City of Whitehorse to keep McIntyre Creek road study on the table, for now

Despite an outcry from environmentalists and park users, Whitehorse city staff still want to keep the option of studying whether to build a road through McIntyre Creek as part of the city's official community plan.

The city is still in the process of revising the plan, a wide-ranging document that will guide the city's growth for the next 20 years. It covers everything from transportation to climate action to density and land use. McIntyre Creek lies in the crosshairs of all of those issues.

The draft plan calls for the city to study whether it needs a "transportation corridor" running between Mountainview Drive and the Alaska Highway. The idea is that it might be needed to ease traffic coming in and out of the fast-growing Whistle Bend subdivision. But that would take it through McIntyre Creek, a beloved, 3,600-hectare green space and key wildlife habitat.

At the city's standing committees meeting Monday, Mayor Laura Cabott said the plan as written doesn't commit the city to building anything.

"We're not building a road, we're not being asked to build a road," Cabott said. "We're being asked in this OCP to do the studies, to do the work to help inform those that will make that decision whether there should be a transportation corridor or whether there absolutely should not."

A staff report notes much of the area is already laced with trails and access roads. Mélodie Simard, the city's manager of planning and sustainability, said staff are recommending a provision that would create a 125-metre setback between the creek and any development.

But that likely won't be enough to placate opponents. Coun. Michelle Friesen said a road through the creek would also lock the city into even more private vehicle use and contradicts the city's stated climate change goals.

"I'd really love to see this removed and to see this investment of time and resources go towards things like active transportation and accessibility and improved public transit options," she said.

Meanwhile, the city is also developing a transportation master plan and looking at upgrades to Mountainview Drive to accommodate increasing traffic. 

And, the Yukon Liberals have promised to turn McIntyre Creek into a territorial park. Cabott said that's a separate planning process that will include the Yukon government, Yukon University and two Whitehorse First Nations, and it's one the city should not prejudge by taking the road study off the table.

"I would hate to see us curtail those decision makers in the future, but really I think what is being proposed actually helps them in making decisions," she said.