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Silver Star Provincial Park - History
Silver Star Provincial Park was established on May 17th, 1940, as a Class A Park. Its 9000 hectares were set aside to preserve the subalpine environment and community watersheds, and to protect the area for recreational use by all British Columbians. The park has been reclassified several times over its history, and a brief summary of those revisions follows:
O.I.C. # 601 May 17, 1940 Silver Star Park established
O.I.C. # 1660 Dec. 14, 1940 Classified as Class “A” Park
O.I.C. # 1648 Nov.28, 1942 Re-classified and O.I.C. 601 cancelled
O.I.C. # 1740 July 23, 1958 Re-Classified to Class “C”
O.I.C. # 1574 June 8, 1976 Re-Classified to “Recreation Area”
O.I.C. # 2282 Dec. 9, 1982 Deletion of Lot 1355
O.I.C. # 416 Mar. 8,1984 Deletion of 24.0 ha. of road R/W
O.I.C. # 392 Mar. 21, 1989 Re-Classified as Class “A”
O.I.C. # 1855 Dec. 17, 1992 Deletion of Silver Star Resort Ski Area
O.I.C. # 522/01 April 18, 2001 Delete Golf Course Lands and Boundary revision
Detailed Summary of Park History 1940 - 1971
Silver Star Provincial Park has quite a storied past, as various stakeholders have competed over the years to have their agendas advanced. The park's function as a watershed reserve has been constantly challenged by pressures to develop commercial recreation and accommodations on the mountain. To view a detailed summary of significant dates for the park. click the icon below.
Ski Area Founders Discuss Starting the Ski Resort
To read an article published in the Vernon Morning Star, March 24th, 2000, click the icon below. In the article, ski area founders Bill Attridge, Neil Davidson, and Joe Peters discuss the trials and tribulations experienced in starting up the ski area.
Ski Area Brochure - 1960
To view a Silver Star trail map and brochure from 1960, click the icon below.
If you look closely at the brochure above, you'll notice that there are no on-hill accommodations. This was a different era, before the "ski-area arms race" for fee-simple real estate and luxurious on-hill accommodations had begun. Holidaying families typically would stay at motels in Vernon, and drive up the mountain for a day of skiing.
1980 Silver Star Recreation Area Master Plan
To view the 1980 Silver Star Recreation Area Master Plan, click the icon below. This document was prepared by the Silver Star Advisory Committee, which consisted of staff from the Thompson-Okanagan Regional Office of the Parks and Outdoor Recreation Division, Ministry of Lands, Parks and Housing.
Proposed Silver Star Village - 1981
To read a letter from the North Okanagan Regional District's Planner to the Ministry of Lands, Parks and Housing regarding the proposed new Silver Star Village, click the icon below.
History of Alpine Skiing at Silver Star
For a historical summary of skiing and associated development on the mountain, see Silver Star Mountain Resort's History Page.
For an interesting newspaper clipping describing the history of the ski lifts, click the icon below.
History of Cross Country Skiing At Sovereign Lake
For a short history of cross country skiing at Sovereign Lake, click on the icon below (we apologize for the faintness of the text).
Sovereign Lake Lodge Opens in 1993
The "North Okanagan Cross Country Club", since renamed "Sovereign Lake Nordic Club", constructed the current Sovereign Lake day lodge in cooperation with B.C. Parks in 1993. To view a news release announcing the opening of the lodge, click the icon below.
B.C. Parks Justifies Ski Resort Deletion Due to Class A Status
In what now appears to be a blatant attempt to hand over a large section of Silver Star Provincial Park to the private ski resort, B.C. Parks changed the status of the park from "Recreation Area" to "Class A" in March 1989 . Two years later, B.C. Parks held a public open house to allow comment on the proposed deletion of almost the entire east half the park, stating that "It is not appropriate to include......a major downhill ski resort within the boundary of a Class A Provincial Park".
B.C. Parks also cited the then-upcoming 1991 World Cup Cross Country Ski Race as another non-conforming land use for the Class A Park, and even hinted at future deletions in the Sovereign Lake area by mentioning the Fortune Creek Drainage as a non-conforming resource commitment. B.C. Parks stated at the time, "The watershed will be retained in Silver Star Park as long as it can accommodate compatible recreation uses. If no such uses can be developed, it will be retained until alternative means of protecting watershed values can be put in place." This clearly demonstrated B.C. Parks' willingness to delete the Sovereign Lake area from Silver Star Provincial Park. B.C. Parks seems to have forgotten that one of original reasons for establishing the park in 1940 was to protect the watersheds!
Was it necessary to delete the entire alpine ski area and World Cup trail area from the park? Most certainly not, if the only goal was to allow cross-country ski trail development and the installation of high-speed chairlifts. Many provincial parks have private ski resorts that operate within their boundaries, including Manning Park, Cypress Provincial Park, and Mount Seymour Provincial Park. These privately owned commercial enterprises typically operate under a 50 year renewable Park Use Permit. So at Silver Star Provincial Park, it appears as if the true reason for deleting these lands from the park was to increase the land base available for future real estate development. The most recent Silver Star Official Community Plan would certainly confirm this, since many of the 1991 World Cup cross country trails are now slated for development into medium-density housing.
