Victoria Beach shoreline project sparks waves of fury

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 13/01/2011 (5445 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

QUESTIONS flew and tempers rose when hundreds of cabin-owners crammed into a public meeting Wednesday night to debate a shore-protection plan that has rocked Victoria Beach.

But despite periodic outbursts, the meeting did not become the “public lynching” one cabin-owner told the Free Press he feared.

About 350 people turned out to the public meeting at the Fort Garry United Church, leaving dozens of concerned Victoria Beach residents spilling out of the sanctuary and listening from the halls. On trial: a plan by 11 lakefront cabin-owners to build a “revetment,” or stone structure that aims to protect the shoreline from erosion.

“Inaction is not an acceptable option,” cabin-owner Gregg Hanson, who is spearheading the initiative, told the crowd. “We cannot leave the future solely in Mother Nature’s hands.”

The shoreline in parts of Victoria Beach was gouged by a cyclone-like storm last October, which destabilized parts of the shore cliffs. Hanson and other cabin-owners want to build the revetment with their own money to prevent the shore from crumbling further, eventually eating into their property.

Proponents want to start building the revetment in February, so that it is in place before the spring storms hit and further smash the shore. The structure will feature tonnes of sloping rocks, surmounted by a walkway that butts against the shore.

But opponents point to environmental warnings that the revetment could damage the sandy stretches of public beach as a sign that further study is needed. “We’re saying we want all of the alternatives properly looked at,” one cabin-owner told Hanson and other proponents. “You cannot remove what you’re putting in, it’s permanent… and the magnitude of the downside of the coin-flip here is so huge.”

While most who approached the microphone at the public meeting offered similar statements, some had harsher words for Hanson, Reeve Tom Farrell of the RM of Victoria Beach and others working on the revetment plan. One speaker accused the group of lying; another demanded that RM Coun. Karin Boyd not vote on the issue due to what she said was a conflict of interest.

This tension was expected — earlier this week, Hanson told the Free Press he feared a “public lynching” and that his group was being painted as “the devil incarnate.” But these objections were roundly booed by the crowd, and many acknowledged that it was important for Hanson and others to be able to save their property.

Many who stood up to speak expressed a desire to find a way to combat shore erosion co-operatively instead of responding to a plan created by the cabin-owners on the shore.

“We’re looking for a public solution for our public beaches, not a private solution,” one Victoria Beach resident said.

The revetment matter was originally scheduled to be voted on by the RM’s council on Jan. 18. Towards the meeting’s end, Farrell agreed to host a second public meeting. “I don’t see I have any alternative,” he said, while the crowd applauded.

melissa.martin@freepress.mb.ca