William Hawrelak Park Closure - Are Trees the "Canary in the Coal Mine?"
... What might the public discourse reveal about the administrative project development approach?
Vlog Overview
My return to the academy (in 2014) to earn a PhD after 32 years of parks planning and operationalization of recreation and leisure services practice (1982-2014) uncovered many practice realities extensively studied by researchers. This dual lens gives me a unique inside (practice)/outside (research) perspective (and visa-versa) to bridge the two worlds. I will share park development policy and practice decision-making practice using an academic lens (i.e., institutional theory).
Each vlog except this one, called Ice Sculptures, will have a short video presentation followed by some key takeaway notes. I will use lots of “I” and “me” to personalize my experiences, with lots of examples. My personality is such that I like to have fun, be a bit irreverent, hence some of my memes and (weak) attempts at humour. My goal is to provide a level of nuance to seen and unseen aspects of decision-making processes. I have opinions that may or may not be popular with my planning brothers and sisters, or elected officials. The vlog provides an informed perspective, but mine and mine alone based on my experiences and my studies. Use them as you see fit. So lets get started!
Todays Ice Sculpture
William Hawrelak Park Redevelopment - Are Trees the “Canary in the Coal Mine?”
As a long time parks practitioner, I found it inconceivable that William Hawrelak Park would have to be closed for three years, and now we learn 200 trees will be bulldozed. This is one of Edmonton’s premier river valley parks that is host to many events, festivals, and a place where Edmontonians exercise, relax, decompress not to mention meet their community. The administration did talk to the community. I feel bad for the Heritage Festival Organizers, Arbor Day Organizers, the Edmonton Federation of Community Leagues who recently invested significantly to build a community plaza commemorating the 100th anniversary of EFCL. My comments herein are my own. I did not discuss this issue with the EFCL, any other NGO or any councillor.
Edmonton Councillor Erin Rutherfords recent concern about the EIA gave me additional pause. The Environmental Impact Assessment failed to mention the loss of 200 trees that would be destroyed by the project, and replaced with whips and shrubs. As a recovering parkie, we were often caste as tree huggers, often to the chagrin of our engineering brothers and sisters within the Corporation. The loss of 200 trees should have been a key issue to flag for council in the March council report, if not protected.
I have zero doubt that this is a construction efficient decision, and likely the most cost efficient. It checks all the finance and engineering boxes. It has a certain resonance to taxpayers. I get it. I have no information, nor do I believe, that the Council report writers, EIA report writers or project construction team deliberately mislead the councillors. In fact, I believe it may be the opposite, which is even more concerning. The public discourse begs some broader questions about the project development process.
Overall Project Management. The Deputy City Manager who wrote the report and answered questions is a well respected and skilled engineer from Integrated Infrastructure Services Department, who is responsible for construction. In Edmontons municipal parks world, there are multiple departments responsible for sub park functions - programming (Community Services including outreach to community partners), maintenance (Operations, including the tree guys), community engagement (Communications and Engagement) and budgets (Financial and Corporate Services). Should an “owner-operator” of the site, effectively Community Services who lead the operationalization of park services, have been lead to both the process and answering questions, supported at Council by Infrastructure Services? Also, I would have been interested to have read any internal or external discordant views in the March council report that included community engagement. In short, who is the singular voice for parks in the Administration?
Does this represent an unspoken clash of competing types of infrastructure cultures within the organization? The hard infrastructure and its construction took precedence over the green infrastructure. Could existing lines be abandoned and a new utility alignment occur that did not require removal of the trees? If there was an additional cost, was it flagged for elected officials? Or did the actions here simply reflect historical attitudes to prioritizing hard over soft infrastructure by internal administrative decision-makers (i.e., construction entities) in order to expedite construction. Research has shown that within organizations, there are those with power and agency, and those will less. It was also my experience in the parks world, and guess who had less agency?
