B.C. village wants access to wetland restored

For years, residents of Ashcroft, B.C. have been going to a backwater on the Thompson River for all sorts of recreational activities, even though it currentlyinvolves trespassing on land owned by the operator of an inland dry port known as the Ashcroft Terminal.

Now, anumber of them are fighting to regain legal access.

The Ashcroft Slough located about four kilometresnortheast of the village was a First Nations' fishing area well before the establishment of the village, according to community advocacy group theAshcroft Slough Society.

Today, it's a favourite place for local swimmers and wildlife enthusiasts.But Ashcroft Terminal says the slough is on 300-plushectares of its land.

The company isa major inland transloading and container storage distribution centre that serves the main lines of the Canadian National and Canadian Pacific railways.

Ashcroft Terminalpurchasedthe riverfront land two decades agoand has been expanding its footprint ever since.

The Ashcroft Slough Society sees Evans Road as a public right-of-way going through private land.

"There used to be three access points along that road [to the slough]," societyspokesperson Daniel Collett toldShelley Joyce, the host of CBC's Daybreak Kamloops.

One of the access points is the Ashcroft Terminalentrance, where a gate was installed this springto restrict public access to the section of the road leading to the slough.

The terminal says it has plans for the area.

"That area down in that zone is all being reconstructed and it's going to be a large railyard," said company spokesperson Kleo Landucci.

The company has invited the societyto join itsworking group. It says it wants to support recreational facilities outside of its propertyincludingenhanced walking trails and enhanced access to the river at a location other than the sloughas alternatives to continued access to the wetland.

But Collett says that's not what the residents want andthe society is consideringgoing to court.