New: Facebook has blocked all Canadian news. Join our mailing list to stay in the loop.

New: Facebook has blocked all Canadian news. Join our mailing list to stay in the loop.

As February gets underway, the roar of snowmobiles can be heard all over the north country.

It’s not quite like it once was, but the Snow Road Snowmobile Club fed more than 200 people Saturday morning (the next breakfasts are Feb. 15 and Feb. 29) and the parking lot was full of cars and sleds.

President Ruth Wark said they have 560 permit members and they groom/maintain 475 kilometres of trails, including those on more than 300 private landowner properties.

Although conditions aren’t quite perfect, the District 6 trails are in much better shape than some of their neighbours.

They maintain private and public trails from Lanark to Plevna, to McDonalds Corners to Clayton, Flower Station, Ompah and Quackenbush Lake.

“A lot of clubs east and south of us don’t have the snow yet,” she said.

The way trail permits work, when you purchase one, you designate what club you support and part of your permit fee goes to that club for trail maintenance.

“A new groomer costs about $300,000,” Wark said. “We have a 2009, a 2004, a 1998 and a 1993.”

Wark acknowledged that numbers are down however.

“We used to have more members or trails we used to have,” she said. “My opinion is that it’s on the decline as the population ages.

“But we also don’t have the winters we used to have.

“There are ups and downs however and as people leave, there are a lot of new members coming in.”

Down south, the L & A Ridge Runners have been holding steady at about 575 members, said President Keith Dawson.

“It’s (membership) within 10 per cent of the last three or so years,” he said. “Right now, we need more snow.

“We’re just getting started.”

He said things are in pretty good shape from the Bellrock Road parking lot in Verona heading north.

(The Ridge Runners groom the K & P from Orser Road to Tichborne. Snow Road handles Tichborne to Sharbot Lake.)

“The K & P is only part of the trails we maintain,” he said.

Like Snow Road, they also have many kilometres of private trails they look after.

“We maintain a large area,” he said. “From our clubhouse in Yarker, up to Arden, to Napanee, Amherstview to Perth Road Village.”

But there a little more to snowmobile clubs than just cruising around in the snow, said North Frontenac Coun. Fred Fowler, who was also having breakfast in Snow Road Saturday morning.

“I live here,” he said. “And part of my portfolio is trails.

“It’s important to keep this building going, not only for the recreation but as a potential shelter like it was during the ice storm.”

The Snow Road building also serves as a waystation of sorts, providing shelter to people who break down, a place to get warm and soup or chili in crockpots, on weekends and sandwiches, hot dogs and snacks during the week. It’s on the honor system with a price list posted.

Published in NORTH FRONTENAC
Wednesday, 12 June 2019 13:22

Trail Building Day in Flinton

Lennox and Addington owns approximately 1,150 acres of managed forest lands in five locations in the Township of Addington Highlands. Certified according to the Forest Stewardship Council’s standards for sustainable forestry, the land has generated little impact from a tourism perspective. The Community & Development Services Department hopes to change that by constructing approximately 10 kilometres of single track mountain bike trails within “Forest 2”, a 127-acre parcel in Flinton.

In May 2019, construction began on the L&A County Forest trail system that will allow the public to make better use of this natural asset. The County has leaned on the knowledge and experience of Lennox & Addington resident Mike Sewell, an avid off-road cyclist that has experience building similar trail systems in Vermont. The new trails are being created with the desires of off-road mountain bikers in mind, taking advantage of the terrain of the forest. The routes weave around large pines, and up and down hills and boulders to create what is expected to be a very enjoyable experience for riders.

Given that there are limited opportunities in the region specific to off-road cycling, the County sees the Forest Trails as a significant tourism opportunity. The new system complements the popular County Trails road cycling loops, which incorporates nearly 600 kilometres of paved County roadways. Together, the two initiatives will cater to the needs of both road and off-road cyclists.

To date, approximately 6 kilometres of trail has been constructed. The public is invited to assist with the project during a special Trail Building Day on Saturday, June 22nd from 8:30am - 1pm. Those interested in participating are asked to bring along their own rakes, shovels, and branch clippers to help put the finishing touches on some of the newly-constructed trails. Participants will assemble in the parking lot at the Addington Highlands Municipal Office (72 Edward Street, Flinton) at 8:30am to learn about the new County Forest Trail initiative. Coffee and treats from Addison's Restaurant will be available. At the end of the event a free slice of pizza can be enjoyed from Pine Grove Pizza.

