Lawsuit could impact perimeter road construction: Journal of Commerce

Lawsuit could impact perimeter road construction: Journal of Commerce: "

This latest article is the most indepth that I've seen so far about this latest blow against the South Fraser Freeway. Here's an excerpt:

According to the notice of civil claim, the plaintiffs allege that ancient burial sites are being disturbed, altered and permanently harmed by the construction of the South Fraser Perimeter Road.

In addition, the plaintiffs claim the road construction project could have been modified to take these significant archaeological sites into account. However, these spiritual and sacred sites were not protected and no consideration was given to these factors in the final design of the project.

“In terms of the road, there is a section that shows definitively there are human remains and they decided to push it through anyway,” said Burnstick.

“The archaeology report, which was never made public, shows the whole area is riddled with archaeological finds and we don’t want the road to go through there.”

The provincial government didn’t release the Archaeology Impact Assessment to the public in 2006, but continued to move forward with the SFPR project.

However, an Archaeological Impact Assessment produced for the Ministry of Transportation in 2001 by Golder Associates Ltd. reports there are four previously recorded sites existing within the proposed development area.

Three of these sites, including St. Mungo and Glenrose Cannery, contain unique and highly significant archaeological deposits.

The report said a number of activities related to road construction, such as excavation, demolition, clearing, grading, paving and the installation of subsurface utilities, have the potential to impact archaeological deposits.

These activities were expected to disturb cultural deposits and features, damage artifacts, hinder access to archaeological deposits and destroy contextual information essential for interpreting site function and age.

“This is not just a Native issue, this is a human rights issue,” said Burnstick. “What would people think if a bunch of Aboriginal people started digging up burial sites around white communities?”

See full text at http://www.journalofcommerce.com/article/id44637

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