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LETTER: Surrey cemetery expansion threatens ecology, history

Proposed expansion of Sunnyside Lawn Cemetery fails to consider the future
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Walking trails in the Semiahmoo Heritage Trail area should be preserved, this writer says.

Editor,

I am writing regarding the threat to the heritage and ecological site that runs between 148 Street and the current boundary of Sunnyside Lawn Cemetery.

 have been contemplating the City of Surrey motto, which is “The Future Lives Here.” Grand and progressive thought, that.

With the proposed expansion of the cemetery, the eradication of 140-year-old Douglas firs, the historic track of the then commercial highway between Canada and the U.S. would be a loss. An ill-thought one. Like the last cry of an extinct bird.

Difficult to believe that in the current times of “green” awareness, forest preservation, Indigenous land respect and the biophonics movement for community well-being, that this is even being considered. I do not believe that anyone has been isolated in a cave for the time span required to be unaware of the societal movements of our times, let alone respect for the past.

“The Future Lives Here." Well, I guess it does for the dead. Just not the living beings that make up the community.

No, don’t run through here, live people (fitness). No, don’t walk your dog through here, live people (mental well-being). No, don’t you walk with your live children here (the true future). No, don’t join the community wildlife walks and cleanup efforts (community association and friendships). It is only for the dead, who were able to enjoy the forest trail in the past while they were alive.

Just raze it all. Without a wildfire. Without any meaningful public consultation. Be the architects of extinction to benefits that Surrey has and does offer to its people.

Beyond the sadness of this folly is the crafty way in which the inertia of policy edges inexorably ahead. I note, as a 22-year resident, that the bulletin shelter, just east of the 148 Street pedestrian overpass, has mysteriously vanished. Where City publications regarding the trail, its history, local forest birds, community trail events is gone, as if this admirable City effort had never existed. So no concerned citizen can post this news – and the city deliberately does not. Shameful bit of subterfuge, that.

So this is where the “future lives." In a place and an era where the good that the City has previously done is undone.

Cheers then to the sad future that is 2025. 

Gordon D. Fraser