After the trail building event is over, those in attendance are encouraged to lace up their hiking boots or hop on their bikes and enjoy the trails. For more information visit www.lennox-addington.on.ca/explore/county-forest-trail or call 613-354-4883 ext. 3271.

Published in ADDINGTON HIGHLANDS

Flooding, washouts, impassable trails and terrible conditions forced the postponement of the Spring ATV Ride for Dad in Ompah for a week, but even though it corresponded with the Mother’s Day weekend, organizers were still pleased that about 400 drivers and passengers that came out last Saturday.

Byron Smith of Ride for Dad said they’ve been coming up here for about eight years and even though numbers were down slightly this year, it’s still important to them.

“It’s important for us to get word to smaller communities,” Smith said. “The big attraction to this event is that so many participate.

“We get guys coming to us saying that because of this event, they got their prostate checked and it was caught in time.”

He said they still got plenty of pledges and sold some memorabilia.

“All the money we raise goes right into cutting edge research,” he said. “We don’t put any money into bricks and mortar.”

And even though the event had to be put off for a week, it didn’t seem to dampen the spirits of the participants.

“It was fun, and for a good cause,” said Beverly Bulman, who lives in Bailieboro but has a cottage in the area.

“I’ll go anywhere to ride a trail like this one,” said Roger Rocha of Ottawa.

Published in NORTH FRONTENAC

As President of the Friends of Frontenac Park, Simon Smith has had occasion to attend gatherings with other park officials from the larger region and the province as a whole. He learns about other parks at those meetings.

“I think Bon Echo Park draws 5 or 6 times as many people as Frontenac Park”, he said when interviewed this week, “and I remember someone telling me that Sandbanks draws as many people on a summer weekend as we draw all year.”

Unlike the other parks, all of the campsites in Frontenac Park are hike or boat in sites, and the park draws more of a nature loving and hiking crowd than some other provincial parks.

Unlike the other parks, however, Frontenac Park is open year round, and thanks to the Friends of Frontenac, the office is staffed on weekends throughout the winter.

The Friends of Frontenac held their AGM last weekend in Kingston, and are entering their 27th year. Not only do the Friends help in the park office, members help with trail maintenance as well, and that is a pretty big job since there are well over 100 km. of trails in the park to go over periodically. The Friends also help with boardwalk improvement, and other extras in the park. The Friends also raise money for information signs and kiosks.

“We had a Vision session a few years ago and came up with a number of initiatives to raise the profile of the park and we have been working through them since then. One of the ideas was to support a Christmas Bird Count in the Park, which has happened and has been growing each of the three years it has been held. We have been working on signs, and a multi-language brochure, and each year we move forward a bit,” he said.

The Friends also organise educational events in the park throughout the spring, summer and fall, such as “Introduction to Back Country Camping”, “Wilderness Navigation”, and “National Canoe Day”.

Frontenac Park is known for its rock outcroppings, lakes and spectacular vistas because of its location within the Frontenac Axis of the Canadian Shield. One of its more key features is that most of it was at one time settled land. There are 15 historic homesteads, the Tett mine and others mines which were all located within the park’s boundaries. Chris Barber spent ten years researching that past and produced a comprehensive book, The Enduring Spirit, which is for sale at the park office. The historical past of the park is kept alive through signage along the trails, and through other means.

More recently the park is beginning to play a bigger role as a centre for citizen science. The Christmas Bird Count is a good example of this, as are other programs. Because of the park’s location on the edge of the Canadian Shield, the mix of species is very rich, and since the land enjoys a number of protections against both development and major disturbance, it is a good place to conduct science.

The Friends of Frontenac Park have also developed working relationships with other groups in the region and beyond, promoting conservation, the enjoyment of the outdoors and developing an understanding of the value of nature. Later this spring they will be hosting a meeting of the Ontario Nature Federation at the Park Centre.

And they are integrally involved in two challenges that have made Frontenac Park a destination even in the so-called shoulder seasons, when tourism drops way off. The Frontenac Challenge is to hike all of the trails in the park between Labour Day and the end of October, and the winter camping challenge is just that.

“The amazing thing is that people come from far away to participate in these challenges. They somehow hear about them, and they come,” said Simon Smith.

