No sledding on these streets

North Bay council’s Community Services committee has turned down a request by two city residents to amend its snowmobile bylaw, citing safety and liability concerns.

John Seguin and Dennis Shannon had approached council on separate occasions respectively in 2001 and 2003.

They asked that the bylaw be amended to allow snow machine travel on city roadway shoulders in the Wallace Heights/Airport Hill area and all roadways on the west side of Lakeshore Drive.

The matter was referred to council’s Snowmobile Advisory
Committee, which considered the request but ultimately recommended against it.

At Tuesday’s committee meeting of council, the Community Services committee agreed with the advisory committee’s recommendation and voted against amending the bylaw.

Real difficulty for city council
A report from Jamie Houston, the city’s director of parks, recreation and leisure services, stated “the SAC is of the opinion that permitting snowmobiles to use any portion of public roadways within the city that are not designated as official snowmobile trails is too hazardous, raises many liability issues and would very likely create considerable public complaint.”

As well, Houston wrote, the advisory committee “recognizes the very real difficulty for city council in setting a precedent for one or two residential areas and then trying to deal with subsequent requests from other areas.”

Community Services chairwoman Susan Church praised the work of the advisory committee.

But Shannon was not too pleased.

I’m disappointed,” he said as he left the council chambers.
“I think it’s time for change. Council will have to get out of there.”

Trail request turned down
In a related matter the Community Services committee turned down a request from hotel owner Marc Charron, who request the inactive portion of the CN train line running thorugh the centre of North Bay be developed into a four-season trail.

Portions of the line have already been sold to a third party by CN, Church said, and the Kate Pace Way already serves the same function.