(The Vancouver Sun posted the following story by Glenn Bohn on its website on March 27.)
VANCOUVER, B.C. — A request for pesticide-free zones along Canadian National Railway tracks adjacent to river and ocean waterfronts in Greater Vancouver was dismissed by the B.C. environmental appeal board on Wednesday.
CN spokesman Graham Dallas said spraying will begin in May following the dismissal of the request from the Society Promoting Environmental Conservation, Vancouver’s longest-established environmental group.
During two days of hearings, SPEC presented studies about alternative methods for controlling the weeds and trees that grow on railway right-of-ways.
Its appeal of the pesticide permit issued by the B.C. water, land and air protection ministry last year asked for “pesticide exclusion zones” near environmentally sensitive areas, such as the salmon-rich Fraser River near New Westminster Quay, Richmond Nature Park, the North Shore waterfront and Vancouver’s Coal Harbour.
“We have concerns that some of these pesticides will find their way into the water table and potentially contaminate water courses and marine habitat,” SPEC coordinator Ivan Bulic said in an interview.
Bulic noted Alaska hasn’t allowed railways to spray pesticides since the mid-1980s, forcing companies to use alternatives such as high-temperature steam or sending in crews to manually clear rights-of-way — something railways did before pesticides and herbicides were first widely used in the 1950s.
But the environmental appeal board ruled Wednesday that SPEC did not present sufficient evidence that the pesticides to be used — Roundup, Karmex and Arsenal — would cause unreasonable adverse effects on the environment or to that of human health.
CN spokesman Dallas said no railway in North America uses steam to kill weeds along railway tracks, because that technique has proven to be a failure.
“The problem is that many of the weeds we’re dealing with have roots that go two or three metres below ground,” he said.
“If you use steam to kill the growing part above ground, it essentially doesn’t kill the plant.”