For more information about the Friends of Frontenac Park, go to the website Frontenacpark.ca

Published in CENTRAL FRONTENAC
Wednesday, 14 February 2018 11:08

2017 construction surpasses $10 million mark

Following up on a very good construction year in 2016 ($8.7 million in construction value and $125,000 in permit fees collected), values jumped 18% to $10.34 million in 2017. Permit fees also jumped to $147,000. Looking further back to 2015, construction values are up by almost 50% over a two year period.

Permits were taken out for 30 new homes in 2017, a high water mark for the township, and although there were only 7 permits taken out for Commercial/Industrial construction in 2017, that still represents a large increase as only 1 commercial/industrial permit was purchased in each of 2015 and 2016.

The totals for 2017 were somewhat augmented by the permit for a single project, an Ultramar Station on Highway 7, the numbers as a whole represent a “positive trend” said Chief Building Official Shawn Merriman.

In addition to his December report, which rounded out the year, Merriman reported on January of 2018, and the new year has not exactly gotten off to a hot start in terms of permits.

“Only one permit was purchased in January and it was for a wood stove,” Merriman said.

The total construction value for 2018 is therefore pretty low, only $5,000, but the year is still young.

Canada 150 revisited
Central Frontenac is on the receiving end of some Federal Canada 150 infrastructure grant money that the original recipient municipality was not able to spend. The township applied for $150,000 from the program, intending to spend it on the long awaited Olden Ball Park in Mountain Grove, but were passed over in the initial grant intake. The township is now eligible for $50,000 provided the spending is matched by $100,000 in local spending and it is all complete by the end of March. Treasurer Michael McGovern said that there should be no problem, because spending on the project that the township already undertook last year is eligible for matching funding and the township can also purchase lighting for the park, the next major expense in the project, before the end of March.

Don’t look a gift park in the mouth
Gord Brown, from Arden, made a presentation to Council on behalf of the Kennebec Lake Association, the Friends of Arden and the Kennebec Recreation Committee, about the 6 km. of trails the three groups have been developing with Mark Snider, the owner of the Kennebec Shores development. As part of the Kennebec Shores plan of subdivision process, a 150 acre park was created and transferred to the township. The property, which used to be owned by Ross Baker, was at one time as ski hill with cross country ski trails.

Brown described them as “a nice mix of forest and vegetation, hills, ridges, cliffs and valley. The hilly terrain offers an experience that is significantly different than local flat rail-bed trails.”

He said that Mark Snider “knows the property extremely well and has expressed an interest in further trails development,” and added “the parkland also hosts an open hill for tobogganing and a pond for skating.”

He then described some of the work of the three groups are doing on the property, including developing signage for the trails that are already well marked, developing public parking lots, bridges and walkways over creeks, and more.

He asked the township to invest $8625 into materials that volunteers plan to use to build some fences, put up signs, install gates to prevent ATV’s from using the trails, etc.

Mayor Frances Smith said that the park could be an “asset to the township for recreation and economic development. She proposed a motion to receive Brown’s report and enlist township staff to look at the trails and the park in terms of safety and accessibility.”

Members of council spoke out as well, all expressing support for the project but expressing concerns over liability since the township owns the property.

The matter will likely come back to Council in the late spring.

Purdon named to Council
In response to the resignation of Olden Councillor Jamie Riddell, who has taken on the role of Deputy Fire Chief, Council appointed John Purdon, a former Olden Councillor who finished fourth in the 2014 election contest in Olden District. Riddell, and Victor Heese, were both first time candidates who were elected that year in Olden.

“John has been approached and has agreed to join council,” said Mayor Smith. “He is experienced and is not intending to run for council this year.”

Council voted unanimously in favour of inviting Purdon to join them at the council table. He will be sworn in at the next meeting, on February 27th.

Public Works briefs
Council accepted a bid from Morris Chemicals for the dust suppressant, Calcium Chloride after a joint tender process with Frontenac Islands. Central Frontenac will also join with the other Frontenac Townships to commission of a study of signage in the township with a view to assess the retro-reflexivity of township signage.

Budget approved
Without comment, Council approved the 2018 budget and spending estimates. The budget will increase the levy to Central Frontenac residents by 5.9% over 2017, with much of that increase going to replenish.

Published in CENTRAL FRONTENAC

On Saturday morning, the first of many people began to explore the new trails through the parkland just north of Kennebec Lake.
“There are about five to seven kilometres so far with two to three more to come,” said Gord Brown, one of those who’s spent time, marking out and grooming the new trails. “But it’s hard to tell because those are Nova Scotia kilometres.”
In other words, there’s a lot of up and down walking.

