Highway about to get dangerous

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 29/01/2019 (2160 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Canadian Premium Sand, a publicly traded Canadian company, is proposing to operate a frac sand mine and processing facility adjacent to the community of Hollow Water First Nation, about 200 kilometres northeast of Winnipeg.

When fully operational, it will be the largest open-pit frac sand mine in Canada, providing cheap and highly sought after silica sand used in the fracking process by the oil and gas industry.

Before it can begin operating, the company must first receive an environmental licence from the government of Manitoba.

The first step in the environmental licence approval process is the submission of an Environmental Act Proposal (EAP) by the company to the province. The company has now submitted its EAP, which is available for review. As part of the EAP, the company must provide details of its operations.

What has been learned from Canadian Premium Sand’s EAP submission should be cause for real concern for those who enjoy the summer months at their cottages, or for those who simply hop in the car and make the hour-and-a-half drive from Winnipeg to enjoy the numerous beaches the east side of Lake Winnipeg has to offer, such as Grand Beach.

In addition, it will be a concern for those living, recreating or commuting to Pine Falls, Little Black River, Hollow Water, Seymourville and Manigotagan, and for cottagers whose properties are located in this region of Manitoba and who travel on Highway 304.

As for those who own cottages in communities such as Patricia Beach, Beaconia, Grand Beach, Lester Beach, Belair, Hillside Beach, Albert Beach, Traverse Bay and Victoria Beach, who number in the tens of thousands, they know very well that travelling back and forth to the cottage, especially on weekends, is a daunting task, as Highway 59 is a steady stream of traffic heading to and from the east beaches.

That drive will get a lot worse, and certainly more hazardous. Why, you ask? Well, in order for the company to get its frac sand to market, it needs to transport it by trucks to Winnipeg, where it will be loaded onto trains to be transported to North American markets.

The route these frac sand trucks will take to Winnipeg will be Highway 304 south from the mine location, a two-lane, undivided road, until it meets Highway 59, south of Grand Beach. These trucks will then continue south on Highway 59, which is also undivided until south of the South Beach Casino, located in Brokenhead, at which point, Highway 59 turns into a divided four-lane highway to Winnipeg.

From the information contained in the EAP submission, we now know approximately 120 truckloads will be moved daily, 365 days a year, to meet the company’s initial target of delivering one million tonnes of frac sand to market.

In year 3, however, the company wants to ramp up its yearly production target to two million tonnes a year, as revealed in the Preliminary Economic Assessment report, which is not part of the company’s EAP submission.

This would mean that, at minimum, the company would need 240 truckloads a day, year-round, to meets its yearly production target. These numbers reflect only one-way trips, not round-trip figures.

In fact, it could be even more truckloads per day if the government does not lift road weight restrictions in order to allow the company to use trucks with dual trailers to transport the frac sand to Winnipeg.

What we don’t know is what this is going to cost taxpayers, as all of this additional truck traffic, 24-7 every week of the year, is most certainly going to put additional financial strains on the community — on first responders, who will have to deal with additional accidents, and also on our health-care system. It will also place additional pressures on our public auto insurance system, and will most certainly increase highway and road infrastructure costs.

These costs will be borne by the taxpayers, not by the company. So far, the province of Manitoba has been silent, and perhaps has not yet even calculated these costs.

So buckle up, folks — we’re in for the ride of our lives.

Don Sullivan is a landscape photographer, former director of the Boreal Forest Network and served as special adviser to the government of Manitoba on the Pimachiowin Aki UNESCO World Heritage site portfolio. He is a research affiliate with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives Manitoba and a Queen Golden Jubilee medal recipient.