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The Latest Environmental Destruction in and Around the University of Victoria (UVic)

A CRD Watch Report
by Sasha Izard

In February of 2024, a significant amount of treescape in and around the University of Victoria was reduced to mere stumps. A stretch of trees were wiped out on both sides of Sinclair Road for so-called ‘road upgrades’, being rammed through by the municipality of Saanich. One stretch at the edge of Sinclair Hill left the treescape separating the road from a section of the campus parking lot completely open.

Private properties, on the other side of the road, or sections of district land in front of them also had numerous trees cut, bringing back painful memories to residents of the cutting of a swathe of oaks and other mature trees on the intersecting Finnerty Rd. at the entrance to the UVic bus exchange a number of years earlier, that seemed completely pointless and still does to many.

The UVic bus exchange also lost numerous mature trees for expansion recently, and in 2023, I documented that numerous trees were brought down, ironically in front of the building housing the environmental law department on campus, near the beginning of the Bowker Creek head.

In February of 2024, a repeat of this took place in front of the building housing the engineering department, for the purposes of more expansion, photos of which will be posted below.

Also at this time a row of trees were cut down in front of the Velox rugby field (owned by UVic), as well as two large mature trees being reduced to stumps on the other side of the street, in front of another UVic sports field.

At the bottom of Sinclair Hill, various trees were wiped out as well, in the area around Cadboro Bay Village. A number of stumps had plastic bags placed on top and pesticide applied to them, as also took place for trees cut at the top of the hill.

Numerous trees in forests around the former Queenswood nunnery now owned by UVic, as well as in Haro Woods and in Mystic Vale, are all threatened by the University of Victoria’s expansionism at the cost of natural habitat. That UVic Properties is a paying member of the Urban Development Institute development lobby, is also a cause for concern.

In 2022, I criticized UVic’s development-minded expansionism at the cost of the natural environment in the paper, as it became apparent during the Cadboro Bay Local Area Plan Update process that UVic was one of the main “stakeholders” pushing a development agenda in the municipal area around it. Various residents in the area also wrote in to local newspapers offering similar criticisms of UVic’s aggressive approach to the area around it at this time.

Recently, I also investigated and criticized the UVic Real Estate Club for seemingly acting as a lobby on behalf of developers.

The following is a photographic record of the logging in and around UVic taken in February of 2024:

A tree is cut for so-called ‘road improvements’ that some have criticized as ‘make-works projects’ at the bottom of Sinclair Hill below UVic.

Tree stump below the sign for Cadboro Bay Village.

The stump of the “Tree of Heaven” in Cadboro Bay village. Ostensibly the reason provided for the cut was that the tree is an invasive foreign introduced species. However, the municipality of Saanich didn’t bother to remove its offspring which are also clearly visible nearby, thus offering doubts about the real motives, which seemed almost certainly to be the desire to put a roundabout at the edge of the village.

Stumps were plastic-bagged and pesticided by the municipality at another corner of the area on the edge of the village to be turned into a roundabout. As can be seen on the sign, the active ingredient is Triclopyr. According to the Wikipedia article on it:

“Garlon’s fact sheet for their triclopyr ester product indicates that triclopyr is highly toxic to fish, aquatic plants, and aquatic invertebrates, and should never be used in waterways, wetlands, or other sensitive habitats.^[6]“

The location of this pesticide application was almost a stone’s throw from a wetland frequented by wildlife in Cadboro Bay park and only a bit further away is the Salish Sea.

A new stump at the edge of the village.

Section of trees next to a UVic parking lot removed from the edge of Sinclair Hill, with pesticide application sign.

Another pesticide application sign can be seen having fallen on the ground.

Trees removed on the opposite side of the road near the edge of Sinclair Hill.

A sign found on the ground on the UVic side of Sinclair Rd. The 3 to 1 ratio, while sounding good on paper has received much criticism. I personally came to refer to the cutting of mature trees and replacing them with overly tight plantings of small seemingly token replacement trees in Saanich parks as ‘Potemkin forests’ after the historical ‘Potemkin villages‘. Other criticisms include that the Saanich parks themselves are likely to run out of space for replacement trees for all the mature trees cut down, in the not so distant future as the urban forest continues to be cleared for ever increasing development.

A row of freshly cut stumps on the opposite side of Sinclair Rd. from UVic.

The same row from another angle to offer perspective.

Another stump on the opposite side of the road.

Further up the road: fresh cut stumps in front of the UVic owned Velox rugby field.

The row of trees cut down in front of the parking lot by the Velox field.

Two large mature trees cut down on the opposite side of the road near another UVic sports field.

On the other side of the campus by the engineering buildings, a section of wooded grove had been bulldozed.

A series of stumps in front of the UVic engineering building.

A pile of discarded wood, not far from the Engineering building.

More stumps in front of the UVic engineering building, looking like a Molchat Doma album cover.




When it comes to the university industrial complex, I’m reminded of that irritating saying from the BC Lotto Commission: “Know your limit, play within it.”

The university should apply this creed to ending its ever expanding negative impact on the environment around it. UVic demonstrates with its own land, a microcosm of what is wrong with the macrocosm in our society as a whole.

UVic like any other capitalist institution, is addicted to an unsustainable ever expanding development footprint at the cost of natural habitat.

Sadly, this is unlikely to be the end of this process…

Gandhi once said: “The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.”

I would add that the same goes for both its flora and its fauna.

In the Greater Victoria area, these are both receding at an ever more rapid pace.

To the politicians and bureaucrats running its institutions, the profit motive, seems time and again to trump all other values, including the eco-systems we and other species depend on for our own survival.

Both the near-term and long-term consequences of this nearsighted approach by our institutions, can only result in disaster.

S.I.
02-21-2024
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