COLD LAKE – MD of Bonnyville council has a better picture of what the Cold Lake campground expansion project will look like.
Caroline Palmer, general manager of planning and community services for the municipality, presented the expansion plan submitted by Edmonton-based Wood Environment and Infrastructure Services at council’s May 20 committee meeting.
“There’s an additional 83 lots in total with your tenting, buddy, and pull-through sites, a number of handicap pull-through sites, a number of back-in sites and a number of capped back-in,” Palmer detailed, noting there could be further changes to the plans that were presented to council.
“Through discussions with the manager of the park, we’ve discovered that we don’t have a lot of people walking in wanting to use the (tent sites). We thought we would reduce from 20 lots to possibly just 10 and use the additional 10 for when people are… RV camping,” she explained.
Once the project breaks ground, they will also be updating the layout of the road within the Cold Lake campground.
“The road structure now would be too tight, it would have to be elongated for the RV sizes and that kind of thing in the event of an emergency,” Palmer explained, adding their hope is the adjustment won’t limit the size of RVs for customers.
“We’re hoping to have reasonably sized RV sites because they come in all shapes and sizes.”
Campers familiar with the Cold Lake MD campground will also see a bit of a change on the north side in the camper area.
“We’ve had a lot of drainage issues there in the past where people would rent lot 57 and have to walk through water to plug in their campers, which is probably not the safest thing to do,” Palmer said. “We’re probably going to eliminate possibly two stalls there to eliminate the drainage properly.”
Another portion of the campsite on council’s mind was the lookout.
“It’s currently fenced off right now,” noted Reeve Greg Sawchuk. “It looks like some frost (damage) or something, what’s being done about that?”
According to Palmer, an engineer examined the structure.
“It’s extremely unsafe. I’m looking for a report, hopefully, at the end of this week to give us a recommendation on how to remove it. My recommendation is to remove it, the ice every year demolishes this lookout. We’re hoping to create possibly a lookout on the east side and refurbish the shoreline there.”
If everything goes as planed, Palmer believes construction on the expansion project will begin in August.
The overall plan also includes a future phase two, which would see additional sites added on the south side of the campground.
“With our current budget, we can’t do the whole plan, unfortunately, this year. Our hope is to move forward into that phase of the process possibly in upcoming years,” Palmer said.