“I would say it’s a moderate difficulty trail,” Brown said. “It’s about two-thirds bush and one-third meadow and winds through the 156 acres of Parkland.”
Highlights along the route include the old ski hill, Mallard Pond (which should be good for skating in the winter), beaver meadows, rock cliffs and several glacial erratics (huge boulders deposited when the glaciers retreated 10,000 years ago).
The trails are on Central Frontenac Township parkland, which was acquired when the Kennebec Shores Waterfront Community was developed several years ago.
In fact, Brown credits current Kennebec Shores owner Mark Snider with most of the work done on the trails.

“Mark has done most of the work over the past two years,” Brown said. “We only started helping two weeks ago.
“He’s a real outdoor fanatic with a big weed wacker, bush saw and heavy duty mower.”
“He even cleared trail in the winter.”

The trails are an ongoing project of the Friends of Arden, Kennebec Lake Association and District 1 Rec Committee.

Published in CENTRAL FRONTENAC
Wednesday, 22 March 2017 11:18

Cataraqui Trail to close for snowmobiles

The snowmobile clubs that groom and maintain a snowmobile trail on the Cataraqui Trail have announced the official end of the snowmobile season.

The Lennox and Addington Ridgerunners and the Leeds and Grenville Snowmobile Association will be closing and locking the gates on Saturday April 1, 2017.

The gates are open during snowmobile season to allow snowmobilers with a valid OFSC permit to use the Trail. They are closed during the balance of the year to keep other motorized vehicles off the Cataraqui Trail. Other than snowmobiles, only authorized maintenance vehicles are allowed to have access to the Trail.

The Cataraqui Trail is a 104 km long multi-use trail along a former railway line that goes from Smiths Falls to Strathcona (near Napanee). Permitted uses on the trail include hiking, cycling, skiing and horseback riding.

Published in General Interest
Wednesday, 28 September 2016 23:39

Funds transfer raises eyebrows at County

Frontenac County Council has approved a staff plan to take $300,000 from a reserve fund geared at helping low-income residents remain in their homes, and use it to purchase land that is required to complete the K&P Trail.

Some of the money will be used to buy land for the stretch of trail that runs from Tichborne to Sharbot Lake, and some for a lot in Verona that has been earmarked as a parking lot/trailhead.

The remaining $100,000 is to remain in the reserve fund “pending finalisation of the K&P Trail land acquisition project and the Verona Trail Head Project” according to a report from Treasurer Marian Vanbruinessen and CAO Kelly Pender.

Pender explained to Council, at their meeting in Glenburnie on September 21 that the reserve fund was created in 2014 to buffer against the possibility that the Province of Ontario was going to pull its funding for the Kingston/Frontenac Renovates program. That program provides grants of up to $3,500 and forgivable loans of up to $10,000 to low-income homeowners in Kingston and Frontenac County to pay for major repairs. It has been more widely accessed in Frontenac County than in Kingston over the years. Since that reserve was created, using county tax dollars from 2014, the province has renewed its commitment to fund Kingston Frontenac Renovates until 2019.

In his report, Pender said that three things may happen at that time: the province may continue to fund the program; the province may pull out and the program will end; or the province may pull out and the City and County may step in to fund it themselves.

Under that third option, the County would then have to seek more money from taxation.

“There is some urgency here,” Pender said of the need to find money for land purchases. “We have made offers to purchase which will come through in the near future and we have no money set aside to cover all those offers when they come through.”

The K&P trail has been a central project for the Frontenac County Economic Development Department, and has been identified as the county legacy project for Canada 150 next year. The trail links the Cataraqui Trail in South Frontenac with the Trans-Canada Trail in Shabot Lake. It was created by using the track bed from the former K&P Rail line, which Frontenac County purchased several years ago from its previous owner, Bell Canada.

The trail is complete from the southern border of Frontenac County until the CP rail crossing at Tichborne. The next eight kilometres of former track bed has been sold off to over 20 adjacent landowners and the county has been in negotiation with those landowners, seeking to secure the entire length in time for work to commence in the spring of 2017. The goal is to have the Kingston to Sharbot Lake trail completed by next summer.

Some members of Frontenac County Council were sceptical about diverting money from Kingston Frontenac Renovates to the trail.

