BC to demolish century-old wooden rail trestle in Cowichan Valley
“What they're doing to the Holt Creek Trestle is a travesty:” historian T.W. Paterson
The B.C. government is poised to destroy a historic wooden railway trestle on the Trans Canada Trail in the Cowichan Valley.
The plan is to replace the century-old Holt Creek Trestle with a single-span steel structure.
Award-winning Cowichan Valley historian T.W. Paterson noted the Holt Creek Trestle’s pending demise in his weekly on-line column, British Columbia Chronicles. https://twpaterson.com/
When finished, the century-old span “will look nothing like a railway trestle, just a functional, streamlined river crossing,” he wrote.
In a follow-up with sixmountains.ca, Paterson said: “What they're doing to the Holt Creek Trestle is a travesty.”
Paterson is not alone in his concern.
“It’s crazy, just nuts,” said consultant and former pulp-and-paper executive Graham Kissack, who cycled across the trestle this week.
“Nobody even asked, ‘Should we spend some taxpayer dollars and rebuild it?’ It just makes me mad.”
The province says in a recent news release the Holt Creek Trestle opened in 1922 and served as a rail line until 1991 when CN Rail handed the line over to the province. The timber structure sits 34 metres above Holt Creek and spans 73 metres.
https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/transportation-projects/other-transportation-projects/holt-creek-bridge-replacement
The release said a 2017 structural assessment of the bridge determined the bridge was nearing the end of its lifespan. “The assessment recommended the bridge be replaced rather than continuously repaired and maintained.”
The replacement project is anticipated to be completed in May 2025, but a submission for tenders on the project expired only on Sept. 10.
Holt Creek Trestle is located a short walk from regional Glenora Trails Head Park on the Cowichan Valley Trail — part of the iconic Trans Canada Trail stretching more than 28,000 kilometres.
Paterson noted that the Kinsol Trestle was also once slated for destruction and replacement until people campaigned against it. The rehabilitated trestle was reopened in 2011.
https://canadiangeographic.ca/articles/the-man-who-saved-the-kinsol-trestle/
Paterson added that visitors along the Trans Canada Trail need a greater appreciation of the area’s history.
Better historical signs along the way would certainly help.
The province conducted an evening information session on Mar. 27, 2023, in Duncan to present plans to replace the Holt Creek trestle.
Alison Nicholson, who represents the Glenora community on the Cowichan Valley Regional District board, attended that session.
Some people expressed concern about the look of the new bridge, she said, adding other concerns have centred on public access during construction. The issue of preserving the trestle for history’s sake appeared not to be on the public’s radar.
Cowichan Tribes’ Khowutzun Development Corporation has already completed preliminary work on the replacement project at Holt Creek, though the trestle currently remains intact.
The pending destruction of Holt Creek Trestle stands in stark contrast to events two decades ago in the Okanagan.
A 2004 news release announced the senior governments would spend $13.5 million to reconstruct 12 wooden trestles and two damaged steel trestles at Myra Canyon, site of a wildfire in 2003.
https://archive.news.gov.bc.ca/releases/archive/2001-2005/2004WLAP0047-000668.htm
The ultimate cost reportedly totalled $17 million by the official opening in 2008. That’s closer to $23 million in today’s money given inflation.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/historic-b-c-trestles-reopen-after-2003-wildfire-1.758063
Many of the reasons given to save those trestles, including heritage and tourism, also apply to Holt Creek.
The 2004 news release said that 50,000 people annually visit Myra Canyon and its trestles, generating $5 million in economic benefits.
Recently, the province said that Cowichan Valley Regional District, which manages the trail between Shawnigan Lake and Glenora Trails Head Park, in 2023 reported 78,230 visits at Glenora.
The province acknowledges that Holt Creek bridge is “an important active transportation corridor and recreation tourism attraction in the Cowichan Valley.”
(BC government: photo of Holt Creek Trestle, conceptual design of planned new bridge. sixmountains.ca: close-up photo of trestle, cyclist).
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