A $300,000 slice of the regional budget already allocated to start a “missing link” pathway is now likely to sit idle well past next year, a consequence of uncertainty among officials as to whether the proposed Salt Spring Island Regional Trail (SSIRT) should be considered recreational or transportation-focused.
That distinction matters, at least to the Capital Regional District (CRD) Board, who have presided over considerable administrative friction on a long-imagined 21-kilometre bicycle and pedestrian route that would run from Fulford Harbour to Ganges, then on to Vesuvius — closing the last gap in a 186-kilometre regional network that connects trails in Victoria and the Cowichan Valley.
The CRD Board had allocated that funding for design work for SSIRT, and the CRD’s Parks Committee — after an exhaustive multi-agency feasibility study concluded SSIRT represented a “significant opportunity” to enhance active transportation across Salt Spring — unanimously recommended the CRD Board refer “planning, implementation and operation” of all Gulf Islands regional trails to the nascent Transportation Committee.
The board did just that, but in January that committee referred the issue back to the board, largely over concerns SSIRT might be more recreational than transportation-oriented — and therefore less suited to be managed alongside $53.5-million plans for widening and lighting on the Galloping Goose and Lochside trails.
Notwithstanding the 47-page SSIRT feasibility study report, the board agreed not to determine a designation without more information, and tasked CRD staff to return with their own report — on the “implications” of designating all Gulf Islands Regional Trails as regional trails under the transportation service.
Gulf Islands representatives seemed at their wits’ end over the process.
“At this point in time, regional trails in the Gulf Islands are still under the auspices of regional parks, [while] regional trails in the Greater Victoria Area are under the transportation service,” said Salt Spring CRD director Gary Holman at the CRD Board’s Committee of the Whole meeting Wednesday, April 29.
“So when we talk about a regional plan, and a regional service, and a regional commission — do staff believe that we can resolve what are silos at this point, in terms of regional trail management within the CRD?”
Salt Spring property owners are expected to contribute some $175,000 this year to support the CRD’s Regional Transportation Service, roughly $26 per average residential property. If managed by that service, Holman has said, SSIRT would be the first local manifestation of a tangible benefit for Salt Spring; Holman, along with the island’s Local Community Commission (LCC), had opposed being part of the new service at all, given Salt Spring’s extant self-funded transit service.
CRD general manager Kevin Lorette reiterated staff were performing the work asked of them by directors, and expected that report on implications — covering issues such as land authority and construction standards — will be part of the update to the Regional Transportation Plan, being brought to the board in September 2027. At that point, the board presumably will consider again how it wants to designate Gulf Islands regional trails.
Southern Gulf Islands alternate director Robert Fawcett said he had concerns about the pace of the process, and given the only complete section thus far is a two-kilometre stretch on Mayne Island, finishing the rest could take years.
“Currently, the residents on the Southern Gulf Islands don’t have any access to convenient, green, affordable multi-modal transportation at all — so I’m really glad that we’re looking at equity when we’re doing this,” said Fawcett. “If we look at how much we’ve built so far through the Regional Trails Plan, to get to all of the Gulf Islands and all of the sections, we’re looking at many, many decades.”
CRD regional planning and transportation senior manager Patrick Klassen clarified that a June transportation workshop will focus predominantly on “umbrella objectives” — broader vision and goals for the transportation service — with limited opportunities to discuss actions like how to define regional trails or how to build them out.
“There’s quite a bit of time that lies ahead to develop the plan itself,” said Klassen. “We are still in that earlier stage of developing the higher-level framework.”