Councilor Natalie Nossal, from Frontenac Islands, said, “I'm sorry but that is $400,000 that the county set aside to fill a void that did not transpire, not for this purpose.”

Councilor John McDougall, from South Frontenac, is the county rep on the Housing and Homelessness Committee for Kingston and Frontenac.

“Kingston Frontenac Renovates has never been discussed as something that might lose its provincial funding. As far as anyone knows the funding is solid. I think this money could be used for the trail. I think it is a good idea,” he said.

Earlier in the meeting, the council received a presentation by Sheldon Laidman, Manager for Housing from the City of Kingston, whose department handles money transfers from the Province of Ontario for Loughborough Not-for-Profit Housing in Sydenham; McMullen Manor in Verona; and North Frontenac Not-For-Profit Housing in Sharbot Lake, representing a total of over 100 units of social housing.

Laidman said that the province is pulling out of its financial support for those and all other social housing units in Ontario over the next 10 years, and the county should start thinking about how it will continue to support those properties, as it will still be obligated to offer discounted rent-geared-to income for low-income families and seniors.

With that earlier, sobering presentation in mind, Mayor of Frontenac Islands Denis Doyle said, “Putting that money into a fund for our future rent-geared-to-income commitments is closer to the intention for the money than this is.”

“That money was not collected for trails,” said North Frontenac Mayor Ron Higgins.

County Warden and Central Frontenac Mayor, Frances Smith said, “We have made commitments for purchases and we have money available that we do not need now, and may not need in the future. Whatever we do, we have to pay for the trail now and for our social housing commitments as well,” she said.

Smith then asked Anne Marie Young, the Manager for Economic Development for Frontenac County, “How did your spending on these properties go beyond what you had available?”

Young replied that $80,000 had been set aside for the land purchases, “which is about half of what was needed, at a minimum.

In the end the transfer from reserves was approved, with both representatives from Frontenac Islands and Mayor Higgins from North Frontenac voting against it.

(Yup, there is an editorial about this one – see page 2)

Published in FRONTENAC COUNTY
Wednesday, 23 March 2016 18:15

Frontenac County Council – March 16

K&P Trail update

Trail proponents and the county's economic development department have a goal of completing the K&P Trail as far as Sharbot Lake by Canada Day, 2017, Canada's 150th anniversary.

The trail is now complete from the bottom of the county at Orser Road, just east of Road 38, all the way to Tichborne. However, to complete the last eight kilometres of trail will be more complicated than the first 50 or so were.

While the section of trail that is now complete was (almost) entirely owned by the county after they purchased it from Bell Canada, who acquired it from Canadian Pacific, the section now being looked at was sold off to private owners. There are 22 land owners who own sections of the former K&P rail line, some who own a few metres and some three or more kilometres.

Marcel Giroux and Wayne Robinson, who both have decades of history in the Tibchborne to Sharbot Lake corridor, have volunteered to meet with landowners and negotiate agreements.

In her report to County Council, Anne Marie Young notes that Robinson and Giroux “feel every person will want some kind of consideration/ compensation for the value of the trail they own.”

She said that a draft appraisal report has been completed to determine fair market value to establish a figure that can be used as a basis for negotiation. “Expropriation is also an option if need be,” she noted, and added that a meeting has been held with the county’s solicitor to determine a plan if that becomes necessary.”

For his part, Marcel Giroux is optimistic that amicable arrangements can be made with most of the landowners, but accommodations, not only of the financial kind, will need to be made.

“There are some places where houses have been built over the trail, or septic beds are on or near the trail, so we will need to find alternate routes,” said Giroux, in a telephone interview after the Council meeting

Giroux added that the most of the landowners who have been approached have been either supportive or at least neutral towards the idea of allowing a trail to go through their land.

He said that as negotiations continue, those pieces that have been secured will be completed to the high standard of the rest of the trail.

“We want to create some more momentum if we can,” he said.

There is an initiative aimed at consolidating the K&P trail north from Sharbot Lake through Central and North Frontenac into Lanark and Renfrew. A meeting was held in January with officials from the other counties, and further meetings are planned.

Upgrades to county offices

A report on necessary and desired upgrades to the county offices, which are located in what is called the “Old House”, was presented to Council. The “Old House” was originally constructed in 1919 by Colonel William H Fair, and is attached to the Fairmount Home and the offices of Frontenac Paramedic Services.

