“Off-highway vehicle use in the Bighorn Backcountry damages soil and vegetation, reduces water quality in the headwaters of the North Saskatchewan River, and destroys and degrades fish habitat."
“Off-highway vehicle use in the Bighorn Backcountry damages soil and vegetation, reduces water quality in the headwaters of the North Saskatchewan River, and destroys and degrades fish habitat."
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Spoiler alert: this column doesn’t think much of the $90 Kananaskis Conservation Pass that Environment and Parks Minister Jason Nixon is introducing. But the minister was right in one key respect. His department should be “about managing demand and supporting environmental sustainability.” The conservation pass, unfortunately, is likely to disappoint on both counts.
Managing demand is where the pass should see some success. Based on the Washington state experience, the minister’s $90 annual vehicle fee should reduce the number of cars travelling to K-Country. In 2011, Washington introduced much more modest vehicle fees (annual: $30; daily: $10). State-wide, this pass reduced visits to parks by an average of seven million visits per year.