Corporate Tree Management Policy. The entire rationale for a tree policy is to protect trees on city owned lands. The existing tree policy allows for compensation when avoiding trees is simply not possible. My experience with the tree policy is that it is not a green light to tree destruction provided you fund a tree assessment fee. Replacing the trees with whips of the same financial penalty is not the same as the ecological goods and services of a mature 25 year old tree. Was every effort made to retain the trees and reroute the utilities as a show of corporate leadership for its own policy? Should the tree assessment fees be dramatically increased to discourage construction project managers? (Yes i remain a tree hugger.)
Its probably too late to change course, but the Hawrelak Park trees may be the proverbial “canary in the coal mine”. The loss of trees at Hawrelak represents a symptom - the expansion of neoliberal policy applied to community projects, that prioritized efficiency of the construction process, and minimizing the cost of government. The real and human cost of relocating festivals borne by our park co-production partners, festival goers and park visitors appears is hard to quantify, but nevertheless real. It appears there was no single voice for parks - it was passed between silos.
I have confidence in this group of councillors who have demonstrate4d a broad people orientated approach to sustainable city building. Has that message been adopted by the Administration?
Dr. Priebe,
Thank you for your writing on the Hawrelak Park Rehabilitation Plan, and what are apparently your experienced and educated efforts to explain how this project was allowed to proceed.
I worked a bit with the ERVCC via Kristine Kowalchuk to try to delay the current "rehabilitation" of Hawrelak Park. I was told that lack of meaningful public consultation - including with traditional 1st Nations users of the parks land base - and the removal of 220 large trees might be platforms to delay the project. It now proceeds with a large swath of grass base already removed.
After over 35 years of local environmental work with groups like Greenpeace, Western Canada Wilderness Committee and Council of Canadians, my conclusions remain the same. This so-called "rehabilitation" was a go from the beginning - a make-work project driven by private corporate interests (Chandos Construction, for one, has now planted its advertising signs around the park, and no doubt had its say in the plan).
City policies and by-laws were used to justify the project as necessary "renewal", the public was minimally "engaged" on "how" they wanted the project to go, unknown consultants were engaged to finalize design, and it was a done deal in 2018. There was absolutely zero effort to engage the public on "if" the project should proceed.
Long story short, I will continue to research my question of how such a massive and disruptive project in Edmonton's favorite park could proceed in an ostensibly democratic society. So far, none of Council nor project communications officials seem concerned that the Hawrelak project - like others such as the Gondola, and paving McKinnon Ravine for a freeway - would have been flatly refused with any meaningful public engagement. It is absolutely clear to me that neither public input nor the environment were ever seriously considered. Another recent example of this is shown in the massive chunk of concrete and removal of about 100 mature pine trees on 106 St between Argyll Road and 51 Avenue for what I was told by city officials was about a new bike trail (presumably an environmental effort). Does the right hand know what the left is doing?
Corporate capture and conflicts of interest will be areas of my research should you or your readers wish to participate should you wish to post this.
Thanks, Richard (Philip) Merry, Edmonton
Markus Eymann
Has anyone figured out the carbon footprint of this project? How about the carbon costs of the ongoing use of the lights? I know that the new lights will be LED's which are a lot more efficient than old fashioned lights, but is this an example of the efficiency paradox? This is where a new technology increases the efficiency of an older version of the same technology, but the increase efficiency results in increased use which gobbles up most or all of the gains in energy efficiency that result from the initial improvement.
The efficiency paradox can be seen in automotive technology where increased efficiency in internal combustion engines enabled the production and sale of ever larger SUV's and pickup trucks. These vehicles have replaced the smaller coups and sedans that used to dominate the private vehicle market. Consequently, the fuel consumption of the average private vehicle has not gone down as much as the increased efficiency of internal combustion engines suggest that it should.
Back to Hawrelak Park, are we just saying, "Hey lighting is cheap on electricity, let's spread it all over the landscape."
I say, "No, let's not. Let's take advantage of increased energy efficiency to reduce our carbon footprint, not as an excuse to increase our use of technology. "