Town staff continually monitor activity in the Kicking Horse River through the Town's Ice Monitoring Program which includes nine river cameras, three pressure transducers (a sensor that measures water level and the height of the ice) and one water temperature sensor that are installed along the Kicking Horse River at five monitoring locations in the Town of Golden and one location 10 km east of town.
The river monitoring system indicates that the current ice flow on the Kicking Horse River occurred between 9 and 10 p.m. on Monday night (December 5). The size of this ice flow is considered average, and much smaller than past events. Town staff have been aware since the event occurred and continue to monitor the situation. The Province has also been informed.
A reminder to residents that when there is ice on the river, please stay away from the river banks as the ice is not stable.
When ice jams happen, staff assess the situation including any seepage (dikes are porous), if water is still flowing beneath, and any other hazards. In some circumstances we open a ‘task’ number with the Province and with the help of field experts may deploy heavy equipment to open the channel for better flow. The jury is still out as to whether these activities are effective in the end. At this time we have not deployed any equipment to create a channel. With the current ice flow, water is still moving underneath.
Managing the Kicking Horse River is complex and outside of the Town of Golden’s jurisdiction. The river itself falls under Federal jurisdiction and the dikes fall under Provincial jurisdiction. The Province requires the Town of Golden to maintain and improve dikes, immense work has been done to protect Golden from the risks of river flooding through that work. The Town received a grant for over $400,000 for the ice monitoring program and over $7 million for dike upgrades including the River Walk frontage and several other areas from the canyon to the confluence. The entire dike system in town now nearly completely meets the height and integrity requirements of the Province.
Each time an ice flow event occurs, the topic of dredging the river comes up within the community. Dredging the river is something that happened up to the 1990s. Dredging is no longer permitted by the Provincial and Federal governments. What is permitted and only when conditions are met, is ‘bar scalping’, which is the targeted removal, at a specific time of year, portions of large gravel bars. The community saw this happen in 2008. Permission to do this requires long and expensive years of monitoring and proving of conditions met (something that the Town continually monitors). And despite what the community may think about those conditions being met (the height of the gravel bars) they must meet a specific height before any consideration is given. It’s been 14 years and the height has not reached that trigger point. In addition to this, there is the cost associated with bar scalping. Just because the Town gets permission to remove the bars, does not mean we have funding for it. In 2008, it cost nearly $500,000 between applying for permission and removing it, and on top of that, we are not allowed to sell it to recoup costs. Town staff will always apply for a grant to do the work, but they may not be available. In this case, the local taxpayer would be on the hook for the full cost of removal. In summary, we don’t dredge because we don’t have the authority to, not to avoid the cost of doing so.
Past Town Councils have lobbied the Province for years to either take back management of the dikes or give us the full authority to manage the river ourselves. Neither has happened. We firmly believe that the advocacy has made it possible for the Town to receive the grants we needed to improve our dikes, even though it’s the Province that actually owns the infrastructure. But unless there is a change in Provincial and Federal government policy, we are bound by the system described above.
We understand that this is a complex issue but the Town of Golden will continue to work diligently to keep Golden safe from river flooding.