The report says there is ample floor space in the building for the current and future space needs of county staff. However, since it is a house and not an office building, much of the space is wasted and there is a lack of privacy in many of the offices, which are located in converted bedrooms, family rooms, etc.

Of the 13 issues of concern raised in the report, the most immediate has to do with washroom facilities and accessibility issues, which need to be addressed in order to comply with the Health and Safety and Accessibility acts. Other than that, the issues are more those of efficiency and costs of operating an older building.

Staff put forward eight wide-ranging options for Council to consider, from doing nothing, to decommissioning the building and constructing new offices, possibly within Frontenac County.

Council favoured the middle of the range, asking staff to come back with costing for option 4, “renovate for washroom accessibility and improved reception and improved productivity” and option 6, “Old House conversion to new use and addition to accommodate accessibility and productivity needs.”

Published in FRONTENAC COUNTY

Stay off of thin ice for any purpose, OPP warns

Pass holders for the trail system run by the Ontario Federation of Snowmobile Clubs (OFSC) sat on their hands throughout the green Christmas season, but were buoyed by a heavy snowfall on December 28 and subsequent cold weather.

The trails are still not open, however, and the word from local snowmobile clubs, who each have responsibility for a different section of trail, is that it will not be until next week, at the earliest, before any of the trails in Frontenac and Lennox and Addington are officially open.

Dieter Eberhardt, the trails co-ordinator for the L&A Ridgerunners Snowmobile Club, which handles grooming on the Cataraqui and K&P Trails as well as a smaller trail that runs through Puzzle Lake Provincial Park to Arden on the north end and Yarker to the south, said that when the snow first came to the Ridgerunners trails it fell on ground that had no frost in it at all, and going over the trail with any machine only revealed mud beneath.

“Now that any water in the snow or ground has turned to ice, that is no longer a problem, but what we are still dealing with is a lack of snow,” he said.

He added that the groomers are out on the trails this week and with a bit more snow cover the K&P and Cat trail portions will be open in a week or so. What he calls the backwoods trail runs over lakes and will not be open until the lakes have a solid base of at least 15 cm of ice on them, which will take longer.

“Since the Cataraqui and K&P Trails are open for other uses, snowmobilers are using them now, but we are not going to sanction their use until we have groomed them and are sure they are in good condition for snow machines,” he said.

Meanwhile further north, the Mazinaw Powerline Club has not had as much of a problem with lack of snow on their trails because the storm on December 28 delivered up to 30 cm of dense, packed snow to the north-south trail they manage between Kaladar and the top of the county.

“We need to go over the trail twice. The first time is what we call packing, and it includes removing limbs and other debris on the trail along with packing the snow. The second pass is the grooming pass. We are working on it now,” said club president Pat Reid, who was working on the trail when contacted via cellphone on a chilly Tuesday morning.

Beaver flooding on the K&P Trail north of Snow Road has been the pre-occupation of groomers working with the Snow Road Snowmobile Club. They manage the K&P Trail from St. Georges Lake in the south all the way to the border of North Frontenac and Lanark in the north, as well as some east-west trails.

“There is quite a swath that is covered in water because of beavers,” said club president Alice Gilchrist.

The club is also, like the Mazinaw Powerline, going over parts of the trail that are located on private land that they could not get to until the snow was on the ground.

“We have to wait until hunting season is over, and this year some farmers kept their cattle out late because they still had grass, so we are working hard to get everything ready,” she said.

Because of the beaver issue the Snow Road club does not know when the portion north of Road 509 will be open.

All the clubs are keeping any of their trails that cross over lakes closed until there is enough ice on the lakes to put in a safe trail.

As far as lake ice is concerned, the OPP SAVE (Snowmobile, ATV and Vessel Enforcement) unit are warning people to be stay off the ice throughout Eastern Ontario.

“It's not safe to be out on the lakes at this time,” Sgt. Byron Newell of the SAVE unit told CBC Ottawa last weekend.

"You want nice, clear, blue or black ice. If it's opaque at all, that means there's a snow freeze on the ice, which makes the ice more weak and dangerous," he added.

According to Newell, and this view was echoed by the snowmobile clubs consulted for this story, 15 cm of ice, at a minimum, is required for the ice to be deemed safe for use.

However, ice needs to be monitored for safety at all times, which snowmobile clubs do on all ice trails that are part of their networks.

"Ice is never 100 per cent safe," cautioned Newell.

Published in General Interest
Page 1 of 4
With the participation of the Government of Canada