CREDIT: Pat McGrath, The Ottawa Citizen

Fitzroy Harbour residents are furious about a Mississippi Valley Conservation decision they believe will allow thousands of pleasure boats to be towed through their community each season.

The federal government, Ontario and Quebec together will provide $1.4 million to establish a truck and trailer bypass to move boats around Chats Falls dam near Fitzroy Harbour, west of Ottawa.

The residents are concerned the conservation authority approval of the bypass through the Morris Island Conservation Area is the first in a series of decisions that could result in dozens of boats on trailers each day on quiet residential streets.

Project manager Gary Wiseman said yesterday he expects a bypass that will carry about 500 boats a season will be completed by the fall of 2004. The project still requires the approval of the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources and the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans because it uses boat ramps on the Ottawa River.

Paul Lehman, general manager of the Mississippi Valley Conservation, said the authority would have to approve the boat launches before the bypass goes ahead. He said the authority has authorized the use of the rail bed and could approve the boat launches this summer.

The bypass service, which is already used at five other spots along the river, will use ramps to put boats onto trailers and set them back into the water on the other side of the falls.

The Chats Falls Boat Bypass will mean that for the first time, boats from as far up river as Lake Timiskaming, 550 kilometres away, will be able to follow the river to the Nepean and Aylmer sailing clubs.

The bypass would run from Willola Beach Road around Fitzroy Harbour Provincial Park, through Fitzroy Harbour and beside an abandoned rail line in the Morris Island Conservation Area to Lavergne Bay on the Ottawa River.

Village residents say Ottawa River Project Inc., the non-profit corporation that wants to build the bypass, should never be allowed to tow boats along residential streets and past the Morris Island Conservation Area. Opponents regard the planned bypass it as a safety hazard and a threat to the scenic conservation area west of Fitzroy Harbour.

Michael Campbell, president of the Willola Beach Property Owners Association said no one knows how many boats a season will use the bypass. Mr. Campbell said the bypass should be on the Quyon Ferry Road where there are fewer people.

"They shouldn't be putting this on residential streets where there are people," Mr. Campbell said. "There are children who skateboard, ride their bikes and play hockey and elderly people walking on the road. Boaters who aren't careful could run over children who are swimming."

Bruce Collier, a member of the Willola Beach Property Owners Association, said residents are disappointed in their councillor, Eli El-Chantiry, and other Ottawa council members who support the bypass, they say. Residents are planning a rally against the project at Fitzroy Harbour Community Centre today at 5:30 p.m.

"There is no problem with a boat bypass, but the location is a problem," Mr. Collier said. "In 1998, Mr. Wiseman was quoted as saying there would be 12,000 boats in a 100-day period. That means 100 boats a day up to 10 metres long.

"That would disrupt the Morris Island Conservation Area and quiet residential streets. There would be loud trucks going past two schools and a park used by 75 small children."

Mr. Collier said tailings from a lead mine would be used to build a 45-metre earth ramp in the river at the end of Willola Beach Road and the channel will have to be dredged, possibly contaminating fish and wells in the area.

"We are trying to figure why they need to put this through our area," Mr. Collier said. "There already is a canal which is 75 per cent completed on the Quebec side of the Chats Falls Dam."

Mr. Wiseman said work stopped on the canal in 1856 when the builders realized most passengers and freight would travel by rail. He said it would cost about $20 million to complete the canal compared with $2.2 million for the bypass.

"The conservation authority has approved our going through the old rail bed," Mr. Wiseman said. "We will have to improve the trails and build foot bridges so people have the option of staying off the rail bed.

"The system has been running since 1991 (in other communities) and there has never been an accident or an incident on the water or on the roads. There are bypasses at Portage du Fort, Bryson, Chapeau, Mattawa and Timiskaming."

Mr. Wiseman said the bypass will attract tourists to the river. He said only a "core group of five or six people" oppose the project.

Mr. El-Chantiry said city council approved the bypass and allocated $350,000 for the work in April 2003 before he was elected. He said he opposes the proposed route through village traffic and the conservation area, but added it is too late to scrap the bypass.