Map & Memo
In this lab, I did an Environmental Impact Assessment for a potential ski resort. As part of this lab, I produced a map showing four different types of 
protected areas along with base data showing elevation (also symbolized with a hill shade), rivers, roads and an approximate snow line. I then wrote a memo explaining the steps I took, my results, and recommendations, from the perspective of being an actual natural resource planner. The memo I wrote is as follows:
The Garibaldi at Squamish project is a proposed mountain resort situated between Vancouver and Whistler. As a natural resource planner retained by BCSF, I have analyzed several aspects of this project including protected vegetation, fish and wildlife habitat and provided my results and recommendations below. In this analysis, I found and imported data related to protected areas along with elevation data, the project boundary and linear features such as rivers and roads. Ungulate areas and old growth forest management areas were simply imported from DataBC into the map. Areas with red-listed ecosystems were selected based on the terrestrial ecosystem mapping information. Areas with specific biogeoclimactic units along with soil moisture and nutrient regimes are known to contain red-listed ecosystems, and those were selected and added to the map. Please consider the first map for further information about areas with red-listed species, shown based on a common species to that red-listed area type. For the riparian fish zones, a buffer of protected area was added around the river information. This buffer extended 100m on either side of streams with an elevation of less than 555m, and for other streams was 50m from streams. All four of these protected area types were then combined into one layer to calculate the total area they cover without overlap. I also analyzed how much of the project area is less at less than 555m of elevation based on a DEM. This is all summarized in the second map with a background hill shade added to facilitate understanding of the slopes on the map. The results found in this assessment were that 52.62% of the project area is covered by one or more of the following types of protected areas: old growth management areas (6.78%), red-listed ecosystems (24.82% including 6 types of red-listed ecosystems), ungulate winter range (7.98%), or fish habitat riparian management zones (26.02%). The listed percentages of each protected area type add up to more than the total protected area percentage as there are several locations that are protected for multiple reasons. Of the total project area, 29.93% is below the snow line of 555m elevation and so would potentially not have enough snow for reliable skiing. The proposed resort is not in any parks. There are several roads leading to and within the proposed project boundary, meaning access would not be a big issue. I believe that the two greatest environmental concerns associated with this project are the old growth management areas and the fish habitat. Although there is a very large proportion of area with red-listed ecosystems, most of these areas are below the snow line and therefore would not be very useful for the resort anyways as there is potentially not enough snow. These areas could therefore be avoided with minimal losses in success of the resort. Were the resort to want to do something besides ski runs in the area (as it is proposed as a year-round resort) this would be extremely detrimental and destroy a very large amount of red-listed ecosystems area. Although the fish habitat has smaller buffer areas above the snow line, there is still a lot of buffer area above the snow line that would be problematic. Additionally, these areas are spread across the whole area evenly so it would be difficult to develop large swathes of forest without these areas getting in the way. A solution would be to leave these areas as forest because normally people would not ski in the gullies anyways, but to go laterally across the hill overpasses may need to be built over the streams. The ungulate winter ranges are also considerably important because they cover 7.89% of the project area including a considerable part above the snow line. Additionally, these animals will be negatively affected by fragmentation so although it could be legal to alter forests surrounding these areas, it would still not be good for the animals. Ungulate areas are less of a problem though, because they are almost all on the edge of the area so could be not included in development. The old growth management areas are importantly detrimental because they are small sections scattered throughout the project area. They are also very close to a number of fish habitat buffer areas. They would interrupt a lot of ideal runs, especially in the northern half or the proposed project areas, disrupting ideal planning for skiing. Nonetheless, with careful route planning, these could be avoided (since they are all quite small areas), but not without harming the Garibaldi at Squamish resort’s success. In conclusion, I would recommend BCSF to continue opposition to the project. Not only is a large section of the project below the snowline (and also almost entirely covered by protected areas such as areas with red-listed ecosystems and river buffers for fish protection), but over half of the total project area is covered by protected areas. It would be quite difficult to successfully plan runs avoiding red-listed ecosystems, ungulate winter range, old growth management areas and river buffers for fish protection as they (particularly the last two) are scattered across the project area intersecting most ski lines down. Even if permissions were granted to disrupt those lines, there would still be many plants, animals and ecosystems that would be harmed. Even if the areas were avoided, fragmentation because of the ski resorts along with other nearby human impacts such as noise would still be detrimental to those species.
Ethical Issues
I personally do not believe this project should be allowed to continue because as explained above, more than half of the project area is covered by old growth forests, red-listed ecosystems, ungulate habitat (in winter), or fish habitat. I believe it would be impossible to build a successful ski resort without harming these threatened species and ecosystems, and that these sensitive areas should not have to be sacrificed for economic gain and the creation of another ski resort near to where several others already exist. In general, I tend to value the environment over the economy. This does not differ from what I wrote in my memo (that BCSF should continue to oppose the project). Had my opinion differed from the likely opinion of the company that hired me, this could have been an unethical conflict of interest. I would have been very uncomfortable writing an actual memo in support of the project, given the evidence, however hypothetically it would not be impossible to provide enough evidence to satisfactorily claim either side of the issue.
Accomplishment Statement
Created an informative and polished map demonstrating potential environmental impacts of a ski resort.
