Letters, March 31

A spring walk in Winnipeg

Three times a day, I venture out on the sidewalks to walk my two dogs up and down the sidewalks in my West End neighbourhood. Three times a day, I wonder if I will arrive back home without broken limbs or worse after falling on the icy, uneven, slippery early spring sidewalks.

So far, only luck and ultra vigilance have spared me injury and danger. I often opt for walking on the road, which is usually clear and easily navigable. The road is clearly not ideal but often the only reasonable place to walk.

I understand that snow falls in Winnipeg and that this snow accumulates on the sidewalk. The snow clearing efforts provided by the city leaves a thick layer of snow in its wake, which is very problematic once the thawing process begins. Spring is especially challenging since the sun melts the snow during the day and nightfall brings colder temperatures again. This cycle can last days or even weeks, depending on the weather for any particular year. This year it has gone on for several weeks already. Do we accept this as just nature doing its thing or can we actually implement some proactive strategies to improve the safety and convenience of all pedestrians in our city?

I would love to see some more tangible initiatives to help solve this issue. Maybe it means that residents take on more responsibility in clearing the snow on the sidewalk running along the front of their homes, or the sidewalk snow clearing efforts are more robust and thorough.

I strongly believe that this situation is not OK. It doesn’t work for me and I am a mobile, active walker. How is it even remotely possible for someone in a wheelchair or parents trying to push strollers through the muck and ice? We can do better than this for our residents!

Carole Jantz

Winnipeg

A plea for park

I am writing as one of the many people who use and care deeply about the Kilcona off‑leash dog park in northeast Winnipeg.

The City of Winnipeg is planning to build a roadway through this park. For those of us who spend time here daily, this proposal feels unnecessary and deeply damaging.

Kilcona Park sits on what was once a landfill, but over time it has become something remarkable. The area has evolved into open, wildflower‑speckled grasslands that function as a vibrant urban wildlife habitat. It supports butterflies, bees, beavers, painted turtles, and birds such as western meadowlarks, blue herons, and pelicans, to name a few.

What was once a dump is now a thriving natural space shared by people, dogs, and wildlife.

This renaturalization has been aided by park users who have reintroduced native plants. Much of the park is now rich in native nectar sources, including common milkweed, a critical host plant for the monarch butterfly, which was formally declared endangered under Canada’s Species at Risk Act in 2023. This is especially concerning given that habitat loss is the primary reason for the monarch butterfly’s decline, and the proposed roadway would further fragment this restored landscape.

Over the years, I have personally spread thousands of native wildflower seeds throughout the park and, shovel in hand, transplanted many established native pollinator plants from my own garden to the park to ensure they successfully take root.

The proposed road would divide the park, fragment habitat, and permanently alter its character. There is also a safety concern. A long‑standing gap beneath a city‑owned fence near Lagimodiere Boulevard has gone unaddressed despite reports from park users after dogs slipped through.

With a roadway and additional fencing proposed, inadequate fencing could place dogs in serious danger.

Access to the area already exists via Springfield Road. Rather than cutting through sensitive parkland, the city could improve existing infrastructure.

Once a road is built through this park, its character cannot be restored. I urge the City of Winnipeg to pause this plan and work with the community to protect this rare natural space.

Denise Desrosiers

Winnipeg

Critical error

Re: Lewis begins NDP leadership with Prairie tension and a big rebuilding task ahead (March 30)

Regardless of what NDP supporters want to believe, Canada is a two-political-party country. The NDP did have a chance, in 2022 to 2024, to make a difference in the future of Canada, but chose to get in bed with the reigning Liberal government. And I don’t think that the voting public will forgive them for that error of judgment.

What good did it do for the beliefs and policies of the NDP party? Hospital wait times are at an all-time high, affordable housing is only a dream for most Canadians, and when was the last time there was talk of the federal government funding for installing charging stations from coast to coast for EVs?

Alfred Sansregret

Winnipeg

On Western ‘alienation’

The NDP leaders from Alberta and Saskatchewan, Nenshi and Beck, wasted no time in coming out to denounce Avi Lewis as the new leader of the federal party.

Party membership expanded during this leadership race, candidates proved their abilities to fundraise using grassroots methods. Seventy per cent of NDP membership voted in this leadership race, up from the approximately 50 per cent that elected the previous two NDP leaders. Of those 70 per cent, more than 50 per cent had Lewis as their first ranked choice. Members of the party in Alberta and Saskatchewan have had a chance to make their voices heard, fund their preferred candidates, and vote; many probably ranked Lewis as their top choice.

The media also needs to reframe how Alberta and Saskatchewan grievances are discussed.

We hear of Western alienation, sometimes the more precise identification of the Prairies might be used. Either way, the political discourse talks about Alberta and Saskatchewan as if they compromise the entirety of the Prairies or the west. As if British Columbia and Manitoba are not part of Western Canada, as if Manitoba is not part of the beautiful Prairies that we ought to preserve for future generations.

This isn’t Western or Prairie alienation, but oil and gas alienation.

Kelsey Enns

Winnipeg

Counting the flaws

Re: Counterpoint: the new transit system is good (Think Tank, March 26)

I see that Joe Korenelson has added his voice in support of the new “improved ” transit system. So far the city has trotted out Bjorn Radstrom, the transit drivers union boss, the mayor and Coun. Janice Lukes to tell us that how good the new transit system is.

The problem here is that a really good system doesn’t need to be defended. A really good system will get letters to city council and local newspapers of congratulations rather than hundreds, possibly thousands of letters condemning the new system and describing using transit, which was once manageable for all riders, has now become a nightmare with multiple transfers and travel times doubled and tripled.

A really good system will be convenient to get around and not add to the difficulty of using the transit system. Transplanting a system designed around a city which has an immovable “spine” like the subways of New York or the light rail of Vancouver is a poor decision, since Winnipeg has neither. Some suggest the system was changed to accommodate the requirement of the Housing Accelerator Fund, which curiously requires a “frequent transit system within 800 metres of the housing in question.”

Be that as it may, having spent million to “modernize and improve” the transit system I guess the only way to save face is to keep telling us, don’t believe what you experience, believe what we tell you.

“The system is good.”

Finally, frequency is irrelevant if the whole system is not convenient.

Gilles Nicolas

Winnipeg