Water-Centric Planning

The City of Dawson Creek hosted a workshop titled “Sustainable Planning and Development for Small Communities”, a program developed by Canada Mortgage & Housing Corporation to help small communities. Held in December 2006, the workshop was attended by municipalities from throughout the Peace River region.

Sustainability is a buzzword. We hear it daily…but what does it mean in the community context? The Building SustainAble Communities conference, held in Kelowna, provided a timely opportunity for three leading British Columnbian proponents of water-centric sustainability to collaborate in explaining what it means to move along the “soft path” of water use in neighbourhoods and communities.

Thinking Beyond seeks to inspire and facilitate action. It is a practical resource designed for community leaders, water managers and policy makers seeking to make the case for a comprehensive and long-term appraoch to water demand management. By illustrating the potential of this approach, it urges communites to take water security to the next step–to think beyond the pipes and pumps and embrace new ways of managing water that offer opportunities for big savings, of both water and money.

Climate change is resulting in increased variability and since we are unable to slow down the change in the short run we need to us new innovative measures to manage water resources. To adapt to these new conditions requires a rethinking of how we build infrastructure and how we use water.

In keeping with its newly adopted Water Conservation and Drought Contingency Plan, the Village of Lumby introduced a Stage-1 Water Conservation threshold that instituted water sprinkling regulations, a public education awareness program, and increased water-level monitoring for village wells.

Over the last few years, upgrades to intake screening facilities and pressure reducing stations in the District of Lake Country have increased efficiency and safety, which has allowed operators to meet the new demands with no net increase in staff. To continue this trend, the district has begun a program of integrating and automating operation facilities.

Award-wiinning science journalist Chris Wood has written a series of articles on how global warming will affect British Columbia and what we can do about it. In a story titled “Fraser River Will Surge Over Dikes”, Wood describes how hundreds of thousands of Lower Mainland residents living behind dikes along the Fraser River face a far more deadly flood threat than they know.

Award-wiinning science journalist Chris Wood has written a series of articles on how global warming will affect British Columbia and what we can do about it. In a story titled “Pumping Blind”, Wood describes how with each passing year, we're pumping more from the buried lakes and slow-moving underground streams known as aquifers.

Award-wiinning science journalist Chris Wood has written a series of articles on how global warming will affect British Columbia and what we can do about it. In a story titled “Global Warming's Threat to BC: Seeking Solutions”, he explains why one stunningly simple key could unlock enormous opportunities to make water go further.

Award-wiinning science journalist Chris Wood has written a series of articles on how global warming will affect British Columbia and what we can do about it. In a story titled “Drying Up the Okanagan”, he explains why this thirsty region is the 'canary in the coal mine' for British Columbia and water.