Premier Gordon Campbell announced plans Tuesday to create 66 new conservancies and 11 parks.
"These new parks and conservancies will build on the work we`ve already done to safeguard B.C.`s wilderness, including preserving the largest intact temperate rainforest on Earth -- the Central and North coasts," Campbell said in a news release.
The developer of a controversial resort community on Shuswap Lake withdrew the marina component of the plan just as a packed public hearing into the project was about to begin on Monday.
After weeks of rallies, a letter-writing campaign and media coverage about the possible negative impact that motorized boat traffic could have on the Adams River sockeye spawning grounds adjacent to the 21-acre site, New Future Building Group downsized the West Beach project, dropping a plan to build a 160-slip marina from the rezoning application and lowering the height of the proposed condominium building.
The average house price in the Prince George region has increased 84 per cent since 2003, according to a study by the B.C. Northern Real Estate Board.
However, owning a home in the North still consumes a much smaller percentage of household income than Vancouver, according to the fifth annual Housing Affordability Study released Wednesday.
Businesses and households are being asked to get a jump on updating their equipment to ensure a smooth transition to the day when dialing the 250 prefix will be required for local calls and not just long distance ones.
In a joint press release issued Wednesday, officials from Telus, Rogers and Bell urged customers to reprogram their phones, wireless equipment, computers, fax machines and security systems, noting that 10-digit dialing is just two months away.
VANCOUVER -- The tiny mountain pine beetle has transformed British Columbia`s vast pine forests into a major source of greenhouse gases, federal scientists say.
By the time the infestation ends, the rice-sized beetles will have killed so many trees an extra billion tonnes of carbon dioxide will be wafting through the atmosphere, researchers from the Canadian Forest Service report in the journal Nature today.
VANCOUVER -- U.S. seismologists warn a shallow fault line running near Abbotsford could cause an earthquake similar to the one that resulted in $2 billion in damage to the Seattle area in 2001.
New seismic hazard maps released by the U.S. Geological Survey show the Boulder Creek Fault east of Bellingham, Wash. running 11 kilometres long and 17 kilometres wide into B.C. near Abbotsford.
DUNCAN -- When Wal-Mart`s first supercentre in B.C. opened in North Cowichan yesterday, hundreds of customers rushed through the doors and there wasn`t an empty parking spot in sight.
Shoppers turned out to see the new store with its 156,000 square feet of retail space, including a McDonald`s restaurant, in the Cowichan Commons development just north of Duncan.
VANCOUVER -- Surging natural gas prices could spark a modest recovery of Canada`s drilling industry, the Petroleum Services Alliance of Canada reported yesterday.
Last January, the alliance issued a gloomy forecast for 2008, suggesting that just 14,500 gas wells would be drilled this year -- 22 per cent lower than 2007, and 37 per cent off the boom in 2006 when there was a flurry of activity to replace supply lost when a pair of hurricanes hit the Gulf of Mexico in 2005.
Whalley is bidding for a new reputation with the construction of an upscale condominium development.
Promising to "bring Yaletown to Surrey," Building 3 of the Quattro development will be launched May 3 and is expected to sell out in less than an hour.
Surrey Mayor Dianne Watts toured the four-hectare property at 108th Avenue and East Whalley Ring Road yesterday.
Metro Vancouver will vote tomorrow on a proposal to borrow $1.4 billion to pay for projects that are already under way or have been approved.
But the impact to individual homeowners will grow heavier if the regional district proceeds with a wish list of water, sewage and solid-waste projects.
Burnaby Coun. Colleen Jordan, vice-chairwoman of the Metro Vancouver finance committee, described the $1.4 billion as being "like an approved line of credit."
Canwest Publishing Inc., Canada`s largest owner of daily and community newspapers, has signed a sponsorship deal with the organizer of the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics and Paralympics.
The deal, announced Wednesday outside the Vancouver offices of Canwest`s Pacific Newspaper Group, will see the Vancouver Organizing Committee obtain advertising and marketing space in 10 regional newspapers, including The Vancouver Sun and Province.
VANCOUVER - A Concord Pacific project in the booming Downtown Eastside has become the first to be targeted by local activists who are gearing for an anti-condo war.
The 154-unit Greenwich condo project -- which is being built near Hastings and Carrall in the middle of what has been the city`s drug market, scavenging centre and residential-hotel enclave -- has found itself temporarily stalled as area advocates protest a technical glitch in the approval process.
Construction of a multimillion-dollar resort at the old high school property in Valemount is just a couple of months away from entering the construction phase, says Shirley Sander, president of Alberta-based Saas Fee Land Developments.
When the final nail is hammered into place, the Valemount Village Resort and Spa will be comprised of about 155 condominiums, 20 townhouses and 25 commercial
Political debates, community campaigns and lawsuits are continuing to swirl around the future of Vancouver Island`s wild west coast.
But the next major decision on the shape of development around Jordan River, Shirley and Otter Point rests with one person. Bob Wylie, Highways Ministry provincial approving officer, has sole responsibility for deciding whether an application by Western Forest Products for 319 subdivisions will get the go-ahead.
NANAIMO -- Downtown stores are being "strongly advised" to remain open on the 16 days between May 1 and Oct. 15 when cruise ships will be in the Harbour City.
An e-mail sent to business owners from the Downtown Nanaimo Partnership says "we strongly advise that you extend hours of operation on the dates mentioned" and said that on Sept. 21, a Sunday, two cruise ships with more than 4,000 passengers will be docking.
One of two planned office towers for downtown Vancouver is on indefinite hold because the developer says there`s no market for it, a troubling sign for the city`s commercial future.
David Negrin of Aquilini Investment Group said the company had planned to build a 23-storey tower on land it owns near GM Place. But he said commercial brokers weren`t able to find any tenants willing to pay the $40-45 a square foot the company needed to make the project -- which had been planned as a cutting-edge carbon-neutral building designed by well-known architect Peter Busby -- work financially.
B.C. recruiting tourism, construction workers and families
VANCOUVER -- The B.C. tourism and construction industries have joined forces to recruit out-of-province families to work in both sectors that face serious labour shortages.
They will work on joint marketing programs and help each other at domestic and international job fairs.
The B.C. tourism industry employs about 118,000 British Columbians and faces an estimated shortage of 84,000 new workers by 2015, while the construction sector employees 196,000 and faces a shortage of 38,000 workers by 2014.
West Fraser Timber`s financial results worsened in the first three months of 2008, with a loss of $69 million, down from a loss of $3 million in the previous period.
Like other Canadian forest companies, West Fraser, which has extensive operations in northern B.C., is being hurt by a collapse in the U.S. housing market and a strong Canadian dollar.
"The length of this downturn is unclear but it is very severe," West Fraser president and CEO Hank Ketchum said Friday in a release of the results.
