From housing prices to the push for street performers, laws governing development and expansion are an inescapable and omnipresent part of life in Jasper. Looking at Land Use provides an in-depth exploration of how those laws impact the lives of the park’s citizens, business owners and government—untangling the complexities of the issues and exploring what they mean for Jasper as it heads into the future.
While the past might tell different stories, these days there’s no question Jasper exists primarily to facilitate tourist access to the national park. More than two million visitors pass through the park gate each year, and the accommodations, tour companies and other businesses in town help them get the most out of their experiences here.
Cathy Jenkins, Parks Canada’s reality and municipal services manager, pointed out that were the town not here, far fewer people would visit the park. But, just as the town draws more people to the park, it also has an environmental impact on it.
According to Parks representative Dave Kriezenbeck, the agency has been focusing on keeping parks relevant to Canadians, and a big part of that involves getting more people to actually come to national parks—especially people from urban centres that might not have as much experience in nature.
And hotels and tours and the rest of it helps make someone who might be uncomfortable in the woods get the most out of their experience here.
Parks obviously wants more people to come to the park, but more visitors necessarily means more environmental impact. This puts the agency in the strange position of having to promote visitation to the park at the same time it’s trying to protect the sensitive wildlife that lives here.
Kriezenbeck said Parks is constantly thinking about “the balance between protection and preservation and us presenting to the rest of Canada what we have here and why it’s important.” This is true for Parks’ daily work, but also when it considers any development decisions.
Part of that balance is developing a philosophy that allows the agency to show off the wonders of the park as much as possible, while keeping environmental impact to a minimum.
The townsite is the primary place where that balance exists, which is why so many rules and regulations are placed on land use planning and development within it.
Kriezenbeck explained that while many of the rules might feel tiny and mundane, they all fit into the larger philosophy of the “balancing act” between visitation and protection.
“And really it’s the philosophy that drives all these small things that we try to figure out at the bottom. Like, why does my parking space have to be this big? It builds up to this philosophy,” he said.
Of course, these rules present challenges, especially to municipal managers trying to plan for the town’s future. Just like Parks works to ensure Jasper National Park stays relevant, Jasper’s municipal managers are thinking hard about what they want the town to look like moving into the future, and are well aware of how land use planning and development factors into that.
Mayor Richard Ireland has been thinking about these things since before the municipality was even incorporated, and said that if Jasper wants to be able to maintain its place in the international market, it needs to have a strong plan for the future.
“The world is changing and we to some extent have to change with it,” he said.
He thinks a necessary part of that change will be updating many of the older buildings that currently occupy the townsite.
“We for the most part have a very dated product in this town. It’s a post-war product, it’s time to be refreshed,” he said.
But that refreshment is complicated by the fact that the municipality has no control over land use planning and development in town; all those decisions are made by Parks. Ireland said this has been an issue since incorporation in 2001, and while Parks and the municipality have done their best to work under the current rules (which are enshrined in the federal Canadian National Parks Act), the organizations are in the process of trying to change them.
As with all changes to federal legislation, the process will likely be a long and complicated one, but if and when it does happen, Ireland hopes that placing more control in the municipality’s hands (almost certainly with oversight from Parks) will allow managers to start planning for the town’s future in earnest.
“We have to get to a point where it is clear who is responsibility for what—and not only is it clear, but it makes logical sense. Because the process needs to respond to community needs.”
New rules should mean “clearly defined parameters” for who has control over which decisions, he said.
Parks Canada and the municipality will always work closely together, and clearly defined roles will make it easier for both organizations to do their jobs.
A thriving town is essential to keeping Jasper National Park relevant. And as Ireland said, one of the best ways to accomplish that is to make sure the processes are in place to allow town managers to plan appropriately going into the future.
Trevor Nichols
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