Weaselhead Flats and North and South Glenmore parks surround the Glenmore Reservoir — a primary source of Calgary’s drinking water. The parks are home to everything from bears to moose and a wide variety of birds.
For park users, the natural spaces provide a place to feel like you’ve left the city.
On Saturday, the city hosted a walking tour of the area as part of efforts to get public input on developing a 10-year plan for managing the Weaselhead Flats and Glenmore park areas.
The project will be led by the Urban Conservation team with various city staff providing expertise. External contributors and Indigenous Peoples will be brought into better understand past, present and future use of the park and to contribute to the future vision for the parks.
Read more:
Calgary ring road opponents say province not enforcing Weaselhead protection order
The purpose of the management plan is to establish ways improve resource protection and balance current and future uses of the park.
So far, Calgarians have made it clear they value the biodiversity.
“The response has been tremendous,” said Vanessa Carney, landscape analysis supervisor with the City of Calgary. She said there have already been hundreds of responses on the city website and many wildlife photographs submitted as well.
“A tremendous amount of support for the health of the park and asking us not to change and not to develop the area. There’s been some great feedback about how people use the area as well as what they really value and what they might have concerns about with regards to biodiversity,” Carney said.
Concerns have been raised about congestion on paved paths and about people creating their own trails. Trail design is going to be part of what the city considers in the management plan.
“Pretty much everything is open for discussion but one of the things will be looking at is trying to encourage people to work with the existing trail network and not start creating what we call desire lines or goat trails,” Carney said.
Gary Haerle, vice president of the Weaselhead/Glenmore Park Preservation Society says there are times when the parking lot is filled to capacity. Haerle said managing congestion in the parks is something the city will need to look at.
The group is the final stages of producing a study on the impacts of the ring road. It’s expected to be be released this fall.
“We know that the ring road brings increased noise and increased movement. It increases the difficulty of movement of nesting birds,” Haerle said.
Read more:
Tsuut’ina man cuts off braids in protest as Tsuut’ina Trail opens in Calgary
Haerle added the west end of the reservoir is becoming more flooded in recent years and at times water covers the pathways and nesting grounds.
“The water has been reaching into the pathway areas and as a result it’s covering over some of the shrubbery that’s in the delta area and it continues on pathways. Given that water will probably be a bigger challenge in the next few years, this will probably be one of our bigger issues,” Haerle said
Hearle said wildlife has been impacted by people who approach animal nests and feed animals and let their dogs off-leash.
The bylaw states that dogs must be on a leash in the park and must remain on the paved pathway, unfortunately there are dogs owners who insist on letting their dogs loose.
“Remaining on trail is essential and remaining on leash is absolutely essential. We also know that just the visibility of dogs causes animals stress because they know they have to be on alert more than usual when dogs are present,” Hearle said.
The city established an online engagement portal to collect feedback, which will remain open until March 31.