Perhaps one of the most bizarre claims made by B.C. Parks was that the 1991 World Cup Trails had to be situated below 1600 metres elevation. Nothing could be further from the truth, and the absurdity of this claim was borne out during the actual running of the event in December 1991, when there was so little snow on the lower World Cup trails that volunteers had to shovel snow onto the trails to allow the race to proceed! By creating the public perception that the World Cup trails had to be below 1600 metres, B.C. Parks could justify the deletion of lands south of the Silver Star resort village, lands that would later be scheduled for development into hotels and condominiums.
To learn more about the change to Class A park status and how it was used to justify deletion of a large section of Silver Star Provincial Park, click the icon below.
To view an article that appeared in the Vernon Daily News, April 12th 1991, click the icon below. See if you can figure out where the public information meeting was held.
You may want to right click the article and rotate the view until it is oriented correctly.
To view a B.C. Parks advertisement that appeared in the local newspaper in April 1991, click the icon below.
You may want to right click and rotate the view until it is oriented correctly. If you read the section titled "Nordic Trails", you'll notice that once again, B.C. Parks has omitted some key information that might have exposed the true underlying reason for deleting these lands from the park.
The public notice fails to mention that the resort could only ever host such an event in November or early December, before the alpine area opens for skiing. Once the chairlifts start running, the village area is far too congested to serve as a suitable venue for a nordic ski race. The current construction of the Firelight Lodge, which consumed what used to be the resort's nordic ski school area, and the planned development of the World Cup trails into medium density residential housing, confirms that real estate development was the ultimate underlying motivation for deleting the park lands.
In order to host another World Cup race or World Masters race, the resort would need a facility similar to that found inside the park at Sovereign Lake Nordic Center.
Public Opposes Parkland Deletions
The public meeting held at the Schubert Centre on April 16th, 1991 was attended by just over 70 people (63 signed the register), which is a surprisingly small number of people on which to base broad public opinion regarding the deletion of almost half of Silver Star Provincial Park! Despite overwhelming opposition to the parkland deletions, the Ministry of Environment Lands and Parks would eventually opt to delete 2740 hectares from the park. The southeast corner would remain intact for 9 more years, until the ski resort proposed a golf course there, resulting in its deletion in 2001. To read an article published in the Vernon Daily News the day after the April 16th, 1991 meeting, click the icon below.
Decision to Delete Ski Area Based on Minimal Public Input
Despite the poor attendance at public information meetings, B.C. Parks concluded that the general public was in favor of deleting the alpine ski area and World Cup cross country trails from the park. It seems odd that in a province of over 3 million people, B.C. Parks would justify deleting such a large portion of a Class A provincial park based on questionnaires filled out by just 73 people. The entire public consultation process was vulnerable to manipulation by vested interests, so there was no way that B.C. Parks could claim due diligence in seeking pubic input. To view a copy of the Public Involvement Summary from May, 1991, click the icon below.
Local Volunteers Make 1991 World Cup a Success but Lose a Park in the Process
The 1991 World Cup could only happen through the combined efforts of hundreds of local volunteers. Unfortunately, those volunteer efforts were exploited to enable the ski resort to have the World Cup trails and entire alpine ski area removed from the park. To view a Vernon Daily News article from December 3rd, 1991 (5 days before the event) click the icon below.
It is interesting to note that no major sanctioned cross country ski races have been held at Silver Star Mountain Resort since the 1991 World Cup. The World Cup trails were built under a Park Use Permit, and then finally deleted from the park along with the entire alpine ski area, by an Order in Council, December 17th, 1992. The resort proposed building a stadium for Nordic Races in the future, but this never materialized. Instead, a large hotel now occupies the area proposed for the stadium. The ski trails themselves are now slated for development into condominiums and hotels.
Alpine Ski Area and World Cup Trail Area Removed From Park
To view a B.C. Parks press release announcing the deletion of the alpine ski area and World Cup trails from Silver Star Provincial Park, click the icon below.
World Cup Trails Slated for Development into Condos and Hotels
Time changes everything. Once land has been deleted from a Class A Provincial Park, it seems that just about anything goes. The land south of the Silver Star village was deleted so that nordic ski trails could be built for the 1991 World Cup. Now those same trails are slated for development into medium density residential housing. We see the same pattern with the lands deleted from the southeast corner of the park, where what was supposed to be a golf course, ends up being a sewage effluent irrigation area. Does the same fate await the Sovereign Lake area? Only time will tell.
To view a map of the proposed expansion of the ski area village into the World Cup trail area, click the icon below. The World Cup trails are shown in dotted blue lines. Look at the Silver Star Nordic Trail Map, and see if you can match the dotted blue lines of the Official Community Plan map to the trails shown on the Nordic Trail Map.
Incremental Parkland Deletions
The Provincial government's eagerness to hand over Silver Star Provincial Park to privately owned commercial interests has by necessity been tempered with the understanding that this must be accomplished in stages over many years to avoid public outrage. For the most part, the strategy has worked, and the process continues today with the majority of the recreational land handed over to the private ski resort. Current policies endorsed by B.C. Parks in the Sovereign Lake area of the park almost ensure that all recreational pursuits on the mountain will soon be controlled by the private resort, and that the park will quite likely disappear completely. Perhaps then the goals of the private resort will have been realized, and the foreshadowing provided by the jingle "Silver Star.....My Mountain" will be apparent.
