MOTI Minister meets Mayor Minions

The BC Minister of Transportation and Infrastructure was in Port Alberni yesterday, and received a long list of municipal and regional requests.

Port Alberni Mayor Sharie Minions said she lobbied for both the Horne Lake and Bamfield / Lake Cowichan emergency exit routes.

“What we need first and foremost as a municipality is safe access in and out of our community in states of emergency, so we are focussing on wherever the province can make those investments in a stable and steady way going forward,” she said. “An emergency route in and out of our community may not be just one route. Improvements to emergency routes could be improvements to two routes recognizing that our whole community – if absolutely needed – worst case scenario – would not be able to easily evacuate on one forest service road and our highway, so the province was very open today to recognizing that there is a need for very significant emergency improvements, and fixing up multiple roads.”

MOTI Minister Mike Farnworth agreed that local leaders are most concerned about emergency routes out of the valley.