The Active Trails Whitehorse Association wants city council to get snowmobiles off some trails.
In front of council on Nov. 18, Dec. 2, Jan. 6 and Jan. 20 ATWA member Keith Lay argued that the Snowmobile Bylaw should be changed in order for there to be consistency with the ATV Bylaw and to align with the definition of non-motorized trails per the 2020 City of Whitehorse Trails Plan.
Non-motorized trails, according to the cited 2020 Trails Plan, are for “to be used by a variety of non-motorized users.” However, the city’s Snowmobile Bylaw allows snowmobilers to operate on motorized trails and trails not specifically listed in the excluded trails part of the bylaw. That list has the Birch Trail Loop in Crestview, the Millennium Trail and the perimeter trail in Whistle Bend on it. Ski trails are also out-of-bounds for snowmobilers.
“Until the snowmobile by law is amended as ATWAsuggests, in order to be consistent with the 2020 trail plans definition of a non-motorized multiple use trail, as does the ATV bylaw, confusion and inequity will remain with regard to trail designation and use,” Lay told council on Jan. 20.
Lay told the News he has been pushing the city on this since 2012.
Landon Kulych, the city’s manager of parks, told the News that the non-motorized multi-use trail designation is aimed at preventing ATV use on trails in the summertime.
“Where snowmobiles are permitted to go and not go is designated by the Snowmobile Bylaw itself, not trail designations, per se,” said Kulych.
As for why that is, Kulych said snowmobiles and ATVs interact with the ground differently, with snowmobiles operating on top of the snow pack. He also said the snowmobile usage of the trails make them more inclusive and accessible to other users by packing down the snow.
Kulych also said the city hears from trail users who appreciate how snowmobiles are engrained in the trail community.
Prohibiting snowmobiles from using non-motorized trails would pose a fundamental change to the Whitehorse trail network, said Kulych.
Mark Daniels of the Klondike Snowmobile Association said the association puts in hundreds of volunteer hours every winter maintaining trails in the city — for every trail user. He said there are “very, very few complaints and very, very few conflicts about the trail system.”
Daniels said certain signage could be improved, but added that the association works with the city on that matter.
“Pretty much every trail user can coexist,” he said.
City manager of parks Landon Kulych said that snowmobiles aren’t allowed to go anywhere where they would damage vegetation. So, if a trail is not wide enough to accommodate a snowmobile, it wouldn’t be allowed to go there, he said.
“That is most of the trails inside the city limits, right? They're mostly very skinny, winding, meandering trails through the forest,” said Kulych.
But Lay said these trails aren’t listed on the excluded trail section of the Snowmobile Bylaw.
“So you get people who are, I mean, a little less responsible than the average snowmobiler, and they'll go into these places and push through them, and they get wider. And then you get more machines in the summertime. And as I've said, it fragments the city's trail system,” he said.
“There's certainly room for the both of us in this community. I mean, we have motorized multi use trails. We should be allowed to have non-motorized multiuse trails as well, some of which may go right beside your home. And we just need some peace and quiet.”
Lay told the News that of Feb. 26, he has not heard back from city council on the matter.
Contact Jim Elliot at jim.elliot@yukon-news.com
