listen again” will disappear after a some days or weeks. I think it is of benefit for this material to be available for longer and would like to repost it when it disappears from the CBC site. I know you responded in February to Jesse Brown’s TVO show “Search Engine” saying things are in flux. Do items like this need to be removed from the easily available public record while copyright infringement and sharing legalities are in flux? This is not material CBC was making money on, nor is it material I will be making money on. It is information in the public interest that I want to keep available.

Thanks Kindly

Charles Hodgson

The relevant links are as follows:

My revised post at GuideGatineau.ca

All in a Day “listen again” URL

Search Engine episode “CBC and iCopyright”

I copied Julie Delaney and Jesse Brown on that too.

Supplementary – March 23, 2010

I did hear back from Jeff Keay who said he’d look into seeing if the audio would remain available for the long term or not. I responded saying:

…the question isn’t really “will this specific audio remain available via CBC’s website?”

It’s more like: do I need to depend on the kindness of CBC (this time in the person of Julie Delaney) to make available similar archival material in future? Or are there reasonable conditions under which I can repost the material; for instance when adequate credit is given, when there is no profit lost on CBC’s part or gained on my part, and when the material is specifically relevant to other material being offered in the same context…

I then heard back from Jesse Brown who may talk about the incident on his blog or podcast. I don’t see the question of being able to repost CBC material as being too controversial. Everyone is being reasonable about it. But Jesse Brown indicated (and I agree with him) that just by talking about things like this is the way to move the issue forward to a more reasonable policy.

Supplementary again – April 11

Coverage via TVO

The NCC has issued the following open letter in response to the GPPC news release of March 17 entitled Conservation Plan an Empty Shell:

March 19, 2010

Open Letter to Gatineau Park Protection Committee

Jean-Paul Murray, Co-Chair

RE: Gatineau Park

It is unfortunate that the Gatineau Park Protection Committee is still not satisfied with our latest efforts to protect the park (re: Gatineau Park Ecosystem Conservation Plan).

The Committee continues to perpetuate the idea that the NCC has allowed 119 houses, 5 new roads, a major grocery chain, gas station and a donut shop to be built within the park since 1992. As we have attempted to communicate on various occasions, the boundary rationalization exercise in 1997 includes the acquisition of Meech Creek Valley and excludes some parcels that were within the 1960 perimeter. However, overall the 1997 boundary is 700 hectares greater than the 1960 perimeter. Neither the grocery store, nor the donut shop often mentioned by the Gatineau Park Protection Committee was ever in Gatineau Park — not within the 1960 perimeter and not within the 1997 boundary.

We wish the Gatineau Park Protection Committee would focus more on the positive things the NCC has done, and continues to do to ensure the environmental stewardship of Gatineau Park, rather than focusing on events in the past.

The Committee is also concerned with residential development in the park and so is the NCC. However, the Committee suggests that the NCC has jurisdiction on private properties located within park limits, which we do not have. We have chosen to focus our efforts on acquiring as much as possible of the developable land because, once we own the land, we control and manage it. Since the adoption of our renewed approach for land acquisition in Gatineau Park, in January 2008, the NCC has acquired 25 more properties representing an additional 150 hectares. With this the NCC has potentially prevented the construction of more than 150 houses in the Park. Today 99% of the land in the Gatineau Park is publicly owned.

We would like to take this opportunity to remind the Committee of several recent NCC initiatives.

• We are currently implementing the 2005 Gatineau Park Master Plan, from which came our Gatineau Park Ecosystem Conservation Plan and will come our Green Transportation Plan for Gatineau Park, Gatineau Park Recreation Plan and Gatineau Park Heritage Preservation Plan.
• Gatineau Park boundaries were clearly identified in1997 and in 2008, our Board passed a motion to reconfirm these boundaries, further emphasizing the NCC’s desire to protect this natural space.
• There is ongoing, open dialogue and collaboration between the staff of the NCC and groups that share our interest for the park. In the past year more than 20 meetings have taken place with these groups. I personally meet at least twice a year with the Gatineau Park Conservation Coalition.
• The NCC signed, in October 2008, a collaboration protocol with the municipality of Chelsea which helps to ensure a better protection of Gatineau Park.
• In 2009, the NCC launched and is pursuing a corporate Environmental Strategy whose objectives include enhancing biodiversity in Gatineau Park and in the Greenbelt.
• With respect to the committee’s concerns about Meech Lake shore, in the Fall 2009, the NCC began work to rehabilitate the shoreline on NCC lands. As for the privately owned lands along Meech Lake, they fall outside of the jurisdiction of the NCC but we intend to call upon residents to help in the restoration of the shores.

Where we find some common ground with the Gatineau Park Protection Committee is a desire to protect Gatineau Park. We are therefore baffled by the committee’s criticism of our latest effort, the Gatineau Park Ecosystem Conservation Plan, for which we collaborated with local environmental groups, the scientific community and experts, and whose very goal is to protect the park.

By continuing to work together with the users, residents, and friends of the park as well as the environmental and scientific communities we will make sure future generations enjoy this treasure we have in our region: Gatineau Park.

The National Capital Commission acknowledges that to ensure the protection of this capital gem that is the Gatineau Park, a sustained and collaborative effort is needed. We are prepared and willing to do it.

Marie Lemay, P.Eng., ing.

Chief Executive Officer

*********

Over at the Ottawa Citizen Ken Gray (The Bulldog) includes with his publication of the above letter some material that had earlier been issued by the GPPC, indicating that it is what prompted the NCC response. However the piece titled Conservation Plan an Empty Shell is yet another piece of text visible here.

According to an NCC press release:

[The NCC] plans to stop track setting services on Gatineau Park’s cross-country trail network as of Sunday, March 21. However, trail patrolling will continue until April 15.

In the event of a significant snowfall prior to this date, track setting will resume and the NCC could again welcome skiers.

The NCC is grateful to the 6,400 cross-country skiers who bought season passes this year (an increase of 18% over the previous year) and looks forward to welcoming them back on the trails next season.

The NCC wishes to thank everyone who contributed to this success. Thanks also go out to everyone who organized special events in Gatineau Park during the winter season, such as the Gatineau Loppet.

Rock Climbers hoping to protect their right to climb in Gatineau Park have set up an online petition with a target of 5000 names.

See it here.

The Lowdown Online is reporting that a deer rescued from the Gatineau River was released in Gatineau Park but died of hypothermia.

Contrast this with yesterday’s Gatineau Park Ecosystem Conservation Plan which points to deer grazing on the plants of Gatineau Park as a significant stress to the park ecosystem, going so far as to recommend that the NCC “encourage the hunting of deer in areas peripheral to the Park where the deer population is too large, in partnership with Québec’s Ministère des Ressources naturelles et de la Faune.”